A Lesson in Social Skills

AOL is buying BeBo the number three social networking site as they start to reposition their offer and see obvious need for a social network community.
Do all social sites need to be huge to offer potential? What drives a social network site? We know Facebook started as a college site and then morphed into a post graduate reunion site before young executives found it the hip place to be seen. We are aware that MySpace and Facebook have enjoyed a meteoritic rise and now have been bought for huge sums but what about the smaller want-to-bes?

An interesting site is www.sellstudentbooks.com . It does what it says on the can ‘sell student books’ enabling students sell their used books and importantly as they do so engage in a community site that offers shared communication not just on the books. It has all the right ingredients; a need (giving students extra cash for unwanted books), an audience (students) and value added as the students act as a validator of what books matter and which texts count. Just like the lecturers did before than they help qualify and rate the content.

We love the rouges gallery of ‘sexy sellers’ and it clearly appeals to many.
The really interesting thing is that they are continuing to push the site boundaries and stickiness and are now adding accommodation and laptops to their trading offer. This is one savvy set up and deserves to be a success.

Used Books and Stars for All

Used books have always been here but the Internet is simply make them more available. First came ABE and Alibris, then Amazon and now eBay. Gone are the days when private collections only had one channel to and Albris now suggests that `house clearances' will become a rarity. For collectors, it may be difficult to gauge a seller's ability to accurately describe a book, its condition and its faults with the descriptive terminology used being often a different language to many.

ABE have embarked on a scheme that is based on the seller’s rating. Apparently the scheme is based on 5 Stars and aims to help promote those booksellers who reject the least number of orders and receive the least number of returns. Obviously those sellers with a higher rating will benefit from increased buyer trust as well as greater resulting revenues. Buyers will see a dealer’s six month rating in the search results, and can also view a dealer’s 3, 6, 12 and current monthly ratings. The scheme doesn’t appear to deal with sellers who ‘white label stock’ and have it drop shipped by a 3rd party.

ABE are waiting for reactions and comments from their sellers’ before implementing the scheme.