The first time I used Airbnb, I was impressed with their chat system. I felt like there was no other convenient way to communicate with the host of the house I was renting. As soon as I received a regular email from the host with additional information I needed to complete, I questioned how Airbnb kept people within the chat system or let alone on the marketplace.

Details started to become complicated and I began having concerns about my rental. That’s when I started to realize the value of keeping the conversation within the platform. There was no security for me when I communicated outside of the marketplace. I was on my own and if things went seriously wrong (and things began to get tense), it could get very complicated. To the advice of my Airbnb support contact, I returned the conversation back to the platform. To protect me, specifically the money I spent, and to have a record of the conversation.

A similar problem came up on Urbansitter. When a mom requested to pay me directly so that a portion of my pay wouldn’t be taken away by Urbansitter, I didn’t argue with her. (Little did I know, Urbansitter does not take a portion of the payment) I took the check and from there on, she texted me to babysit and we were no longer connected via the marketplace.

So, what did I lose while gaining the small transaction fee? No reviews of my multiple babysitting gigs and a bounced check that I had to deal with, which would’ve been avoided if I was paid through the Urbansitter marketplace.

Bottom line, using the platform solves a lot of stress and inconvenience. A recent article in Venturebeat called Sharing Economy Series: 5 Lessons for Making your Marketplace Survive its First Year, mentions staying relevant to your customer.  This statement stood out to us:

“By way of comparison, look at businesses like Uber. Uber doesn’t fear being disintermediated by users and drivers forming relationships outside of their service, because the point is on-demand service. As a user, I couldn’t care less which Uber driver I get, as long as they come quickly and get me to my destination reliably. The same, more or less, holds true for AirBnB because I’m not looking for the same thing on a repeat basis.

For us, though, clients and lawyers form long-term relationships, and we need to continue to provide value on an ongoing basis so we don’t become an irrelevant middleman.”

Marketplaces are like the middleman. But what we always remind our Near Me users, is that the value you provide to your customer is what will keep them on it. Is it customer support? Easy transacting? Convenient scheduling?

Whatever it is, make sure you are solving a problem for your customer--because it’s natural for a person to want to take it off the technology platform once they’ve built a human relationship.

To avoid that, remember to provide exceptional service to your users so that there’s no way they’d want to interact offline. That YOU are a solution to their problem. And don’t forget, there will be people who use your platform to be matched and then take it offline. That’s normal.

Work on keeping the majority of your users coming back to your marketplace by making the customer experience a top priority for your business.

What tips do you have for keeping your marketplace relevant?