Rather than fixing the bugs in the botched relaunch, Zibbet CEO Jonathan Peacock today announced that only a few "outliers" will be successful at the Zibbet Marketplace, despite his taking our money for it. And refusing to refund it. So, for our sakes, apparently, he is abandoning efforts to promote the very site we all paid for in favor of his own hosted standalones, where sellers have to find their own buyers. It keeps him up at night, and SURPRISE! The solution to nobody selling at the Zibbet Marketplace is a side venture that you have to pay extra for!!!!
And no discussion allowed of this disturbing announcement. In fact, he no longer wants sellers to comment on the forums open to only a few. What sheeple are supposed to do NOW is make up ideas and vote on them, with an upfront caveat (is this a first?) that he will do whatever he wants anyway.
For those of you who don't know HOW to access the hidden forums without signing in and being approved by Peacock to view, here is the transcript:
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The future of Zibbet + a new place to add your ideas...
Posted by Jonathan Peacock (Zibbet's CEO) on October 7, 2014 at 9:20pm in Announcements from Zibbet
Hi everyone,
A few members have expressed some level of confusion about where Zibbet is heading. I had planned to address this in a later blog post, but hopefully this will shed some light for you…
Since the beginning, Zibbet has always been very “seller focused”. The thing that keeps me up at night and gets me out of bed in the morning, is a desire to help creatives be successful in their small business. I really really want you guys to be successful; maybe so successful that you can quit your day job and live your passion out full-time! With the current “marketplace store” model, I just don’t think we’re giving you the best chance to be successful. You see, marketplaces are great because they send you organic and in-built traffic, and hopefully some sales. However, in order for a seller to be truly successful, they need to be acquiring their own customers, through their own promotional and brand building efforts. Although there are some outliers that have built successful businesses within a marketplace, it’s not very common. When you drive your own traffic to your marketplace store, you will lose a percentage of that traffic to other stores within the marketplace. Marketplaces are all about helping shoppers discover new items and therefore keep them clicking from item to item and store to store.
Because of this, and many other reasons (more professional etc), we believe that sellers need to be building their brand and their customer base on their own stand-alone website, not a marketplace store. We believe this is the future of ecommerce for our creative industry and will become more apparent as marketplaces burst at the seams, as they overpopulate with millions of sellers within the one marketplace. This is why we are moving quickly to give all sellers on Zibbet their very own, stand-alone website. We think that this is an opportunity that our competitors have missed, or refuse to acknowledge. Plus, it is completely in line with our overarching mission of helping sellers be successful. We’re really excited about the possibilities this opens up for our sellers.
As mentioned, we still think marketplaces are really valuable to sellers, especially as they’re getting started - due to the organic sales it produces. The marketplace will still be a big part of Zibbet and every seller will still have a store within the marketplace.
We think the multi-platform approach of having a marketplace store AND a stand-alone website that is easily managed from the one dashboard (with your inventory perfectly synced), is a HUGE win-win.
We understand that not everyone will agree with taking Zibbet in this direction, however, we want you to know that nothing is being taken away from you, only added. If you don’t like or want the stand-alone website, you don’t have to use it. You are obviously welcome to continue promoting only your marketplace store, as you always have.
Improving Zibbet
For awhile now, especially since relaunch, the forums have increasingly become a platform for sellers to vent their frustrations about what they would like to see improved on Zibbet. As you know, our team is small and we simply don't have the resources to manage the forums effectively and make sure sellers are getting the answers they deserve.
We would like to see that change.
In light of this, we are launching a separate platform for you to add your ideas and vote on your favorite ideas submitted by others. You have a limited amount of votes, so you will need to choose wisely! This will give us a centralized place where we can clearly see all the ideas submitted and, based on the votes, see which one's sellers deem most important.
Whilst this is not a guarantee that we will be able to do your idea, even if it has a lot of votes, it is your chance to have your voice heard and potentially affect what we build next. As mentioned, our team is small and we can’t afford to drop everything and fix the thing that you want us to fix. We have a product strategy that we’re working hard to execute on, because we are convinced that that’s where our growth lies. Of course we want to fix and/or improve anything and everything that comes our way, but the reality of the situation is that growth will stall if we do, and if growth stalls we won’t be able to expand our team to keep getting more done, faster.
Here's the link for you to add your ideas and vote for your favorites:support.zibbet.com/forums/259301-ideas (to post an idea, sign in with your Facebook or Google account. It is not linked to your Zibbet account, so your Zibbet password will not work)
From now on, we’re asking that members use that link for their ideas (large and small) instead of posting in the forums.
Thanks for being on this journey with us. We’re really excited about the future of Zibbet and would love for you to continue to be a part of it.
Best,
Jonathan
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Note that he fails to acknowledge that plenty of folks DO make a nice living off marketplace sites, namely Etsy and Ebay. If he is to be believed, people actually get more traffic and have better sales on standalone websites than marketplaces. I think he's the only one who believes that...or more accurately, thinks he can get others to believe that!
Wednesday, October 8, 2014
Friday, August 15, 2014
Disturbingly Affectionate Email from Zibbet CEO Jonathan Peacock.
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| Zibbet makes me sad |
Are we supposed to be so bowled over by how much he loves us that we're going to overlook the fact that his site has NEVER worked well, works even worse in his relaunch, yet he's keeping everyone's money?
This cloyingly sweet "business" message is disturbing on another level...his attempt to get business people to reveal lots of personal information on his site. My FAMILY? You want to know about my FAMILY? What does that have to do with my selling a vintage teacup?
You want to know where I live??? (Hmm....I've been threatened to be arrested for tweeting about Zibbet by someone who claimed to be in daily telephone conversations with Zibbet owners.)
You want to know where else you can find me online? ICK. The Zibbet owners have already revealed that they scour the internet for "bad" posts made by its sellers as data on who to approve or not approve for access to its closed forums. Whatever else do you want that info for?
Some have suggested that the hopelessly desperate for affection folks will fall for this "Jonny come's a-courtin" email and reveal personal information that can be sold. With this guy, it's hard to know. I recently learned about his Dinars for Dollars scheme, he lures people into buying premium shops on Zibbet knowing he wasn't providing the services he sold us yet refusing to refund the money, who knows?
