Jeremiah Wright

Hi Shawn. Thanks for your feedback. Great questions.

1) Sellers describe themselves and their products on the Niche website. If we discover false or misleading claims, we ask the seller to address the concerns, and if they don’t, we delete their account. In the future, we intend to add features to further inform consumers about sellers, such as customer reviews and ratings, buttons to report inappropriate or inaccurate content, etc. Sellers are also legally liable, if they commit fraud or make false, misleading, or deceptive claims about a product, for example.

I created Niche with the goal of helping small producers with direct-to-consumer sales and marketing, and that’s our focus on the seller side. On the consumer side, the goal is to make it easy for people to inform themselves about the available products, and to find the products they want. If we get a lot of feedback saying, “Hey, I keep seeing sellers and products that I don’t consider local,” then we will add features to help users filter products according to their definition of “local”. In this first version, we kept it simple.

2. Niche is brand new, and we released this free version to get user feedback before the season ends. The current plan is to charge sellers based on the number of products they list, with at least one listing remaining free forever. We might offer some “premium” features as well. We expect most sellers to pay less than $30/month and for many sellers to scale up their listings for a few months of the year, and scale way back the rest of the time, due to seasonal production.

I’m curious to hear more about the kind of information you would like to have about your Niche customers. It would be relatively easy, for example, to add a button that lets users sign up for your mailing list by providing their email address. That's exactly the kind of feedback we want to hear.

Hi Annie. Thanks for the idea and the link.

danijelagranic on Fiverr did a great job designing the postcards: https://www.fiverr.com/danijelagranic

I created a mobile app called Niche - Shop Local to help small-scale producers (and other small businesses) advertise their products, find new customers, and stay in touch with existing customers.

Producers sign up on the Niche website - https://www.nicheapp.us - and describe their products, locations, and schedule.

Customers use the Android and iOS mobile apps to:
• browse local products,
• search for products by name, seller, category, and location,
• view product and seller descriptions, availabilities, and prices,
• save products to a shopping list,
• save sellers as favorites,
• get notified when favorite sellers make new posts,
• share product listings on social media, and
• get directions and travel times to retail locations.

Niche is currently free for both sellers and customers, and it takes about 10 minutes for a seller to setup their first product and see it in the app.



We also provide small signs (postcards) that can be displayed at farmers' market stands, and next to the register, telling customers to "Find us on Niche".

I created a mobile app called Niche - Shop Local to help small-scale producers (and other small businesses) find new customers and stay in touch with existing customers.

Producers sign up on the Niche website - https://www.nicheapp.us - and describe their products, locations, and schedule.

Customers use the Android and iOS mobile apps to:
• browse local products,
• search for products by name, seller, category, and location,
• view product and seller descriptions, availabilities, and prices,
• save products to a shopping list,
• save sellers as favorites,
• get notified when favorite sellers make new posts,
• share product listings on social media, and
• get directions and travel times to retail locations.

Niche is currently free for both sellers and customers, and it takes about 10 minutes for a seller to setup their first product and see it in the app.



We also provide small signs (postcards) that can be displayed at farmers' market stands, and next to the register, telling customers to "Find us on Niche":

I created a mobile app for local shopping called Niche - Shop Local, and I'm looking for feedback and advice, especially WRT marketing to small-scale producers.

The idea is for small businesses and small-scale producers to sign up on the Niche website - https://www.nicheapp.us - and describe their products, locations, and schedule.

Then, customers can use the Android and iOS mobile apps to:
• browse local products,
• search for products by name, seller, category, and location,
• view product and seller descriptions, availabilities, and prices,
• save products to a shopping list,
• save sellers to favorites and read their posts,
• share product listings on social media, and
• get directions and travel times to retail locations.



Niche is currently free for both sellers and customers, and it takes about 10 minutes for a seller to setup their first product and see it in the app.

My current marketing plan is to print postcards that I will mail and hand out to vendors at farmers' markets. One side is directed to the seller, describing the benefits of signing up, and the other side can be displayed at their register, telling customers to "Find us on Niche".



How can I get small-scale producers to try the app, give feedback, and spread the word to other producers?