SwapRight.com Blog

The Art of Barter: How to Trade for Almost Anything

2010-08-13T09:46:00.000-06:00

I came across a new book published this year that focuses on bartering: The Art of Barter: How to Trade for Almost Anything.

It seems like a great book and offers a lot of creative advice for successful bartering of services. The book is available on Amazon, you can order it here.

The authors, Karen Hoffman and Shera Dalin, offer some sound tips on bartering:

Listen. Keep your ears open for what people need or want. Even if they haven't considered bartering, take a chance and ask them.

Be creative. Don't limit yourself to objects. Consider bartering tutoring, housecleaning, haircutting and other skills.

Make a list. Write down potential barters. When an opportunity arises, you'll be ready.

Be proactive. Create your own opportunities. Organize a neighborhood barter party or save money on sitters by creating a babysitting co-op.

Persevere. If someone declines your offer or a deal falls through, don't give up. Wait and try again — circumstances and attitudes can change.

Think big. The authors write of one couple who bartered for their first home by offering to make all the needed repairs themselves in exchange for living in it rent-free. After six months of hard work, they had saved enough money for the down payment.

Bootstrapping your startup by bartering

2010-06-30T08:59:00.001-06:00

I was recently reading a white paper by SVB Capital, "Portrait of a Modern-day Bootstrapper, How pre-funded entrepreneurs survive and thrive in the new age of technology startups".

The article covers some of the more common traits and habits of successful entrepreneurs who are passing on the traditional route of seeking VC and other outside funding sources for their startups. Instead, these entrepreneurs are conserving cash and bootstrapping their operations by using some resourceful and creative ideas and approaches.

In a section of the white paper entitled "Bootstrapping the Balance Sheet", they recommend that startups barter for as many of the services they need as possible.

Barter for as much as possible. Finding creative ways
to trade services may not only save you money, it can
help you build closer ties with the people you work
with. “Not paying for services makes the vendor lack
commitment to your project and quality suffers,” says
White. “So you have to find a way give something back,
and avoid using equity if you can.”

I couldn't agree more, funding for the majority of startups these days is quite scarce. Even if you do have access to outside funding, the more cash you can conserve without sacrificing the quality of your product, the better.

There is a quote in the article from Richard White of UserVoice about how they used bartering in the early days to not only conserve cash but to also build relationships.

“We bartered for a lot of things in the
early days. We put logos of our vendors
up on our Web site and promoted them
in return for discounted, or free, service.
We actually found bartering a way to
build better relationships.”
— Richard White, UserVoice

I actually use UserVoice on SwapRight (that feedback button on the side of the site) and think it is a great product. I find it quite interesting to hear stories of some of the more successful web startups, and how bartering helped them achieve success by not only saving money but also by helping build relationships.

If you are interested in bootstrapping tips, I would recommend reading the article, they also provide some useful links at the end to a variety of resources.

Barter Baby for Beer?

2010-06-24T09:44:00.000-06:00

I'm usually a big fan of bartering, not so much in this case. Although I'm sure many parents have fantasized about swapping their kid for a nice bottle of vintage wine during a meltdown in public, this guy certainly took things a step too far.

Dad Accused of Bartering Baby for Beer

Bartering as a way to save money overlooked by many

2010-06-18T10:14:00.002-06:00

Many people who would benefit from bartering simply never think about utilizing their skills to obtain the services and products they need. Rather than open your wallet each time you need something, bartering and swapping your services offers a great alternative. As the economy continues to stay in a slump, more and more people are using bartering as a method of exchange. I expect this trend will continue as websites such as SwapRight.com make it easy to post your offer to swap and barter services, and allows your offer to be visible to a much larger audience.

Financial Web recently published an article, "How to Save Money by Bartering".

Something people generally do not think about is that they can save money with bartering. By exchanging services with a friend or relative rather than paying a stranger or a business, both you and the person you are bartering with get something you need without spending as much, if any, money.

The article is short but gets straight to the point, which is bartering is a great option but overlooked by many. You can read the full article here.

Barter 2.0 - An ancient idea gets a modern twist

2010-06-17T10:19:00.001-06:00

Costco recently publish an article in the June 2010 version of the "Costco Connection" about the increasing popularity of bartering, as well as how technology is helping fuel the rise in popularity.

They discuss the various types of bartering, SwapRight lands in the category of "direct" or "One-to-one trading". "One-to-one trading" is the most straightforward form of bartering your services, and simply means you find a person or business offering a products or services you need, figure out a deal and then exchange value for value.