Now I know Jonathan's "regulars" are going to claim I am misinterpreting his intent here. But truly, WHAT IS THE INTENT? He still misrepresents how malfuntioning Zibbet is. The "nasty bugs" are the giant chasms of gaps in basic programming that still makes search unusable. It's not fixed as of the date of this blog post. That's a lie. They DIDN'T EVEN PROGRAM for search to recognized plurals and didn't fix it til he read about it on social media! The whole tone is a disturbing blend of a faraway lover and a teacher getting the pre-schoolers to sit up straight by saying "My how straight you all are sitting!" And to SHUT YOU UP. And honestly, what did the half-baked relaunch do for you as a seller? He ADMITTED the search was bad, any buyers who do wander into Zibbet can't even find YOUR ITEMS, yet you are supposed to be contented by fake lovin'? Aren't we smarter than that?
Now I know Jonathan's "regulars" are going to claim I am misinterpreting his intent here. But truly, WHAT IS THE INTENT? He still misrepresents how malfuntioning Zibbet is. The "nasty bugs" are the giant chasms of gaps in basic programming that still makes search unusable. It's not fixed as of the date of this blog post. That's a lie. They DIDN'T EVEN PROGRAM for search to recognized plurals and didn't fix it til he read about it on social media! The whole tone is a disturbing blend of a faraway lover and a teacher getting the pre-schoolers to sit up straight by saying "My how straight you all are sitting!" And to SHUT YOU UP. And honestly, what did the half-baked relaunch do for you as a seller? He ADMITTED the search was bad, any buyers who do wander into Zibbet can't even find YOUR ITEMS, yet you are supposed to be contented by fake lovin'? Aren't we smarter than that?
But bottom, line, it reeks of insincerity and fakey fake. Jonathan Peacock, if you or your pal Andrew Gray want to show me your love, refund my money. That's the PROFESSIONAL thing to do. If you are finding this blog post like lots do via google, you might want to read this blog from the bottom up. But grab a cup of tea from that vintage teacup first because it's full of info, all of which is documented.
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Monday, August 11, 2014
So why Did Zibbet REALLY Relaunch?
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| Zibbet error message, frequently showing, from the "stabilized" relaunched site. |
As we all know now, 2 weeks plus after the relaunch, it's less stable than it was before. It takes forever to load and often times out.
And a search that doesn't work at all. And that the owners knew didn't work, but went with anyway, according to the CEO, Jonathan Peacock, knowing it didn't function even as well as the messed up one in the previous version!
The message above is seen...often and for long periods of time. The new site was beta tested, and still launched with major problems and fewer features. Like, it takes forever to load. Like, people can't work in their shops. Like, SOME shops that were premium were converted into free ones with no features, but with messages telling sellers to purchase again. Like, timing out when searching. Like exposing personal information of sellers. Photo issues. And much more. They've been in major fix-it mode ever since. So why was it hurried out?
What was accomplished for sellers and buyers?
What did it accomplish for the owners?
Why DID they rush out this debacle that was clearly not ready to launch?
Well, in the relaunch, the owners successfully hid all the information prospective sellers need to make an educated decision on whether or not to purchase a shop subscription. Which is how the owners make money. They don't make any money from sellers' sales, not having fees, only by enticing new sellers to purchase a premium shop subscription. Which some suggest had been generating a nice income for the owners until lots of experienced sellers bought them last fall and then expected the site to function as advertised.
Frustrated buyers and sellers have experienced major difficulties in the relaunch, but here's what the owners got to work perfectly! Hiding information.
1. They hid the ability to see how many shops there really are on Zibbet. No way to compare actual shops with the giant banner claiming tens of thousands more shops. (Last verifiable count before relaunch was under 8,000, day of relaunch, that exploded to over 43,000, according to their banner). Of course, hiding that info means buyers can't search for their favorite sellers, either. It's not a good number, so they don't want you to be able to find out. Because a site with few sellers has little traffic.
2. They hid the ability to see how individual shops were doing, sales wise. No way NOW to gauge whether similar shops are enjoying sales or are sitting there bleakly with few. 10 sales a week or 10 in a year? It's not a good number for the overwhelming majority of shops, so now you are not able to find out.
3. They hid the ability to check stats via google analytics. Now, you can only rely on THEIR stats, only. Before the relaunch, google analytics showed that views were just chock full of bot, not actual buyers. No GA for you!
4. They hid the ability to see how sellers are doing via the forums. They have been systematically trying to discredit anyone who expressed an opinion that was not absolutely hero-worshipping of the site (almost comically, you'll have to read previous posts here and elsewhere to see how they and some of their most ardent supporters pathetically attempted to besmirch the reputation of whistleblowers, one even going so far as to compare whistleblowers to work place mass murderers!)They've muted, booted, and made their forums visible only by approval of the owners (which means links to those forums in blogs like this are hidden). Unless of course, you know how to view them from the back door!. Owners who revealed that they search the internet looking for any negative comments by users on social media in order to know who to block.
And when that didn't work, they simply removed the ability to even FIND their forums to ask questions! (With an incredibly buggy relaunch, nowhere to turn). You need to know the internet address to even FIND the joint! Fortunately, they do not control the whole internet. The information is out there now, backed by screenshots in various blogs like this.
So what works perfectly in the relaunch is hiding information that would help a prospective buyer of a premium shop membership make an educated decision.
So why was this half-baked relaunch rushed out?
For a more stable site?
For sellers, with fewer features than before and a search algorithm that doesn't even recognize plurals?
For buyers, who can't even find their favorite shops anymore?
Or for the owners, who make their money SOLELY on premium shop subscriptions? The relaunched site works perfectly in controlling the information prospective premium paying shop sellers have access to. Makes you wonder. Well, no surprise for most.
So again, I want my money back. Every cent.
Friday, August 1, 2014
The Botched Zibbet Relaunch
UPDATE! The botched relaunch of the Zibbet e-commerce site is sadly a perfect example of the careless management of a site that takes money from customers and then fails to deliver. It is indefensible. They launched a PR blitz to a site that loaded so slowly it often timed out. Shop features were missing that were paid for, and customers were told to pay again to enable them. Search didn't recognize plurals. Full legal names were exposed. As were emails, just ripe for the picking of spammers, photos and banners a mess. Error messages and surprise downtimes. Just to name a PORTION of the bugs.
To make matters worse, some of the intentional changes seem designed to confuse, at best, or mislead. Days before the relaunch, there were under 8,000 shops (many abandoned or "name holders"). At relaunch, prospective sellers are urged to join 43,000 plus "creatives". Now, elsewhere on the internet, the owners had claimed there were 10,000 shops, so their math has always been questionable. But 43,000? Requests for how they came up with this number were ignored. Zibbet did respond via a tweet. Here it is: 43,944 sellers have joined Zibbet over the years. Amazing! Look out for that number to keep growing faster & faster!" What's amazing is that they actually publish this number. There were less than 8,000 sellers last week, meaning that over 35,000 sellers have come and gone! 8,000 sellers, many empty, many place holders, many with banners directing to their Etsy shop. PS, Zibbet, glad you are enjoying my blog.
