What is the core of building a marketplace startup?

Without a doubt, it's a marketplace business strategy. Thoroughly thought out. Detailed. Unbreakable.

When it comes to the start of a multi-vendor marketplace business, things become even tougher. You have to build the business model, value proposition, marketing strategy for all sides of your marketplace.

But here's the deal.

If you go through every stage that leads to the successful product development, you have nothing to worry about. Remember, if you leave out one or two items, one day or another the whole strategy may crumble.

How can you actually benefit from this article?

You will get an in-depth, step by step checklist on how to build a marketplace app. Simply check the point you have completed and move further. We have covered there everything from defining your marketplace vision to the development process.

Let`s start.

Marketplace startup team

Before actually proceeding to the checklist itself, we want to emphasize the important factor, that influences the result of your “journey”.

It`s your team.

You need to have reliable and supportive people that work on the same mission with you and are responsible for a certain stage of your product development.

Let`s divide your team into 4 main sections

Product

Marketing

Sales

Engineering

Here is what they are responsible for.

Product team

Competitors review

Requirements gathering

Product vision and strategy

Business value

Product roadmap

Communication between the team and stakeholders

Engineering team

Technical strategy

Product architecture

Development methodology

Engineering team management

Marketing team

Define market

Create value proposition

Build keyword list

Social media advertising

Sales team

Define sales territories

Leads qualification

Lead generation

We would like to embed the video from the founder of Hive - the company we, Apiko Team, cooperated tightly with. In this 2 minutes video, you will learn how to boost the productivity of your team.

3 Team Productivity Tips (in 2 minutes) from Hive on Vimeo.

Now, when you have a general understanding of the startup team, it's time to get a checklist on how to start an online marketplace business.

In this checklist you will learn

How to generate business idea for your marketplace app

What to do during market analysis

How to create customer portrait

How to build value proposition

What to do before product launch

How to develop MVP

Enjoy it!

If you need a tailored advice concerning on how to create your own marketplace,we are always open to fruitful conversation:)