Pay-per-offer explained!

[GateKeeper]

I received an email yesterday from an irate customer. He was upset because he had just paid $4.95 to respond to a vacationer's inquiry regarding his resort. The angry customer accused this website of being a "rip off" because the inquiry did not amount to a sale, or appear to be a legitimate "offer".
I'd like to explain the concept of our pay-per-offer model in detail with the above example in mind and contrast it with another scenario that played itself out at the same time.
For ease of discussion, we will call the angry customer, Mr. X. Mr. X came upon TSG by one means or another and made the decision to try the service. There were no fees required to join as a member, and no payment required to place an ad. To begin with, this is a very low risk for anyone considering selling or renting their timeshare. It is effectively risk free. Mr. X was fortunate. He actually got someone to look at his ad and was able to garner a response to his ad. The nature of the inquiry is almost irrelevant in this case since what is important is that he was able to get someone's attention. Because the inquiry did not involve final negotiations, or even the slightest hint of interest from the curious shopper, Mr. X concluded that the process of paying for the opportunity to speak with potential customers was not successful. Mr. X missed the boat.
Let me contrast this with a similar inquiry that Mrs. C encountered yesterday. Mrs. C paid $4.95 to respond to an inquiry in which the amount the other member indicated in the offer was $0.00, meaning he was not necessarily ready to make an offer. Mrs. C, however, saw this as an opportunity to SELL their unit to the POTENTIAL customer. She wrote a very nice response to the other member, made very clear points about the value of her points based system, offered the customer the sense she was willing to negotiate on the price, etc., etc. Mrs. C embraced the concept of paying for this lead and took full advantage of the audience at hand to sell her unit.
Both situations above offered their respective owners an opportunity to promote each of their timeshares. Mr. X clearly did not appreciate what that opportunity was and chose rather to suggest the process is flawed. My question to Mr. X was simply where else would he go and place an ad at no cost and pay for opportunities/leads/offers as they are generated.
The message for our readers is that the Pay-per-offer advertising model does not guarantee success or even that the other party is ready to enter serious negotiations. The model is designed to produce an equitable process by which timeshare owners can advertise their units for sale and pay incrementally as opportunities arise. Imagine paying $20 or $75 for an ad and never hearing anything from anyone. I wonder if Mr. X will be happier paying for his ad up front and taking his chances he'll find a buyer. Either way he will need to change his stance. Every contact is a potential buyer or renter, what each of us do with these contacts is up to us.

[wanderer]

Wow, what a great description of "it's what you make of it."

It's unfortunate that Mr X became upset, but there are no guarantees in advertising. The first step of the sales cycle is getting the fish to nibble. Reeling that fish in, as Mrs C did, is for the seller to accomplish.

You just never know what some good old-fashioned salesmanship can do!