The shops no longer show how many items they sold, making it impossible for a prospective investor in the site to make an educated decision about whether it works for sellers or not. And they can't access the off-site forums unless they sign up and are approved, and they won't see a balanced discussion if they do. The owners have muted "negative" shopkeepers, and coached a handful of users in a private forum, to bully any "negative" posters (trolls, as the owner Andrew Gray characterized them), and manipulate by posting la-las and games to bury meaty business posts.
And that handful of users, instead of demanding excellence in a site they invest time and money in, conspire to keep it performing poorly. By trying to beat down, silence, threaten and bully those who do demand the site perform. By questioning their sanity, their business sense, their ethics. And accepting anything dished out.
Because apparently pretending a site is excellent is preferable to demanding that it rise to the opportunity it had and perform excellently. Tweeting and pinning and buying each others' items in a pathetic attempt to bring in traffic that they should demand the owners bring in just by providing a credible, working site. Why?
Instead of asking themselves why there is such outrage over the site's management, they defend it. (Does it really help a site for owners to publicly lie and trash sellers they banned from their forums?) Instead of demanding the owners step up and perform basic public relations fence mending, they try amateurish bullying behavior to try and cowl furious customers who want their money back. Even this disastrous relaunch keeps them on message.
Why? Some have suggested it is a C3 church thing, some have suggested there is a financial incentive, some have suggested it's the charismatic owners taking advantage of lonely people.
I don't have any evidence of any of it. I did learn recently that the one who sent me emails threatening not only to sue me but to have me arrested (and I suppose, extradited to Florida for tweeting) bragged that she was in daily telephone conversations with one of the owners.
But I have no proof of that, not being in on those conversations.
What I do know is this: Zibbet has failed to become a credible alternative and the relaunch just confirms that they either aren't up to the task or never had any intention to. And so it fails at the most glorious opportunity they will ever have.
But more and more are suggesting that it doesn't matter to the owners how subpar the site is as long as there's another "mark" to buy a membership, since that's how they make THEIR money.
All of us would have benefited from real competition to Etsy, and it will never happen. Because instead of demanding excellence from its owners, that very vocal and active group made excuses for them, like a doting mom and a spoiled child. (Oh, officer, my baby would NEVER go over the speed limit!) And the sad thing is, everyone who sells handmade, vintage and supplies is let down. Because of an inexplicable conspiracy to try to convince people that less is more. That a few successful sellers is proof that the site works. That subpar is really acceptable. The botched relaunch is merely a nail on the coffin. Either by plan or sheer ignorance, the owners have failed us all. And we have that group of support-at-any-cost folks to thank for that.
Because instead of joining those demanding excellence from a site that had the opportunity to be just that, they chose to make excuses for it. And that I will never understand.
To make matters worse, some of the intentional changes seem designed to confuse, at best, or mislead. Days before the relaunch, there were under 8,000 shops (many abandoned or "name holders"). At relaunch, prospective sellers are urged to join 43,000 plus "creatives". Now, elsewhere on the internet, the owners had claimed there were 10,000 shops, so their math has always been questionable. But 43,000? Requests for how they came up with this number were ignored. Zibbet did respond via a tweet. Here it is: 43,944 sellers have joined Zibbet over the years. Amazing! Look out for that number to keep growing faster & faster!" What's amazing is that they actually publish this number. There were less than 8,000 sellers last week, meaning that over 35,000 sellers have come and gone! 8,000 sellers, many empty, many place holders, many with banners directing to their Etsy shop. PS, Zibbet, glad you are enjoying my blog.
The shops no longer show how many items they sold, making it impossible for a prospective investor in the site to make an educated decision about whether it works for sellers or not. And they can't access the off-site forums unless they sign up and are approved, and they won't see a balanced discussion if they do. The owners have muted "negative" shopkeepers, and coached a handful of users in a private forum, to bully any "negative" posters (trolls, as the owner Andrew Gray characterized them), and manipulate by posting la-las and games to bury meaty business posts.
And that handful of users, instead of demanding excellence in a site they invest time and money in, conspire to keep it performing poorly. By trying to beat down, silence, threaten and bully those who do demand the site perform. By questioning their sanity, their business sense, their ethics. And accepting anything dished out.
Because apparently pretending a site is excellent is preferable to demanding that it rise to the opportunity it had and perform excellently. Tweeting and pinning and buying each others' items in a pathetic attempt to bring in traffic that they should demand the owners bring in just by providing a credible, working site. Why?
Instead of asking themselves why there is such outrage over the site's management, they defend it. (Does it really help a site for owners to publicly lie and trash sellers they banned from their forums?) Instead of demanding the owners step up and perform basic public relations fence mending, they try amateurish bullying behavior to try and cowl furious customers who want their money back. Even this disastrous relaunch keeps them on message.
Why? Some have suggested it is a C3 church thing, some have suggested there is a financial incentive, some have suggested it's the charismatic owners taking advantage of lonely people.
I don't have any evidence of any of it. I did learn recently that the one who sent me emails threatening not only to sue me but to have me arrested (and I suppose, extradited to Florida for tweeting) bragged that she was in daily telephone conversations with one of the owners.
But I have no proof of that, not being in on those conversations.
What I do know is this: Zibbet has failed to become a credible alternative and the relaunch just confirms that they either aren't up to the task or never had any intention to. And so it fails at the most glorious opportunity they will ever have.
But more and more are suggesting that it doesn't matter to the owners how subpar the site is as long as there's another "mark" to buy a membership, since that's how they make THEIR money.
All of us would have benefited from real competition to Etsy, and it will never happen. Because instead of demanding excellence from its owners, that very vocal and active group made excuses for them, like a doting mom and a spoiled child. (Oh, officer, my baby would NEVER go over the speed limit!) And the sad thing is, everyone who sells handmade, vintage and supplies is let down. Because of an inexplicable conspiracy to try to convince people that less is more. That a few successful sellers is proof that the site works. That subpar is really acceptable. The botched relaunch is merely a nail on the coffin. Either by plan or sheer ignorance, the owners have failed us all. And we have that group of support-at-any-cost folks to thank for that.
Because instead of joining those demanding excellence from a site that had the opportunity to be just that, they chose to make excuses for it. And that I will never understand.
Friday, July 25, 2014
What's the truth about Zibbet? I want a refund!
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| Happy I didn't waste money or time on Zibbet! |
I personally want my money back.
