What to do if your marketplace business slows down
Five recommendations to consider for your marketplace during times of slower business. Some can help you make it through these difficult times, others prepare your business for better ones ahead.
Articles by Juho Makkonen
Juho has been building marketplace websites since 2008. He is a Co-Founder of Sharetribe and currently serves as the CEO of the company. He's also a OuiShare connector in Helsinki and a long time advocate of the sharing economy.
Building the platform 7 min read
How to choose a payment service provider for your marketplace, part 3 – Costs, integration, and more
When you are choosing a payment service provider, payment costs, ease of integration, and quality of customer service are important things to consider. In this article, we discuss how PayPal, Stripe, Adyen, and MANGOPAY compare in these aspects.
Building the platform 12 min read
How to choose a payment service provider for your marketplace, part 2 – What are the key features?
There are a number of specific payment features marketplaces need from a payment service provider. This article compares the key features from four prominent PSPs: PayPal, Stripe, Adyen, and MANGOPAY.
Building the platform 6 min read
How to choose a payment service provider for your marketplace, part 1 – Which companies should I consider?
What are the best payment service providers for online marketplaces? This article series helps you answer the question for your specific situation. In the first article, we identify the most relevant PSPs for online marketplaces.
Building the platform 7 min read
How to choose the right online marketplace software
There are dozens of online marketplace software alternatives to choose from. Learn how to make the right choice for your marketplace idea, budget, and future plans.
Inspiration 5 min read
Growing with content – An interview with Simon Powell
The founder of TransferTravel reveals how creating content helped them build supply and awareness about their marketplace, up to 30,000 visitors per month, without spending anything on ads.
Inspiration 8 min read
Why network effects are key to successful marketplace businesses – An interview with James Currier
The managing partner of NFX Guild believes a new class of businesses—ones that combine aspects from marketplaces and social networks—is being created.
Inspiration 5 min read
Trust is key in facilitating transactions – An interview with Vincent Rosso
The co-founder of Blablacar discusses what B2B marketplaces can learn from P2P marketplaces, and specifically, marketplace trust as a facilitator for transactions.
Building the platform 5 min read
Why did Thumbtack succeed?
Starting your marketplace with one city and one vertical is key however for every rule there's an exception. In this case, the most notable one is Thumbtack, a marketplace unicorn which deliberately launched in all US cities and in hundreds of verticals.
Business model 12 min read
Focus your marketplace on one city and one vertical
Scaling too quickly to new verticals is the most common error when growing a marketplace: this mistake can kill your business before it even gets started. Instead you should focus on one city and one vertical.
Inspiration 5 min read
Five must-read books for marketplace entrepreneurs
Our CEO Juho picked the five books he strongly recommends to all marketplace entrepreneurs.
Building the platform 12 min read
How to design the booking flow of your service marketplace
The booking flow of your service marketplace is key to offer a smooth experience and get the most of transactions. We lay out a framework to help design and master your booking flow.
Inspiration 4 min read
From bootstrapping to $1M in funding – An interview with Arash Shiva and Marius Ciocirlan
Arash Shiva and Marius Ciocirlan of Sharegrid reveal how they went from bootstrapping to $1M in funding, using Sharetribe.
Inspiration 4 min read
Discover latent demand – An interview with Boris Wertz
Boris Wertz, the prolific marketplace investor and former COO of AbeBooks, believes there are still many untapped verticals that are ripe for disruption by new marketplace businesses.
Inspiration 5 min read
From idea to profitability in months – An interview with Agne Milukaite and Peter Ebsen
An interview with the founders of Cycle.land, the Sharetribe-powered bike-sharing marketplace that raised more than £400,000 in equity crowdfunding.
Inspiration 4 min read
Do one thing well – An interview with Mike Williams
The founder of Studiotime shares how he built a profitable marketplace business by bootstrapping.
Inspiration 5 min read
Conquer one city at a time – An interview with Tristan Pollock
The founder of Storefront advises entrepreneurs to build manual-first marketplaces and to not scale too rapidly.
Getting started 10 min read
How much does it cost to start a marketplace business?
How much time and money do you need to put in before your marketplace business becomes sustainable?
Marketing & Growth 13 min read
How to measure your success: The key marketplace metrics
Now that your business is growing nicely, it is time to look at marketplace metrics to see how you are actually doing.
Marketing & Growth 12 min read
How to grow your marketplace
Growth tactics to grow your marketplace beyond the initial group of users.
Marketing & Growth 11 min read
How to build supply for your marketplace
When launching a marketplace, you should solve the chicken and egg problem by first focusing on supply. In this chapter, we explain why.
Building the platform 13 min read
How to design your marketplace’s transaction flow
The purpose of any marketplace is to facilitate transactions between users. Learn how to build a smooth transaction flow.
Building the platform 14 min read
How to help your customers find the right product or service
How to design your search, categories, sorting, filtering and browsing views.
Business model 11 min read
How to set pricing in your marketplace
Pricing is one of the most important decisions you need to make.
Business model 9 min read
How to discourage people from going around your payment system
What to do if users try to bypass your transaction fees.
Business model 9 min read
How to choose the right business model for your marketplace
Finding the right business model for your marketplace can be tricky, but is crucial for long-term success.
Getting started 6 min read
Why you should launch your marketplace early
You should strive to launch your marketplace as early as possible. This way you can quickly validate your concept and see whether it really solves a problem for your users.
Business model 3 min read
Your business model does not scale – Why peer-to-peer marketplaces fail, part 3
First, you need to think about what it is that you want. Are you planning to build a large VC-funded global marketplace business, or just a smaller local business? This decision can make a big difference.
Getting started 3 min read
The focus is too broad – Why peer-to-peer marketplaces fail, part 2
It is surprisingly often that I talk to people who have this idea of a marketplace for "sharing everything".
Getting started 7 min read
3 reasons why peer-to-peer marketplaces fail (and how not to)
Peer-to-peer marketplaces can be great businesses. They combine the convenience of online stores with scale that comes from the notion that every consumer can also be a provider.
