Features and Business Analysis for Creating Local Services Marketplace

The reach of World Wide Web and Internet has helped us in numerous ways be it local service marketplaces or other fields. The web-based platform is ideal for professionals allowing customers to find service providers within their area, budget, location and all. What are the key features of such marketplaces, let’s read out!

Business Model:

The main focus of these marketplaces is to connect customers to service professionals. Customers just post their requirements on the platform and within a minute, they can connect to professionals suitable to their business requirements. These services could be a job or anything.

How they make Money?

They have different ways to earn revenues. The best potential avenues come with:

• Advertisements: Hosting adverts are great way to generate revenues.

• Memberships: Some of these offer premium membership for little charges and advanced features.

Essential Features:

If we analyze the main and top marketplace websites then we realize that they are customer centric, easy to navigate, use and an interface that is appealing. Their approach to customer is simple and highly intuitive. User engaging features are also embedded within and some of them are described here:

Homepage:

This is make or break point for most of the websites. While many people have a perception to put in all information on the home page, it is recommended to keep it minimal and subtle. Keep customers in mind while planning content and structure.

Categories:

Multiple service areas blend to form a marketplace and that’s why a dedicated category section is the need of your website. Keep respective categories as per their priority and users must be able to identify them easily!Features and Business Analysis for Creating Local Services Marketplace

How it works section:

Convey how your website works exactly! It will increase engagement; customers will understand your business and website and thus, little chances of bouncing back traffic. Include the how it works sections for: Customer who are searching for random stuff and Professionals that are looking for jobs and clients.

Cross Platform Support:

Mobility has increased the need of inculcating cross platform support. It is necessity and that’s why your marketplace must have a dedicated mobile application as well as a website for desktops and laptops.

Post your requirements section:

This section is what most of the customers will look for when they arrive at your website or app. Professionals and customers need to post their requirements and fill in some details to start up the entire search hunt process.

Signup/login:

Signup pages- most of the websites rely on them as it prompts the user to create an account for themselves. You might need multiple signup options for different categories of customers: Professionals and Customers.

Add Your Requirements:

This is fast forward method for putting your credentials and initiate search. While this can be optional for a website and app, yet can come out to be useful in longer run!

Additional Prerequisites:

Being a marketplace domain, the sites need to be customer oriented and this asks for additional prerequisites section on the page. It helps to match better and know the conditions, is any like:

• Additional information and details

• Timeframe or deadline of search

• Day or timing of availability of a customer or professional

• Consent for details sharing of customers to professionals and vice versa

• Increased privacy options

Verification:

To diminish spam accounts entry, very marketplace must keep some sort o verification process to enhance a healthy and engaging environment. Ask the users to verify account, contact details and a message or missed call verification is even better. It shows that all your logins are verified and genuine.

My Requirements Section:

This will enlist all the requirements of the customer and professionals. They can preview, delete or edit their requirements whenever they want. One can also include recommendations as per their requirements in same sections.

Help/FAQs Section:

It is very general section that is included in almost all the professional websites whether they fall into marketplace domain or not. Create a unique and highlighting section for common queries and frequently asked questions, related questions etc.

Billing History:

TO make the user experience even better, a billing history or details of payment section can do wonders. It will include all the information about date of payment, last transactions, date of transactions and all.

Search:

For any marketplace or e-commerce platform, search section is vital and crucial. Probably it is one of the fastest ways to find out the relevant services or items from the junk. Search sections if integrated with auto complete words and phrases or based on category; location etc. is highly appreciated and useful for users.

Profile Page:

A profile page is of course a mention in the features list. This is the place where professional and customers can view how they look to others when searched. A profile page must include:

• Top section for displaying image, name, area, address, and other important details

• A section for gallery views, application updates status and other information.

• Option to write reviews or recommend to friend or invite others is good addition

Premium Membership:

TO monetize and earn revenues, this is the best and most preferred way. The premium membership plans helps to upgrade the user experience and provides them with some exclusive and advanced features that are not available to others. Keep these features so much tempting that it lures the professionals and customers to opt for some premium membership.

Some other vital points:

• A good approach to make hassle free customer experience is to keep one account for all types of users, no matter whether they are professionals or customers. This is user friendly as it gives them single sign up option and surely will not do any harm to your website and performance.

• Also remember to make the entire registration process to be simple and easy. Long registrations, lots of information and irrelevant details and multiple page verification is a big no. Keep things in balance and minimal to leverage the user’s benefits.