Category: Accreditation

A single spot to search for all types of creative indie products will always be more convenient for shoppers.  In the third phase of our Marketplace Accreditation Program, we will overcome this aspect by building an open source federated search engine – a Google Shopping equivalent for products from indie..Read More

The Indie Sellers Guild is uniquely positioned to learn – from our seller members – when a marketplace is employing a successful strategy to bring shoppers to the platform.  We will study these strategies and share them with our accredited marketplaces.  We will encourage new marketplaces to collaborate, not compete..Read More

In this phase, we will spread the word about our directory of community-focused marketplaces.  We will provide creative indie sellers with training to help them determine whether a specific marketplace is a good fit for their business, and whether they have the resources to take that step.  We will help..Read More

We will publish our research as a whitepaper on best practices to develop a community-focused marketplace.  We will also start rolling out accreditation to marketplaces recommended by our members. Each accredited marketplace will receive a rating, and a listing in our marketplace directory.  Currently, there is no alternative to Etsy..Read More

Our next step is a multiple-choice version of the survey informed by the answers received in the open-ended version.  We included topics such as: shipping, customer service from the platform, type of sellers on the platform, search features, fees, platform policies and enforcement, and more.  The more responses we receive,..Marketplace Research Project

In order to support and accredit community-focused marketplaces, we must first know – definitively and comprehensively – what sellers and buyers want and need in a marketplace.  To this end, we are conducting a rigorous academic research study in partnership with Dr. Samantha Close of DePaul University.  Our open-ended research..Read More