Monday, May 19, 2014
Or, Don't Read the Zibbet Forums, Owners Jonathan Peacock and Pastor Andrew Gray Close the Doors
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| Zibbet makes me sad |
But last night, the Zibbet forums doors were closed by the owners, Jonathan Peacock and Andrew Gray. Apparently, some observations about how the owners of Zibbet made their money from unsuspecting newbies were not appreciated. So instead of answering the questions and comments, Peacock and Gray just put a padlock on the door.
And they won't open it for anyone whom they have suspended. Which is anyone who's questioned how the money we gave them is being spent, why the services we paid for weren't provided, and why the traffic and sales are just SO BAD. Or anyone they just don't like, apparently, even people who have never posted in their forums!
So if you wanted to check out the Zibbet forums, you are out of luck unless you're willing to sign up to read them. But really, why bother? Does a "say only nicey-nice things about this site you invested in, or else you aren't allowed to READ, much less POST" forum really provide any data for you to use? Uh, no. And what's particularly sad is that there isn't much nicey-nice to read either. Hours and hours pass with nary a peep except for self promotions ("I need to pay my bills, buy from me") and ("Show me your pink items and I'll show you mine"), which somehow passes as professional marketing in Zibbet land now. Unless someone asks a real question, then a flurry of comments before the post is closed by the owners and the questioner quickly muted and denied access to even read. No real discussion allowed!!!
So, no worries! I take back my earlier advice to visit them. Don't even bother with the Zibbet forums, they are officially useless. There's plenty of info, real analysis, real facts, including screen shots, all over the internet. Again, I'd invite you to read this blog from the bottom up. Do a search in the Etsy forums, where the Zibbet BoyZ can't zip up lips they don't like. Take a peek at Twitter. There's lots of info out there on Zibbet, you don't have to have a secret password and pledge of undying love and loyalty to find it! And then decide if your time and money are worth it. Robin
Tuesday, April 22, 2014
Giving Up on Zibbet was Hard to Do
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| Zibbet makes me sad. |
But I wanted to sell on Zibbet. I invested in the promise...and promises...of Zibbet, and watching it slide back into oblivion makes me angry. So unnecessary. Like witnessing a teenager who self destructs - so needless, so sad, pathetic and wasteful. Every site stat is going backwards.
The owners seem to think that if they finally do relaunch the site, it will solve all their problems. Their self-inflicted problems. They had some of the best, brightest and energetic sellers buy into Zibbet last fall and they alienated almost every one of them.
By doing nothing to promote sales. Nothing to promote Vintage. And the strangest public relations from any owners of a business most of us have ever seen.
The owners, Jonathan Peacock and Andrew Gray oddly thought that by revamping their forums to be "positive" and muting people would draw savvy sellers. Today I looked at it, zero activity in the Business forum. The only forum with life ... if you call posts 4 hours ago life ... is the Promotion one. Forums matter. It's the little window into the site, and when the owners take it upon themselves to moderate them, it's a little window into the management of the site. And the view in has been a horror show, or a lesson in what NOT to do to maintain and gain paying customers.
In this case, Owners who call sellers "trolls" in a secret forum they conspired in with other sellers, designed to artificially keep sellers from speaking their truth about the site and pit seller against seller. And then publicly mock those who say the owners are doing just that. (Screen shots sure can come in handy!)
Owners who publicly discuss their company's personnel issues and their failure to hire competent staff, or manage the project, so blame their employees for the debacle. Owners who made time to patrol forums, private group posts, twitter posts, to mute discussions, join in on private forums to name call their customers, but can't find the time to oversee the project that ALL of their customer's livelihood depends on. And that we paid for.
Owners who publicly discuss paying customers who they have decided to mute from their forum, allowing a virtual feeding frenzy on rumor and untruths go unchecked, and the victims unable to respond. For instance, floating a rumor that one of us attacked another seller on the Zibbet forums, using profanities, which interestingly was never seen by anyone, nor been substantiated. Yet that rumor keeps being whispered down the lane, like 12 year olds at a slumber party.
Owners who mute sellers who warned that a Google rep told them that Zibbet's partnership with a pay-for-links scheme site would very likely result in "punishment" for all items on Zibbet in Google searches. Owners who deleted that warning.
Owners who wait until they are "outed" on their own forums before disclosing ugly things...like that they support controversial political views and tweeted about them connecting our Zibbet shops with that ugliness.
Or that they were not providing services they charged us for.
Or that they were not meeting the deadline they advertised for the rebuild, not even close. Not until confronted on the forums were these issues disclosed.
There was a reason so many of us invested MONEY in Zibbet. It was the promises there, the potential there and the direction Etsy was heading. Etsy is still heading in that direction, the promises are still being made at Zibbet, but the potential was not only halted, but put into reverse.
I wanted it to work and I'm angry it obviously won't. Because I spent $237 in good faith and so did lots of other sellers. A waste. All I have left from my Zibbet dreams is the ability to warn others. If you are thinking about investing your time or money there, I'd invite you to read this blog from the bottom up. You'll see screen shots that are fact, not rumor. I'd invite you to google and read others' warnings about the site. I'd invite you to visit their forums.
And if after that, you want to invest in it, well, all the best to you. At least you have info that we didn't have last fall about the site. There are a few folks who sell well enough at Zibbet as a second site to keep a presence there. But it could have been sooooo much more. And it should have been, for all the money we invested.
Tuesday, February 18, 2014
Does Zibbet do well in Google Searchs? A review and another few tests.
First off, please remember that Google remembers us and shows us what it thinks we want to see. This means that searching for our own items is likely to result in artificial results for how our items are showing to our buyers. For this reason, to run these tests, I use things that I don't sell. I'd love to hear if your tests on someone else's items are similar or different from mine.
In order to show you the most relevant results, we have omitted some entries very similar to the 148 already displayed.
Permalink Reply by
Fact. As of today there are 839 listings for "lampwork earrings" on Zibbet. I pick this because I'm a fan and often search for new ones to buy. So I googled that term. It's how I, as a buyer, shop for new earrings. It's not how Zibbet owner, Jonathan Peacock says buyers shop, but, hey.
So I searched for "lampwork earrings" and here's what I see.
First I see...
that every page in Google search results shows photos of 4 different lampwork earrings from Etsy or another site, the PHOTOS of them are in the Google Shopping. Zibbet does not provide this advertising to its customers like Etsy does. (Although it advertised that it did when it wasn't (have screen shots, J and A)). So in this search, on every page, I was shown different, gorgeous photos of lampwork earrings, 60 of them. And if you click on one, you go right to that item to buy.
