Thanks for the heads up.
I will tag @VS_Gerrit @VS_Dani and @KDodson in to share the feedback with them.
Jeff
I will tag @VS_Gerrit @VS_Dani and @KDodson in to share the feedback with them.
Jeff
I'm with you here Doug, we've just lost one who's been with us on two Ford sites for 7 or 8 years, and as well as being probably our main Vendor, they were very knowledgeable and helpful within the communities. They were only a small specialist Ford parts supplier, but were willing to help in any way they could.We need some kind of vendor retention policy in place to help retain these long time vendors that have been a part of the community
We went through this years ago, one vendor was a large Exhaust manufacturer where I knew the marketing manager personally, they and others left for 2 reasons, costs and the fact that ebay etc made it hard to compete. I visited and spoke to many of them and they helped us out with our social events (some still do, if we ever get back to holding them), many years ago we had one guy who owned a small lighting business, driving lights, headlight mods etc, and he said to me he could make money out of his Fakebook page but couldn't recover the costs of advertising with us. I posted notifications about supporting the vendors who support us, doesn't last all that long when people can save a $ or 2 by purchasing on line via ebay etc.I'm with you here Doug, we've just lost one who's been with us on two Ford sites for 7 or 8 years, and as well as being probably our main Vendor, they were very knowledgeable and helpful within the communities. They were only a small specialist Ford parts supplier, but were willing to help in any way they could.
To quote their own words "Verticalscope have put the price up by nearly 300% and we just cant justify it any more".
The vendor (Kennedy Diesel ) in question, is complaining that the rate got raised by 50% and that they cannot justify spending that extra money.Are all the vendors mentioned here leaving due to pricing concerns? The first one didn't seem to be a pricing issue, but I'm not sure.
If you know vendors who are active and engaged, but leaving due to pricing changes, please let us know who these vendors are and we will see what we can do to save them.
Thank you for bringing this to our attention!
I suspect that this is the case with my forums as well.On my sites they never get as far as being vendors so I don’t have any leaving because of prices. It’s prices stopping them right from the start.
I've witnessed a few that have also backed right away from the start due to price.On my sites they never get as far as being vendors so I don’t have any leaving because of prices. It’s prices stopping them right from the start.
Pricing is the main issue with the one I'm referring to Sameer, but he was also unhappy because in previous years he'd always been contacted by somebody from VS to discuss terms, whereas this time he was just shot with an invoice which was way above what he'd been paying.Are all the vendors mentioned here leaving due to pricing concerns? The first one didn't seem to be a pricing issue, but I'm not sure.
Said something similar several months ago. Shortly after is when this Free Plan popped up. But one potential vendor later told me how much a month they wanted for the bottom of the barrel truly listed vendor and to me it was ridiculously high. Even for a deep pocket major vendor. It's like they think they are the major media networks running 30 second advertisements rather than forums that may or may not have a large audience. Especially when it comes to the less active, trying to grow, sites.With the new VSS in place, this should be a big red flag that their pricing tier plan is not working..
It would be interesting to see the analytics from the new VSS.Said something similar several months ago. Shortly after is when this Free Plan popped up. But one potential vendor later told me how much a month they wanted for the bottom of the barrel truly listed vendor and to me it was ridiculously high. Even for a deep pocket major vendor. It's like they think they are the major media networks running 30 second advertisements rather than forums that may or may not have a large audience. Especially when it comes to the less active, trying to grow, sites.
If that paid vendor got his/her stuff on all VS sites for that crazy price it would make more sense but not one site that has just a few hundred active members at best, no way. They really need to get down here in the trenches and look at what they are selling for those crazy prices. It isn't and hasn't worked and never will. We just aren't ABC, NBC or CBS and it seems that's what their price structure is geared for.
Most of these vendors are new to forums to begin with some don't even know how to get around, let alone try to use what they are selling. They simply need to get them hooked before they start selling these fantastic vendor plans and that means they need to get their hands dirty and help them. Now this is just from the one but had more that got back to me when I requested it and it was the same story, crazy high MONTHLY pricing. That crazy price for one year would be barely acceptable.
I have no idea how many they have actually turned away with this pricing but I doubt we'll ever see the ones already turned away again. That's the truly sad part. We try sending a potential vendor and they push them away. It's crazy. I'm tired of trying.