Hello VFBers, IOFFers, lurkers, ect;
Some time ago, I mentioned an idea about a website selling flys by tyer's name with the price dictated by the tyer. Byard said he had considered it a long time ago but "selling flys just isn't profitable because of the foreign cheapies". I believe a person's reputation can overcome that.
My proposal is very flexable and Byard gets final say as this is his list. Ideas or messages telling me my idea is stupid/good are welcome at [EMAIL PROTECTED] but please tell me why.
Here's the idea in its infant stage;
Tyers would be given free access to an e-com site to display their flys UNDER THEIR NAME that they wanted to sell. There would be no requirements to meet order dates from the biz as you would merely tie what patterns you wanted in quantities you were comfortable with and send the flys on consignment to said site. You would be informed of your inventory, paid for flys sold (less a small fee), and decide if you wanted to continue or have the remaining inventory returned to you. It might be Line's End or some other person's biz. Byard gets first dibs naturally or he can tell me to scrub the idea.
Nobody is going to get rich selling flys, that's not the purpose. What would happen is that tyers could develop a following, have their names better known in the fly tying world, post their own websites or contact info promoting their handmade rods, flyshops, promote a book they wrote, or other on-topic business.
The possibilities of linking everyone's websites reciprocally would drive more traffic to all by the nature of Google's algorithim and increase everyone's ranking. I have been researching this to the point of exhastion for months for my own businesses and Byard has been right on target with his advice. Naturally, all would have to link to VFB & Linesend. ;-)
As an example of rankings; in March, VFB got 10,664 search engine referals to (this is a big operation) FranchiseOpportunities.com's 54,747. But wait! 46,100 of those hits on FO's site came from Yahoo/FAST/AltaVista which allows you to "buy" ranking position, which they do in a big way. On Google, VFB had 7,830 hits which was almost double FO's 4,040.
Please respond off list as this is marginally on topic and feel free to copy your responses to Byard. Anyone interested in where I got the (free) figures may ask me off-list. I may be too far off topic on this and I apologize in advance to any who are offended.
And now, back to talk about tying flys with peguin feathers, where to get hooks big enough to tie bird patterns on and the low-down on DonO's latest catch. Is it live, or is it PhotoShop?
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