As a buyer, I probably wouldn't even bother scrolling down the regular search results, I've already clicked on a cute set of earrings I SAW and am shopping at their Etsy shop. But say I did scroll down to "regular google". In 15 pages, or 148 results, only ONE listing for a Zibbet item shows. On page 4. 839 Zibbet listings, only one result in Google for as far as any buyer is likely to search. Ahead of that lone Zibbet listing are etsy, ebay, alibaba, amazon, artfire, THE FIND.COM, etc. and dozens and dozens of stand alone websites and blogs, flickr photos, etc.
Get to the bottom off page 15, and Google gives this message:
In order to show you the most relevant results, we have omitted some entries very similar to the 148 already displayed.
If you like, you can repeat the search with the omitted results included.
Wha????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????
Think your potential customer hasn't already clicked on someone else's by now? That they are going to REPEAT the search?
Next, I took one of the "most relevant" of those earrings in the ZIBBET search and pasted the exact title into Google search. "Lampwork Pink Rose Earrings". The "long tail tag" search that Zibbet owner Jonathan Peacock claims will do the trick and get items from Zibbet found. Also because they are darned cute!
There are 16 "lampwork pink rose earrings" items at Zibbet search results. At google, however 10 pages later, those earrings never appeared. NEVER. Cut and pasted the exact title and it's invisible for 10 pages of google results!
Again, only ONE Zibbet item showed, on Page 5 (from one of my favorite sellers, yay!). Curiously, the ONE Zibbet item that showed in Google doesn't show in Zibbet's Own SEARCH using the identical search terms! (they are stunning earrings, by the way!).
By the time I got to the bottom of Page 10, some pretty non-relevant things were showing, things like photographs that included the words "pink" and "rose". And again, I've been shown gorgeous lampwork pink rose earrings photos from Etsy. 44 of them. Think I haven't already clicked on one and gone to Etsy to shop?
SO WHY AREN'T ZIBBET ITEMS SHOWING ON GOOGLE??? WHAT is going on here????
But wait! Here's a work around solution provided in the Zibbet forums! Apparently, NING, the independent site that hosts the Zibbet forums, is in better favor with google. Because, if you post your items on the Ning-hosted Zibbet forums, they can be found by google! Or you can post them on Pinterest or Flickr. Where somehow, the search terms Jonathan Peacock thinks can't be found for our Zibbet items, CAN be found.
I will say it again and have several times.
Putting photos on the bottom of the Community board here on main page with a link and having people comment Google picks it up immediately.
Extremely important tool like a Billboard IMHO.
Sandy
So why aren't our Zibbet showing on Google within a reasonable amount of pages? Why do we have to use an independent site like Ning or Pinterest to capture Google's interest and then redirect to your Zibbet items? Why isn't Zibbet capturing Google's interest? (I am not saying the Zibbet items aren't picked up EVER on google, but the back of the pack is the opposite place we need to be!) And all the competitors, standalones and blogs seem to be able to? People with zero IT, engineering skill or internet interfacing skill or even the ability to build their own sites, are getting found BEFORE ZIBBET. Why?
Ask the owners. And demand a REAL answer. Them telling you that YOU need to work on YOUR SEO is not it. Ask them what, exactly, is the issue and what, exactly, Zibbet is doing about these dismal results?
I'd ask them myself but I was muted from their forums for asking questions like that, apparently.
But, look. Don't take my word for it. Run these tests yourself (unless you sell lampwork or earrings, because your results will be substantially different). Or pick other things BUYERS search for.
I'll publish your results.
Whether they agree with mine or not.
You have my word. Because I'd just like to get to the bottom of this. And again, I want my money back.
Monday, February 17, 2014
Zibbet Review: Owners Jonathan Peacock & Andrew Gray Should Personally Invest to Provide What They Sold Customers
Why should Zibbet customers bear the financial hit for owners Jonathan Peacock and Andrew Gray's delay in the rebuild? They owe their customers all of what we paid for and should personally invest in the site to provide those services or refund every single customer for the fees paid, if requested Their "oh gee, we sold you this, but you aren't getting it" is not acceptable.
We were sold these things:
1. That the site would be rebuilt early 2014, with date of relaunch to be announced in January. (Not happening, and no solid date will be given).
2. That Zibbet was automatically submitting our items to 20 million buyers at The Find.com. (Not happening, blamed on Zibbet site issues that will be fixed in the rebuild but not disclosed AND STILL USED TO LURE NEW CUSTOMERS until "outed" a few weeks ago on the forums. The "false expectations" referenced by Peacock and quoted below.
When cornered on the Zibbet forums in January about the silence on the rebuild, CEO Jonathan Peacock admitted:
Essentially we have over-promised and significantly under-delivered, which is NEVER good in business.
No, it is not. And wouldn't be acceptable to 99% of the experienced Etsy sellers who invested in Zibbet shops in whole or in part on the promises given in their forums and on their sales page.
MANY of us with businesses scramble at times to ensure we deliver as promised to OUR customers. Sometimes it means pulling all-nighters, sometimes it means spending our family money to hire help or resources.
I have done it. I've accepted portrait commissions with a Christmas deadline that I find I underestimated. The ethical thing for me to do is to do all I can, personally, to fulfill my promise. That means investing my family money into doing whatever I MUST DO to make it happen. I pay out of pocket for expedited shipping, I get take out, I stay up all night until my eyeballs literally burn to honor my contract with my customer.
I don't just wait until I'm past deadline and cornered, to tell the customer: I have over-promised and significantly under-delivered, which is NEVER good in business and leave it at that, as Zibbet has done! Precious few of us would ever do that. If I were ever in the position that I could not deliver, I would offer a refund. Zibbet refuses to do that. WE pay for their mistakes, not them. The owners, Jonathan Peacock and Andrew Gray, should dig into their own pockets to live up to their promises, like most of us do when we err.
WHY THE REBUILD TIMING MATTERS
Why does the rebuild date matter so much that it affects our bottom lines? Because the current Zibbet site does not entice buyers or promote sales. And time is money. Knowing you're blowing a couple of months fees til the site relaunches is a loss many of us were willing to take BASED ON THE PROMISES of the owners. Losing half a year? Not acceptable. Not even knowing if the whole year's worth of fees are blown because they have no idea when they'll launch after taking our money? Unacceptable. They should refund us since they can't deliver what they sold us. Personally, if necessary.
Many of us were willing to invest in shops last fall based on representations Zibbet made regarding the rebuild timing. Some were planning "Shop Grand Openings" this winter, to coincide with the promised relaunch, this month or next. The time wasted on listing at Zibbet in anticipation of the promised relaunch is a financial hit few of us sellers will ever recover from. It is so much more than just the Premium Account fees, and I want that back, too!
