All 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.

Marketing & growth
How to fund your marketplace without giving up equity
Venture capital doesn’t work for most marketplaces. Luckily, there are options. Consider grants, loans, and revenue-based financing.
by Juho Makkonen

Marketing & growth
How to crowdfund your marketplace
Your marketplace startup funding options aren’t limited to bootstrapping or raising venture capital. Read on for our CEO Juho’s best tips on a funding method close to all our hearts at Sharetribe: crowdfunding.
by Juho Makkonen

Marketing & growth
How to raise venture capital for your marketplace
Sharetribe’s CEO Juho’s complete guide to raising venture capital for your marketplace.
by Juho Makkonen

Marketing & growth
Why raise venture capital for your marketplace – and why not
Should you raise VC funding for your marketplace? If you want to build a unicorn, yes. If you want to get rich – maybe not.
by Juho Makkonen

Marketing & growth
How to bootstrap your marketplace
Can you build a successful marketplace business without funding? Absolutely! Bootstrapping might even help you become profitable faster.
by Juho Makkonen

Marketing & growth
Marketplace funding: The complete guide
Struggling with funding your marketplace? This guide helps you decide how much marketplace funding you need – and when and where to source it.
by Juho Makkonen

Marketing & growth
11 marketplace metrics you should be tracking to measure your success
The most important metrics that anchor all your marketing and growth activities.
by Juho Makkonen

Marketing & growth
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.
by Juho Makkonen

Platform technology
Part 2 – What are the key features of marketplace payment solutions?
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.
by Juho Makkonen

Platform technology
Marketplace payments – Costs, integration, and more things to consider
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.
by Juho Makkonen

Platform technology
Marketplace payments – Compare payment providers
What are the best payment service providers for online marketplaces? In this article, we identify the most relevant payment service providers for online marketplaces.
by Juho Makkonen

Marketing & growth
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.
by Juho Makkonen

Marketing & growth
"Network effects are key to successful marketplaces," says 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.
by Juho Makkonen

Business Model
Why marketplace trust is key for BlaBlaCar – 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.
by Juho Makkonen

Starting a marketplace
Why did Thumbtack succeed?
Starting your marketplace with one city and one vertical is key. But for every rule, there's an exception.
by Juho Makkonen

Business Model
Focus your marketplace on one city and one vertical
Tackle the chicken-or-egg problem with an extreme focus.
by Juho Makkonen

Starting a marketplace
Five must-read books for marketplace entrepreneurs
Our CEO Juho picked the five books he strongly recommends to all marketplace entrepreneurs.
by Juho Makkonen

Platform technology
How to design the booking flow of your service marketplace
How ten well-known marketplaces match supply and demand, and how to pick the right approach for you.
by Juho Makkonen

Marketing & growth
From bootstrapping a marketplace to $1M in funding
Arash Shiva and Marius Ciocirlan of Sharegrid reveal how they went from bootstrapping to $1M in funding, using Sharetribe.
by Juho Makkonen

Starting a marketplace
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.
by Juho Makkonen

Starting a marketplace
From marketplace idea to profitability in a matter of months
An interview with the founders of Cycle.land, the Sharetribe-powered bike-sharing marketplace that raised more than £400,000 in equity crowdfunding.
by Juho Makkonen

Marketing & growth
Do one thing well – An interview with Mike Williams
The founder of Studiotime shares how he built a profitable marketplace business by bootstrapping.
by Juho Makkonen

Marketing & growth
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.
by Juho Makkonen

Starting a marketplace
How much does it cost to build a marketplace business?
Example of a first year’s marketplace startup budget, and how to spend it wisely.
by Juho Makkonen

Marketing & growth
How to find the best marketplace growth strategies
Choosing the early-stage marketing mix for your marketplace.
by Juho Makkonen

Business Model
How to build your marketplace supply
How to bring in the first, quality providers before your platform has any customers.
by Juho Makkonen

Platform technology
How to design your marketplace transaction flow
The science behind minimal abandoned carts for marketplace platforms.
by Juho Makkonen

Platform technology
The marketplace search engine: How to help your customers find what they’re looking for
Your success depends on demand finding its way to supply. Here’s how to make it happen.
by Juho Makkonen

Business Model
Marketplace pricing: How to define your ideal take rate
Find a pricing strategy that is just right for everyone: you, your providers, and their customers.
by Juho Makkonen

Business Model
Managing marketplace leakage – How to discourage people from going around your payment system
How to solve the most daunting challenge of the marketplace business model: platform leakage.
by Juho Makkonen

Starting a marketplace
Business Model
How to choose the right marketplace business model
Compare marketplace revenue models and find the revenue strategy that can boost your growth.
by Juho Makkonen

Starting a marketplace
Why you should launch your marketplace early
‘Time is money’, and other teachings to inspire you to take the plunge and launch your marketplace as soon as you can.
by Juho Makkonen

Starting a marketplace
Three reasons why 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.
by Juho Makkonen