The article provides some great examples of how people are benefiting from "One-to-one" trading. Monte Cook swaps his caretaker services in exchange for free rent in an oceanfront home in Seattle. Bert Martinez, a professional public speaker, bartered his professional skills by providing sales seminars for a large hotel chain in exchange for vouchers for free hotel rooms, usable across the country.

The article also explains some of the more formal bartering exchange websites, these sites usually utilize an internal 'credit' system to compensate members for their barters. I think "One-to-one" trading sites and formal bartering exchanges both have their place. SwapRight definitely focuses on simplicity, which I think is a good thing for people looking to have flexibility in terms of when and how they barter.

You can read the full article here:

Barter 2.0 - An ancient idea gets a modern twist

Online bartering can help overcome the challenge of "Double coincidence of wants"

2010-06-09T18:27:00.000-06:00

Bartering or swapping, whether it be for product or services, has existed as a method of exchange for centuries. One of the cons of bartering involves the presence of a "Double coincidence of wants". Basically this means that in order to barter or swap services, you need to be connected with somebody who is seeking whatever products or services you are offering.

Wikipedia provides a good definition and example:

"The coincidence of wants problem (often "double coincidence of wants") is an important category of transaction costs that impose severe limitations on economies lacking money and thus dominated by barter or other in-kind transactions. The problem is caused by the improbability of the wants, needs or events that cause or motivate a transaction occurring at the same time and the same place. One example is the bar musician who is "paid" with liquor or food, items which his landlord will not accept as rent payment, when the musician would rather have a month's shelter. If, instead, the musician's landlord were to throw a party and desire music for it, hiring the musician to play it by offering the month's rent in exchange, a double coincidence of wants would exist."

Online bartering websites, such as SwapRight.com, can help overcome the challenges of the "double coincidence of wants" by greatly increasing the exposure of your offer to barter or swap services. Clearly the more people who know what services you need or are offering to barter, the more likely you'll have a successful exchange.

SwapRight.com focuses on barters or swaps that involve services by at least one of the parties. If you are looking to barter, trade or swap services, either for other services or products, why not take a moment to utilize your personal and professional skills and post an offer to swap services on SwapRight.

Time Banks gaining popularity during economic hardship

2010-06-04T15:40:00.000-06:00

A friend sent me an article today about time banks. Seems like a cool idea, a spin on the traditional concept of bartering or swapping of services. I enjoy seeing people resort back to the fundamentals of barter and trade.

Basically a time bank is simply an organization where for each hour of work you provide, you receive an hour of work in return. The services seem pretty diverse, overall a good concept.

The First Two Weeks

2010-06-04T15:28:00.001-06:00

SwapRight has been up for two weeks now and things are going pretty well. Getting the initial traffic to the site and having people post swap offers is always difficult when starting a new site. It's sort of like creating a dating website but only having a few members to start, not a lot of stuff to keep people on the site and engaged. Regardless, people are posting their offers to barter and swap services, which makes me happy. Currently SwapRight has around 300 members and 50 active posts.

The first week I did some online marketing, just the basics such as running some AdWords and submitting the site to various online directories. The ThrillList was kind enough to do a write-up on SwapRight which sent over a fair amount of traffic, thanks guys! I was also able to get the site featured Killer Startups which also provided some decent exposure (as well as a lot of cold calls from people trying to sell me various things).

This past week I held off on any marketing. There were several modifications I wanted to make to the website, and I was also running into a few minor issues with the Facebook integration. Those are all resolved, so today I am starting to focus on marketing once again. I really need to get on top of the viral aspect of marketing this site, as those CPC ads can get very spendy quickly.

- Jeremy

Up and Running....Finally!

2010-06-01T17:43:00.002-06:00

I'm happy to let everyone know I have officially launched SwapRight.com. Well..I guess the "official" launch date was May 17th, 2010, but I am only now getting around to adding the blog to the site. If you haven't had a chance to check it out yet, SwapRight is a free website for swapping or bartering services.

I've been a freelance web developer for around 10 years now, and being a freelancer I run across people all the time who are interested in swapping or bartering their services. I have seen quite a few bartering websites that focus on 'trading' products, but not very many focused on swapping or bartering services. The ones I have found have either been really complicated to use or designed like garbage. Disappointed with the options out there for swapping services, I decided to build my own.

I've been thinking quite a bit about what topics this blog should cover. I don't think I can write about bartering or swapping all day, so this blog will be a mixture of those topics as well as the trials and tribulations of a new internet start-up completely bootstrapping the entire operation. I'd like to be as transparent as possible about all aspects of starting a business...the good, the bad...and the ugly. And trust me, stuff can get ugly.

Tomorrow I'll post about how the first couple weeks have gone in terms of sign-ups and marketing.

- Jeremy Bamford