WHY THE REBUILD MATTERS
The "rebuild" or "relaunch" of the site was mentioned frequently as the panacea for all the other issues on the site. The horrible, blurry photos of our items, the wait of nearly an hour for newly listed items to appear, the downtime, the tacky and dated-looking front page, the lack of credible site stats, issues with checkout and paypal interfacing, the inability to bulk edit, the dinosaur-age message system between buyers and sellers, the site slowness, the site stability, the awful jerry-rigged internal search, to name just a few issues that make Zibbet shops less competitive than selling on up to date ones.
All of which affects the "sellers" (Zibbet paying customers) bottom line because buyers aren't attracted to buy, or even brought to the site at all as promised.
WHY THE FIND.COM MATTERS
Zibbet's stability issues is the excuse for why 20 million buyers are not being shown our items via The Find.com. Since we knew Zibbet has little internal traffic, being found via the internet is essential. Yet Zibbet chose to stop providing that service and didn't tell us, again until forced to when confronted on the forums.
Yes, we paying customers all assumed our items were being promoted via The Find. Zibbet said so, had it as a major feature on the page to invest in a shop on Zibbet WHEN WE BOUGHT. How could we have possibly known that was NOT TRUE? Knowing that our items were being submitted to 20 million buyers on The Find.com was a selling point for many of us. It is why I invested in 3 paying Zibbet shops, in addition to the promised relaunch. It was used by the owners as a major selling point up to the day they were forced to admit on the forums that they were not providing that service! See cut and paste (J and A, I also have screen shots).
THE BO
Permalink Reply by on
Again the relaunch used as an excuse not to provide this service (which many of us find very helpful productive elsewhere where we can actually track where our views come from). Also note that his opinion on getting more traffic by listing more is in dispute, being that my research and others' is showing that Google isn't providing ANY results for Zibbet within 10 pages for buyers searching for common items like "steampunk earrings", see previous posts in this blog on this issue.
THE BOTTOM LINE
So the relaunch we were promised by the owners AND the outside promotion sold to us by the owners are not happening, we customers are left holding the bag. What are owners Jonathan Peacock and Andrew Gray doing to uphold the contract they made with us?
Are they refunding when requested? Nope. We pay, they don't.
Are they investing their own money? Haven't heard it. In fact, they say the rebuild all hinges on Zibbet Premium Account money. My money. Your money. Not their money.
There are sellers like me who depend on their online sales to pay their bills. Their mortgages, electric, food, water, children's schools, health insurance, supplies. Sellers who do whatever it takes to live up to the promises they made to their customers. Sellers who invested their hard earned money in a site where owners make promises, then kinda shrug their shoulders, and say "gosh, gee, this is LOT harder than I thought, heh, heh, well, maybe someday you'll get what you paid for, but I ain't making any more promises!" Tee hee.
They NOW say (I cut and paste, have screen shot):
We would encourage those that are considering a Premium membership only on the basis of the rebuild, to wait until launch to upgrade. We don't want to create any false expectations."
--------
And I say What about those who already PAID for a (or many) PREMIUM MEMBERSHIPS ON THE BASIS OF THE EXPECTATIONS THAT YOU CREATED THAT WERE FALSE?
What is the ethical thing to do? What is the moral thing to do? What is a good business thing to do?
Refund those of us who have requested it. And stop chasing even more sellers away with your whack-a-mole mutings of customers who ask you hard questions in the Zibbet forums. We just want what we paid for. From whatever source you have to get the money, Zibbet owners Jonathan Peacock and Andrew Gray, whatever it takes, just do it.
The momentum Zibbet HAD in the fall began to crumble when Andrew Gray put all of our shops at risk by tweeting controversial political opinions and religious views along with tweets about Zibbet. And their subsequent actions on the forums hurt, too. But refusing to refund those of us who have requested them because of promises not kept and services not rendered, is the biggest blow. It's gone from primary site or second selling site to not worth it at all. Based on owner actions and inactions. We all deserve better. Give us our money back. It's only right.
We were sold these things:
1. That the site would be rebuilt early 2014, with date of relaunch to be announced in January. (Not happening, and no solid date will be given).
2. That Zibbet was automatically submitting our items to 20 million buyers at The Find.com. (Not happening, blamed on Zibbet site issues that will be fixed in the rebuild but not disclosed AND STILL USED TO LURE NEW CUSTOMERS until "outed" a few weeks ago on the forums. The "false expectations" referenced by Peacock and quoted below.
When cornered on the Zibbet forums in January about the silence on the rebuild, CEO Jonathan Peacock admitted:
Essentially we have over-promised and significantly under-delivered, which is NEVER good in business.
No, it is not. And wouldn't be acceptable to 99% of the experienced Etsy sellers who invested in Zibbet shops in whole or in part on the promises given in their forums and on their sales page.
MANY of us with businesses scramble at times to ensure we deliver as promised to OUR customers. Sometimes it means pulling all-nighters, sometimes it means spending our family money to hire help or resources.
I have done it. I've accepted portrait commissions with a Christmas deadline that I find I underestimated. The ethical thing for me to do is to do all I can, personally, to fulfill my promise. That means investing my family money into doing whatever I MUST DO to make it happen. I pay out of pocket for expedited shipping, I get take out, I stay up all night until my eyeballs literally burn to honor my contract with my customer.
I don't just wait until I'm past deadline and cornered, to tell the customer: I have over-promised and significantly under-delivered, which is NEVER good in business and leave it at that, as Zibbet has done! Precious few of us would ever do that. If I were ever in the position that I could not deliver, I would offer a refund. Zibbet refuses to do that. WE pay for their mistakes, not them. The owners, Jonathan Peacock and Andrew Gray, should dig into their own pockets to live up to their promises, like most of us do when we err.
WHY THE REBUILD TIMING MATTERS
Why does the rebuild date matter so much that it affects our bottom lines? Because the current Zibbet site does not entice buyers or promote sales. And time is money. Knowing you're blowing a couple of months fees til the site relaunches is a loss many of us were willing to take BASED ON THE PROMISES of the owners. Losing half a year? Not acceptable. Not even knowing if the whole year's worth of fees are blown because they have no idea when they'll launch after taking our money? Unacceptable. They should refund us since they can't deliver what they sold us. Personally, if necessary.
Many of us were willing to invest in shops last fall based on representations Zibbet made regarding the rebuild timing. Some were planning "Shop Grand Openings" this winter, to coincide with the promised relaunch, this month or next. The time wasted on listing at Zibbet in anticipation of the promised relaunch is a financial hit few of us sellers will ever recover from. It is so much more than just the Premium Account fees, and I want that back, too!
