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DavyJames
12
Oct 3, 2017
When does a drop really end? I have watched these, and the Black edition plus some other headphones, countdown for a while now. They get close to finishing but then the clock goes up and the countdown starts again and again. As someone new to Massdrop I wonder why this happens. Its an interesting, perhaps unusual, business practice.
Jmunandar
174
Oct 3, 2017
DavyJamesSometimes Massdrop does a thing where a product drops and ends every day for a few days. Dont know why they do it, maybe due to popularity of the product or they just have enough stock on hand to do so. what usually happens is they get the number of people who want to join the drop, after the drop ends they contact the manufacturer, which then after manufacturing, sends them to massdrop hq, who then ships it to those who purchased (I think this is how it works, anyone can correct me if im wrong). So those that get in on the drop today, should get it earlier than those who get in on the drop tomorrow. At least thats what i remember the expected shipping date showing when i was watching this drop.
DavyJames
12
Oct 4, 2017
JmunandarThanks Jmunandar. Your explanation makes sense but Massdrop practices don't. If something like the AKG7XXs are more or less permanently available, then simply say so. The product is selling itself so leave it up without a time limit. As it stands their business communication strategy is muddied by drops that never end and yet have a count-down, and polls that go nowhere. Simple things to fix. Practices of never ending count downs and polls that go nowhere detract from otherwise great service..
KJ741N
Oct 4, 2017
DavyJamesProbably nothing more than the tried-and-true marketing ploy - "time ending soon - buy NOW!" When in fact there are thousands on hand and selling will continue.
Remember, companies like Massdrop are on-line marketers looking to make money, nothing more. Their "communities" facade is there for the sole purpose of sucking in potential sales.
sdfx
108
Oct 4, 2017
KJ741NShh they might hear you!!
McDoogle
187
Oct 4, 2017
DavyJamesI for one am sick of scrolling past the same headphones every day. I usually check Massdrop twice a day and unfortunately these headphones are always at the top of both the newest and ending soon lists. Very annoying.
DavyJamesThe "X hours left" on these pages is a byproduct of we built our website. Massdrop was built to run group buys, which have a limited time window and generally don't re-open until they're fulfilled (weeks or months later depending). Because of that, it's designed to express urgency (turning red when there's not as much time left).
As we started to do more collaborations and developing our own products, we found the group-buy model to be limiting. Because of that, we're offering these "daily drops" on our most popular products that are already in our warehouse ready to ship. We were running one drop per week, and folks that bought it on Monday had to wait until the drop would close (7 days) before we'd start processing the orders. This makes sense for group-buys, not so much for products that are already in inventory.
So instead of making everyone wait a week, we started closing the drops every day, and every day sending our warehouse the orders to prepare for shipment.
Because these drops are closing every day, the timer always shows "x hours left", which is correct. I can see how this would be perceived as trickery, but it's a by-product of using systems designed for a different style of selling things.
Will it always be this way? Probably not. Daily drops have been a big success (people like to get their stuff sooner? what a shock) and our product and engineering teams are working on a solution to support this kind of sales along side our standard drops.
McDoogleWe feel your pain, hopefully we'll have a better solution in-place soon.
Jmunandar
174
Oct 4, 2017
DavyJamesNp, the staff has come to explain in detail as to why it is this way.
KJ741NGood answer Will.
DavyJames
12
Oct 4, 2017
WillThanks for your answer. As KJ741N1 said, at the moment it does feel like a "clever", and very irritating, marketing ploy. Like McDoogle, I check Massdrop a couple of times a day and Massdrop sends me two emails each day (you should be able to access logon data as part of your market research). For the last week I have been considering dropping Massdrop because of this specific issue.
I don't know how your systems are configured, nor your resources for system design, but I think that having a special section with Massdrop audiofile products without the timer is really quite straightforward. Alternatively, since you already have filters for "newest","recommended" and "ending soon" just add another filter "never ending". As an aside, your daily processing of orders for these "never ending"drops must surely be appreciated.
Thank you again for your detailed answer. And thank you to others who participated in this thread.
But note also I raised the issue about polls that go nowhere as well (check the two year old Shure SE846 poll). That is for another discussion.
KJ741N
Oct 4, 2017
DavyJamesBetween the polls that go nowhere and the drops that come and go at completely unpredictable intervals, I've nearly given up on buying anything from Massdrop. I eventually realized "waiting around" for Massdrop to respond to polls or bring an item back again becomes an enormous waste of time.
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