We are chasing for a dramatic increase in traction and registration yet we are still waiting for a market break through. We are an online ecommerce platform where people can sell their digital, physical and services and embed to their site or share it to their social media.
I have always wondered about that model when it's not vertical and anyone can sell anything Digital, Physical or Service. (Gumroad, Selify, etc)
Marketplaces tend gain traction faster when they are vertical and specific. My best word of advice would be to select the vertical that's bringing in the most traffic, (Hope it's a big vertical in itself) and focus on studying the consumers of that vertical and BE THE ONE ECOM SOLUTION for that vertical beating everyone else hands down (case in point AirBnB vs Craigslist). Make the experience of the specific vertical buyer better than any other marketplace. Focus on making the experience flawless and friction-less.
It'll become much easier to add other verticals later vs. trying to be everything for everyone from the get go.
I promise you there is a way.
I don't know how far along you are, or how good your solution is, but there is a huge opportunity for ecommerce solutions in the areas of curation and discovery.
Amazon and eBay trump the "one stop shop" for products you know you want to buy. And follow up recommendations based on those products. You can't beat them.
And companies like StoreEnvy, Etsy and Shopify give you ways to sell goods online and connect with customers - all are big and rapidly gaining market share. Which means you'll need to offer more than the ability for businesses to add a storefront to their site or share on social to reach explosive growth.
How your service curates and focuses on delivering relevant and curated collections – so I see what I want to see and you see what you want to see – even though we’re visiting the same online store will ultimately be the test of your success. If you choose to enter the curation game.
And if you do, check out Wanelo - their goal is to organize all of the world's shopping. They just launched a mobile store and they're focused on curation en masse (it will give you an idea of who's already curating what). Also ThreadFlip. And Wantering (who are tapping into the giant stream of online data around fashion trends and matching it with your social profile to curate personalized shopping collections).
If you want to be an ecommerce platform, think about the gap that exists for companies to connect with their customers, and how you can solve it better than anyone else.
One more thing.
Retail is now about delivering an omnichannel experience - a seamless way for customers to shop from any store on any device from any location at any time. Can you provide technology to help solve this problem? Maybe an ecommerce platform isn't the ultimate goal?
The old retail model was about exchanging money for products. The new retail model is still about exchanging resources, but it's about exchanging money, assets and r time for money, assets and or time.
Imagine yourself not as an ecommerce platform, but a resource exchange center. How can you help businesses and customers exchanged their resources better than anyone else on the market?
Best of luck.
Waiting for a market break through?! No one will buy what you're selling if they'll need it in the future. If the market isn't ready for your concept you're not going to get much traction plain and simple.
If it's just no one knows about your company then that's a different story and I'd say PR and third party endorsements (no one wants to be the first to try)
If you've tried that and no one is biting you would be better to go back to the drawing board and find a product/market fit.
Rule of thumb: if you have a good product that people actually need, and then, you'll see the dramatic increase in traction.