WHY THE REBUILD MATTERS
The "rebuild" or "relaunch" of the site was mentioned frequently as the panacea for all the other issues on the site. The horrible, blurry photos of our items, the wait of nearly an hour for newly listed items to appear, the downtime, the tacky and dated-looking front page, the lack of credible site stats, issues with checkout and paypal interfacing, the inability to bulk edit, the dinosaur-age message system between buyers and sellers, the site slowness, the site stability, the awful jerry-rigged internal search, to name just a few issues that make Zibbet shops less competitive than selling on up to date ones.
All of which affects the "sellers" (Zibbet paying customers) bottom line because buyers aren't attracted to buy, or even brought to the site at all as promised.
WHY THE FIND.COM MATTERS
Zibbet's stability issues is the excuse for why 20 million buyers are not being shown our items via The Find.com. Since we knew Zibbet has little internal traffic, being found via the internet is essential. Yet Zibbet chose to stop providing that service and didn't tell us, again until forced to when confronted on the forums.
Yes, we paying customers all assumed our items were being promoted via The Find. Zibbet said so, had it as a major feature on the page to invest in a shop on Zibbet WHEN WE BOUGHT. How could we have possibly known that was NOT TRUE? Knowing that our items were being submitted to 20 million buyers on The Find.com was a selling point for many of us. It is why I invested in 3 paying Zibbet shops, in addition to the promised relaunch. It was used by the owners as a major selling point up to the day they were forced to admit on the forums that they were not providing that service! See cut and paste (J and A, I also have screen shots).
- Hi Deb,
We've had some issues that we haven't been able to resolve with our feed to The Find. Some sellers will find a few of their items on The Find, others will not.
The main reason we've had trouble getting it to work, is because of the bad architecture of our current site.
We have decided that we're going to hold off on sumbitting to The Find until the relaunch of the new site. The Find doesn't send a huge amount of traffic to Zibbet for the items that are indexed there, so we deemed it low priority.
You should definitely get to listing those items though. The organic traffic that you'll get from your items being indexed on Google, Yahoo and other search engines, will far outweigh the traffic that The Find would send you.
- Permalink Reply by on
- Btw, I will organize for The Find reference to be removed from the seller sign-up page. Hopefully this will avoid confusion in between now and relaunch.
THE BO
Hi everyone,
As mentioned, The Find feed submission hasn't been working for a while. It is now removed from our pricing page. We apologize to anyone that felt mislead by this. It was not our intention.
Whilst TheFind has the potential to send traffic to Zibbet, it is a very small amount. If it were significant, we would be straight onto fixing it right away. You will get more traffic by simply listing 10 more items in your shop, which will get picked up by Google and other search engines, then you would from The Find.
I'm going to close this thread up and if anyone has further questions, you are welcome to email me directly:
As mentioned, The Find feed submission hasn't been working for a while. It is now removed from our pricing page. We apologize to anyone that felt mislead by this. It was not our intention.
Whilst TheFind has the potential to send traffic to Zibbet, it is a very small amount. If it were significant, we would be straight onto fixing it right away. You will get more traffic by simply listing 10 more items in your shop, which will get picked up by Google and other search engines, then you would from The Find.
I'm going to close this thread up and if anyone has further questions, you are welcome to email me directly:
Again the relaunch used as an excuse not to provide this service (which many of us find very helpful productive elsewhere where we can actually track where our views come from). Also note that his opinion on getting more traffic by listing more is in dispute, being that my research and others' is showing that Google isn't providing ANY results for Zibbet within 10 pages for buyers searching for common items like "steampunk earrings", see previous posts in this blog on this issue.
THE BOTTOM LINE
So the relaunch we were promised by the owners AND the outside promotion sold to us by the owners are not happening, we customers are left holding the bag. What are owners Jonathan Peacock and Andrew Gray doing to uphold the contract they made with us?
Are they refunding when requested? Nope. We pay, they don't.
Are they investing their own money? Haven't heard it. In fact, they say the rebuild all hinges on Zibbet Premium Account money. My money. Your money. Not their money.
There are sellers like me who depend on their online sales to pay their bills. Their mortgages, electric, food, water, children's schools, health insurance, supplies. Sellers who do whatever it takes to live up to the promises they made to their customers. Sellers who invested their hard earned money in a site where owners make promises, then kinda shrug their shoulders, and say "gosh, gee, this is LOT harder than I thought, heh, heh, well, maybe someday you'll get what you paid for, but I ain't making any more promises!" Tee hee.
They NOW say (I cut and paste, have screen shot):
We would encourage those that are considering a Premium membership only on the basis of the rebuild, to wait until launch to upgrade. We don't want to create any false expectations."
--------
And I say What about those who already PAID for a (or many) PREMIUM MEMBERSHIPS ON THE BASIS OF THE EXPECTATIONS THAT YOU CREATED THAT WERE FALSE?
What is the ethical thing to do? What is the moral thing to do? What is a good business thing to do?
Refund those of us who have requested it. And stop chasing even more sellers away with your whack-a-mole mutings of customers who ask you hard questions in the Zibbet forums. We just want what we paid for. From whatever source you have to get the money, Zibbet owners Jonathan Peacock and Andrew Gray, whatever it takes, just do it.
The momentum Zibbet HAD in the fall began to crumble when Andrew Gray put all of our shops at risk by tweeting controversial political opinions and religious views along with tweets about Zibbet. And their subsequent actions on the forums hurt, too. But refusing to refund those of us who have requested them because of promises not kept and services not rendered, is the biggest blow. It's gone from primary site or second selling site to not worth it at all. Based on owner actions and inactions. We all deserve better. Give us our money back. It's only right.
Friday, February 14, 2014
Zibbet Review: Why can't I find any Zibbet items in Google, owners Jonathan Peacock and Andrew Gray?
 |
| Zibbet makes me sad! |
Maybe I missed their response?
I did see other Zibbet customers responding, all over the map. So I did my own research. Being that Zibbet owners only admitted when outed that they weren't submitting our items to 20 million buyers at The Find.com, as they had advertised they were, alarm bells went off, hearing that people couldn't find their items on google, either. Not google shopping, Zibbet doesn't pay, like the other seller sites do, for our items to be found via Google Shopping. But regular old google.
I googled these items:
Steampunk Earrings
Squirrel Earrings
Hand made Miniatures
Polymer Clay Beads
And wasn't finding any of the hundreds of Zibbet items matching those items in Google within 5 or 10 PAGES of items. I found ebay, etsy, artfire, lots of stand alone sites, the find, amazon, books, blogs, no Zibbet. Is it just me? I tried another browser, still zilch.
