Showing posts with label contest. Show all posts
Showing posts with label contest. Show all posts

Friday, August 29, 2008

Anyone else want a central location for finding exclusively etsy giveaways?

I should start with this confession: I am, at heart, lazy. I'll watch a mediocre show rather than search for a lost remote or eat a lukewarm meal rather than find the waitress to ask that i be warmed up. This same principle applies to finding giveaways--I love them, I love entering them, (I'd really love winning them, though thus far no luck), and I especially love it when the prize is a neat handmade item from a fellow shopkeep on etsy. What I don't love, however, is finding them.

Since laziness is the other mother of invention (maybe the not-evil-but-just-tired stepmother of invention?), I figured i might be able to solve this dilemma by creating a central location for finding out about etsy giveaways. To make it work, of course, I need people who do these giveaways to join in, however. So do that. 'Cause goodness knows I'm far too lazy to go tracking you down and writing you up on my own ;)

Speaking of giveaways, I've decided to edit my RME giveaway--now everyone who enters gets a prize, and there's no longer any closing date for the "contest" (guess it's not much of a contest any more either then, huh? A contest where you're guaranteed to win something for doing very little--hey, sounds perfect for my fellow lazy-kind!)

Wednesday, August 13, 2008

RME: Joining the Revolution-(altered 5/6/2010)

After hearing tons of other shop-keepers on etsy praise RevolutionMoneyExchange (usually referred to as just "RME") to the heavens, and after doing a bit of research on my own, I've decided to join in on this particular free-us-from-PayPal-fees revolution.

My biggest incentive, honestly, was when I had 33 cents of a 1 dollar shipping bill taken out by PayPal in fees earlier this week. Stuff like that is enough to drive a small shopkeeper nuts!

Obviously, then, the perk of RME is its freedom from fees--no costs for signing up, requesting, sending, or receiving money. (There are fees for overdrafts and paper checks though--but since neither of those is an issue for me, that didn't put me off).

Basically it's that you can only transfer money between RME account users--unlike PayPal, where non-account-holders can just use credit cards to pay. This means that if the person paying you doesn't have an RME account they'd have to set one up to pay, and then it will be a couple days before their account clears and money is transferable. (In other words, its work basically how PayPal works when you're not using credit cards--if there is money in their account, it transfers immediately; if it's being pulled from their checking first, there's a delay). Also, it only works for people in the U.S. currently (which I think is very unfortunate).

Yes, that's a bit annoying. But to me it's far less annoying than paying 33% in fees (I know, that's only a bill for 1 dollar, but still!). In order to make it more appealing to my customers, I'm thinking I'll either include a free extra with purchases made through RME or I'll offer a 2% discount (PayPal charges 3%, but they also have a flat 30 cent transaction fee they add to this 3%, which is what makes those low-priced-item transactions on PayPal so brutal, fee-wise). What would you find to be the best incentive?

[5/6/2010 edit: There is longer a giveaway associated with this post because RME no longer offers a referral bonus. But I'm still offering an extra goody to those customers who purchase from my Etsy shop via RME]