Automotive Parts Classifieds - Powered by Styckyd

What does it do?
Adds a new marketplace to your forum specifically designed for automotive enthusiasts to buy and sell parts to and from the entire Styckyd network, add a non-advertising revenue stream for you, and eliminate classifieds moderation.

How does it do that?
We have built it on top of a parts classification standard that many large parts retailers and auto recyclers use. This has allowed us to build a part cataloguing system that makes searches much more relevant and allows sellers to associate parts with specific vehicles.

This is a hosted solution and by using this plugin you'll have access to the for sale listings of all the other forums in the network and vice versa. We'll handle any customer service issues that may arise and alleviate you and your team from having to do the same.

We charge a fee when a seller successfully sells their part - there is no fee to list a part for sale. 10% of that fee goes to the forum.

Who are you guys?
We are automotive enthusiasts and are trying to make buying and selling automotive related products effortless. You can read more about us here: http://partners.styckyd.com/whoweare

Features?

• vBulletin Single Sign-on
• Automatically calculates shipping between buyers and sellers
• Built-in Want to Buy system that notifies buyers when a part they're looking for has been listed for sale
• Hosted solution but users remain on your site - similar to placing Facebook Comments on your site.
• Hosted on the Amazon Web Services cloud so you don't have to worry about spotty service
• We handle any problems and issues with classifieds for you. If you hear any complaints from users, send them our way!
• Integrated Tire Rack affiliate program
• No template edits required

Learn More:
http://partners.styckyd.com

Screenshots:

[KerryF]

Originally Posted by SamirDarji

Awesome! I'd love to see a demo. Has the plugin been re-written for this yet?

Yup, this is how the current plugin included above and available for download on our site currently works. Again, iframes are kind of seen as unsexy but we're kind of proud of what we've done with it... I haven't seen anyone else do it like this before.

Originally Posted by SamirDarji

Personally, I haven't done much in terms of SEO, so this doesn't matter much to me. I'm not sure how many of the sites that have a classifieds forum truly gain users from it. Most new users have restrictions that does not allow them to interact with classifieds forums.

Yes, we did a bunch of research during the summer of '08. What we saw is that when forums lock their classifieds down in this way it greatly reduces the quality of the classifieds. The number of listings plummet. We understand why they choose to do it, but we think we have a better way.

At the moment, this is a value add to enhance the community. We do have ideas on how we'll also be able to turn it into a driver of traffic to the communities, though. But those are still a little ways down the road.

[KerryF]

Hi Ladies and Gents,

I want to gauge interest in a feature that we're currently developing. I've been talking with The Tire Rack to see how we can integrate our product database with the forum sponsorships that they provide and I believe we've found a way to make it work.

Basically after installing the plugin you would add your Tire Rack code and we would insert it into a referral link on the product pages. So on the product detail page for the Bridgestone RE-11 page for example there would be a link to The Tire Rack with your referral code. If a user clicks that link and then purchases the tire from the Tire Rack they pay you a commission.

We don't see any revenue from this feature, our revenue source remains solely earned from helping the users sell their parts. This is just to make the system more useful for everyone.

Thoughts?

[SamirDarji]

I think if you open the door for tirerack, others will want the same and turn the product into an affiliate network that you guys can't make money from.

It's been a while since styckyd has been released. It needs to have mass acceptance by the users. Unfortunately, I don't know any definitive way to make this happen.

[KerryF]

Originally Posted by SamirDarji

I think if you open the door for tirerack, others will want the same and turn the product into an affiliate network that you guys can't make money from.

It's been a while since styckyd has been released. It needs to have mass acceptance by the users. Unfortunately, I don't know any definitive way to make this happen.

Hi Samir,

It's only been two weeks! We have a long way to go! Rome definitely wasn't built in a day, our little site has a long way to go and there are still many more things to do.

We already have a built-in way for the forum admins like yourself to add other supporting vendors to the system so not only the Tire Rack will benefit. They're just the easiest because they already have systems in place to make this happen. We hope that this will add value to the forums and their supporting vendors. Whether or not we make money from this effort is not very relevant to us. Our goal is to help people buy and sell auto parts and we want to earn our keep by providing that service. These are ancillary services that add value in many ways and they're relatively easy for us to provide. If our service helps the forums it's a win for us, too:

1) It provides more reasons for you to want to work with us. If we're helping you, why wouldn't you want to work with us?
2) This is new territory. I could be wrong, but I've been involved in forums for a long time and I haven't seen anything like this before. This allows us to learn more about what works and what doesn't - and keep making it better.
3) If everyone finds the system useful and uses the forensics system then that also adds value to the classifieds system (The product database is the same). So the better we make Forensics, in turn the better Classifieds becomes.

We need a critical mass of users that breaches a certain threshold, but not everyone needs to be on board all at once and we don't expect that either. We'll get them in time by offering a better service. We truly believe that we'll be able to succeed in that. The users that have seen it so far really like it, but it does need more people involved to be really useful and that's why we're looking for forum admins to work together with us. We just need to start the conversation.

We're talking with some and are learning more about what we need to do. We're working on better integration with the vBulletin login right now by popular request. We'll have it done in the very near future. What else do we need to do to get more forums to try it out? The more forums that use it, the better we can make it for everyone.