I asked a friend to try and find these items and again, no dice. Now if I get overly specific, using all the words in a title, I can find them, but even then, the seller's stand alone and etsy shop outranked their Zibbet one, unless the exact order of words was used. And what BUYER is going to use your exact title to search to browse?
Now this surprised me. When I first began listing there, shortly after I bought a Premium membership, a few weeks in, I was finding my items. And I sold several vintage items to people who obviously found me via google, they had to sign up to Zibbit to buy. Right after Christmas, I searched again and wasn't finding my items anymore, but all the problems with Zibbet that arose from the C3 Church Twitter scandal were still swirling around that time, so I didn't really pursue it.
(I have since removed my items from Zibbet, I want my money back for my time and my fees spent there.)
So I had to search for other people's items, and I'm just not finding them. Which is actually a better way to search, since google returns search results they think you'll like. So you are more likely to find your own items anyway.
And others aren't finding Zibbet items on google either, judging from some of the questions posed in the forums, and as of the time of this writing (12:31 p.m., EST on 2/14/14), no explanation has been given by the Zibbet owners.
But I'd sure like to know. And I'm sure the other 9,000 plus people who have invested their money and/or time in Zibbet would, too. Is it just me? Let me know how well you do with searching for other people's items on google. Search the way a real shopper would. Not by copying and pasting a title, but a more general search. Like "steampunk earrings". And let me know what you find.
Is it just me? Or did something happen between Zibbet and google that we don't know about? Did the "pay for links" Handmadology scheme that seller ChuckEByrd warned was a "black hat" move that would get Zibbet penalized actually happen? (Chuck was muted from the forums by owner Andrew Gray for that warning, incidentally). Or something else? Or nothing else? Is it just me? I have no answers, only questions.
Since Zibbet has no internal shopping traffic to speak of, is not paying to have their customers' items in Google Shopping, is not submitting to The Find as promised, not showing up on regular Google within a reasonable number of pages is pretty alarming. We knew when we signed up that we would be relying on internet searches, not internal traffic, at Zibbet. If they aren't being shown...what exactly DID we pay money for? I want mine back. Plus compensation for the time I wasted there. How about you?
-------
Update! It's the sellers' fault for not knowing enough about SEO. According to CEO Jonathan Peacock's post in another thread, below.
See, we're not supposed to ask these questions:
1. Why aren't my items showing up in google when I search like a buyer does? The purpose is to have BUYERS find our items! Why do I have to almost copy the title to get a result from Zibbet? We experienced sellers know BUYERS search for things like "maple leaf earrings", not a whole string of words. AND
2. If it's the SELLERS' fault our Zibbet items aren't being found, because the internet is too "big" (???), then why do our items show up on Google with Etsy shops, Amazon, Artfire, blogs, stand alones, THE FIND, etc? Just not Zibbet?
You know, folks, you can't make this stuff up. Every day the management of Zibbet outdoes itself. To me, the following is just downright disrespectful and petulant.
Permalink Reply by
Hi Lee,
Firstly, just to clarify for everyone, whatever stats counters you install on Zibbet, using our "widgets" system, is INACCURATE. It will only count the visits to your shop from page and won't count visits to any of your items, your profile page, policies page, feedback etc etc.
Secondly, you can see if your shop is getting indexed by Google (as all Zibbet shops do), by Googling "site:www.zibbet.com/SHOPUSERNAME". In your case, you can see this here: https://www.google.com/#q=site%3Awww.zibbet.com%2FMammothIvoryCreat...
Thirdly, 42 Million results for "Mammoth Ivory" items means you're in a competitive space and means it would be extremely hard to rank highly in the search engines for this specific term. This means you need to try and be found using "long tail keywords". Long tail keywords is when you target longer strings of keywords that your customers my be searching for. You can figure out what 'long tail keywords' people are searching for using Keyword Planner as a guide.
Zibbet uses your titles and descriptions to sends Google the information they use to rank your items page / shop. This is just one of the many variables that Google uses to rank you. I have done a search for one of your item titles (which should be considered as a long tail keyword) and I found your item in the first position out of over 5,000 items: https://www.google.com/#q=+Fossil+Mammoth+Bone+Maple+Leaf+Post+Earr...
There are some really great articles on SEO in the Success on Zibbet blgo column. Have a wander through here if you're interested to learn more: http://www.zibbet.com/blog/tag/seo
Hope that helps to clarify. Zibbet absolutely submits your items to be indexed by Google and other search engines. One of the best parts about being with a marketplace such as Zibbet is that we have built up a lot of the things that Google looks for when deciding where to rank you. Sellers benefit from that.
If you can't get your shop / items ranking for your keywords, go for the long tail. The internet is big and competitive and there's millions of other sites trying to rank for the same thing. It all comes down to SEO. Learn about it and work on it if you want to rank better.
Firstly, just to clarify for everyone, whatever stats counters you install on Zibbet, using our "widgets" system, is INACCURATE. It will only count the visits to your shop from page and won't count visits to any of your items, your profile page, policies page, feedback etc etc.
Secondly, you can see if your shop is getting indexed by Google (as all Zibbet shops do), by Googling "site:www.zibbet.com/SHOPUSERNAME". In your case, you can see this here: https://www.google.com/#q=site%3Awww.zibbet.com%2FMammothIvoryCreat...
Thirdly, 42 Million results for "Mammoth Ivory" items means you're in a competitive space and means it would be extremely hard to rank highly in the search engines for this specific term. This means you need to try and be found using "long tail keywords". Long tail keywords is when you target longer strings of keywords that your customers my be searching for. You can figure out what 'long tail keywords' people are searching for using Keyword Planner as a guide.
Zibbet uses your titles and descriptions to sends Google the information they use to rank your items page / shop. This is just one of the many variables that Google uses to rank you. I have done a search for one of your item titles (which should be considered as a long tail keyword) and I found your item in the first position out of over 5,000 items: https://www.google.com/#q=+Fossil+Mammoth+Bone+Maple+Leaf+Post+Earr...
There are some really great articles on SEO in the Success on Zibbet blgo column. Have a wander through here if you're interested to learn more: http://www.zibbet.com/blog/tag/seo
Hope that helps to clarify. Zibbet absolutely submits your items to be indexed by Google and other search engines. One of the best parts about being with a marketplace such as Zibbet is that we have built up a lot of the things that Google looks for when deciding where to rank you. Sellers benefit from that.
If you can't get your shop / items ranking for your keywords, go for the long tail. The internet is big and competitive and there's millions of other sites trying to rank for the same thing. It all comes down to SEO. Learn about it and work on it if you want to rank better.
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