Hey - it’s Fiona

Welcome to the third edition of Marketplace Minute. We’ve had lots of new subscribers join us this week - it’s great to have you all here.

In today’s issue I cover:

• How to improve the design of your listing tiles

• Why it’s important to focus on one niche before you scale

• How to enable Google and Facebook logins for your Sharetribe marketplace without code

How to enhance the design of your listing tiles for better results

Listing tiles are compact cards (or tiles) that display key information about an individual listing. They help customers to compare options and choose which ones to explore further. Listing tiles usually includes elements such as an image, title and price.

Here is an example of a well designed listing tile from Jitty, a real-estate marketplace in the UK:

So how do you design a great listing tile? Here are my top tips:

Different styles will suit different marketplaces so it’s important that you get to know your customers and find out what works for them. It’s often a good idea to create a mockup of several different versions of your listing tile, and then show them to your users to get feedback.

“Should I focus on a particular niche before scaling my marketplace, or should I target a broader market right away?”

A common challenge for marketplace founders at the idea stage is defining their focus. Many aim to appeal to a broad audience, thinking it will maximise their chances of success. I get it - I’ve been there myself. But this approach often backfires. Let me explain.

A few years ago, my husband and I built a marketplace called The Shoot - to help people find and book photographers in the UK.

To build our supply side, we targeted photographers nationwide in every imaginable category - product, travel, family portraits, engagements, headshot. You name it, we had it. We thought casting a wide net was the best strategy.

But when it came time to market our platform, we hit a wall.

Our photographer were too thinly spread across categories and regions:

• A customer looking for a family portrait photographer in Manchester might only find one option.

• A business in Edinburgh seeking a product photographer would find none.

This lack of density made it hard for customers to find what they needed, and it made marketing a nightmare. With so many category and location combinations, our ads were ineffective, and our SEO efforts struggled to gain traction.

We realised we needed to narrow our focus.

Given that London was full of budding photographers hungry for new opportunities, it made sense for us this to become our geographical focus. On the customer side, we identified high demand for couples and family portrait photography.

With our new niche defined, we were able to:

1. Optimise the design and messaging:

   • Highlighted relevant listings on our homepage.

   • Updated the website copy to emphasise “London” and “London photographers.”

   • Showcased testimonials for family and couples’ photoshoots.

2. Increase our density of photographers:

   • Onboarded more London-based photographers specialising in these categories.

This helped in two ways:

1. The website felt more relevant. The updated design and messaging immediately resonated with potential customers, signalling, “This is for me.”

2. Paid marketing was more effective. With a specific audience to target, our paid ads became more focused, allowing us to invest more in fewer campaigns and see better results.

This proved to be a big success. We saw traction grow, and our conversion rate significantly improved.

So the next question is, when is it the right time to scale and branch out into more categories or geographic locations?

When you’re ready to expand, choose your next market carefully:

• Demand: Identify categories or regions where customers are already expressing interest.

• Market size: Focus on regions or industries with growth potential.

• Operational feasibility: Ensure you have the resources and infrastructure to support expansion.

• Synergies: Start with adjacent categories or nearby regions where you can leverage existing strengths.

Test new markets with small pilot programs to minimise risks and refine your approach before scaling further.

And if you’re still not convinced, just take a look at some of the world’s biggest marketplaces to see where they started:

—> ✉️ Reply with your questions and I’ll answer them in a future issue. 

You can add Google and Facebook logins to your Sharetribe marketplace without code

Social logins allow users to sign up for, or log in to your marketplace using their existing Google and Facebook accounts, instead of creating a new account from scratch.

Users often prefer to log in with social accounts because it’s quick and they don’t need to create or remember a new username and password, thereby significantly reducing friction.

In addition to this:

• A simplified sign-up process often leads to higher registration rates

• Platforms like Google or Facebook add an element of trust

• They typically provide verified user information like email addresses, thereby reducing issues with fake accounts or typos

• Social logins make it easier for users to return. If they don’t have to remember a new password, they’re less likely to abandon your platform in frustration.

Thankfully, the team at Sharetribe have made the process of adding social logins to your marketplace super easy. It only takes a few minutes and you don’t even need to write any code!

Sharetribe have written a couple of handy step-by-step guides showing you exactly what you need to do. You can find them here:

• How to enable Facebook login

• How to enable Google login

Please note that you will need to be on a Pro Sharetribe subscription in order to access this feature.

—> ✉️ Send me your tips and I’ll feature them in a future issue. 

Fiona Burns

Find me on LinkedIn or Book a 1:1 call

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