[SamirDarji]

I'm glad to hear that it's going well.

I can't speak for other forum owners, but the barrier to entry for me is tighter integration. The single sign-on that you're working on definitely helps with that integration.

[KerryF]

Great, we'll have that done shortly. Is there anything else or will you be willing to get started with it after that's done?

It'll still take some time to get going, but the more people we have using it, the better it will be for everyone.

[SamirDarji]

That's the biggest barrier of entry for most. For me, since I don't currently have an official classifieds section, will be integration of styckyd with the system to be implemented.

Like most classified systems, to prevent abuse, there are post and time-based restrictions to limit the use of the system. Mainly this is to keep away the scammers that we've all seen as admins. The good thing about the styckyd system is that this is eliminated by asking for valid cc information. It will be rare that scammer is willing to put valid cc information into the system for the purpose of scamming someone, although I guess it still could happen. But I don't want the CC requirement to be a barrier to entry for my users who will quality via post count and tenure to use the original system we want to implement.

So the issue is how to implement both systems and keep them running in parallel via a single screen interface? The best way I could think of that is to have some sort of block of 'featured' ads that is at the top of the classifieds forum, and these pulling from the styckyd system. Very similar to how ebay and other companies have a scrolling bar of the most recent or featured items for sale. This way, a user is rewarded for having their listing in the styckyd system by getting extra exposure, while those that wish to simply list like they normally would can do so.

This implementation would require some sort of feed from the styckyd system, ideally a flash banner in a standard IAB size, so implementation would be even easier. I don't know if there's an rss feed out or anything like that, but that's also another way to get the two systems integrated.

Thoughts?

[KerryF]

Originally Posted by SamirDarji

So the issue is how to implement both systems and keep them running in parallel via a single screen interface?

Sorry, I got lost at this point. Can you clarify what both systems are?

Originally Posted by SamirDarji

The best way I could think of that is to have some sort of block of 'featured' ads that is at the top of the classifieds forum.

This is what we're currently doing. It's the simplest and easiest way to get started. On the home page for Classifieds is the most recent ads listed. This isn't really our goal, though. There are much more powerful, useful, and relevant things we can do with our system.

The next thing we'll be working on once the volume of listings increase is making it so that these are unique to the community (If you had a forum for BMW enthusiasts, it would show BMW parts). After that it will be unique for the users. Similar to how Amazon or Netflix recommends books and movies for you, we'll be able to recommend parts (Seriously, wait until you see what we can do - it's going to be pretty cool).

[SamirDarji]

Originally Posted by KerryF

Sorry, I got lost at this point. Can you clarify what both systems are?

Sorry about that. One system is a traditional classifieds forum and the other system is styckyd.

Originally Posted by KerryF

This is what we're currently doing. It's the simplest and easiest way to get started. On the home page for Classifieds is the most recent ads listed.

But this is on your homepage, and is not something that the user can currently see while concurrently looking at a traditional classifieds forum.

Originally Posted by KerryF

After that it will be unique for the users. Similar to how Amazon or Netflix recommends books and movies for you, we'll be able to recommend parts (Seriously, wait until you see what we can do - it's going to be pretty cool).

Good stuff. Now imagine this integrated with a common classifieds forums with a flash module above the start of the forum that showcased these items on styckyd like the 'vidoes being watched now' on this page:
http://demo.agriya.com/product/produ...el-member.html. This is what I'm looking for.

[KerryF]

Originally Posted by SamirDarji

Sorry about that. One system is a traditional classifieds forum and the other system is styckyd.

Ah, I see. This is where the confusion is then. In response I propose a question: By using Styckyd: Classifieds, why do we need a traditional classifieds system at all?

Until the system is also able to appropriately handle cars I see Styckyd: Classifieds along with a regular forum for cars and then a regular forum for everything else (couches, watches, etc.), those things that people sell on forums that don't fit within the car domain.

Originally Posted by SamirDarji

But this is on your homepage, and is not something that the user can currently see while concurrently looking at a traditional classifieds forum.

As with above, Styckyd becomes the classifieds on forums and the functionality I'm referring to (customization) isn't viewed anywhere on our site. These things are served for just your forum and just your users. The experience will be different on everyone's forum as we build out these customization features. They're easy for us to do but useless for us to create them unless we have data to work with.

Originally Posted by SamirDarji

Good stuff. Now imagine this integrated with a common classifieds forums with a flash module above the start of the forum that showcased these items on styckyd like the 'vidoes being watched now' on this page:
http://demo.agriya.com/product/produ...el-member.html. This is what I'm looking for.

With the understanding above, have your thoughts changed on this? If I'm still missing something, please help direct me so I can understand better.

One way that we'd like to make this more relevant to the users in time (And our goal is to be useful while not being invasive) is to have a text based results search on forum threads. For example, if a product is mentioned within a thread that matches with a search result from our database we can deliver information that is relevant to the content in that page. Like more details provided by Styckyd: Part Forensics, or even some parts for sale. This, too, needs to be developed after we have data to work with, though. So we're at the beginning of our journey.

All of this will be able to be turned on and off at the admin's discretion. For example, if you just want Styckyd: Part Forensics to take advantage of the Tire Rack referrals and links to your other vendors, you can disable Classifieds entirely.