Frequently Asked Questions
What is Xpollen?
Xpollen is a service for merchants and vendors, it allows you to find potential customers for your products and services. It allows consumers and businesses to place a specific request and invite responses from vendors. These requests are being placed via Social Media applications such as Facebook and MySpace.
What do you mean by Social Media?
Social Media is a class of membership based websites that allow individuals to create a profile, link to friends and develop ongoing interactions with their friends.
What is the consumer demand in Social Media?
Interaction between friends is primarily social, however, out of these social relationships, needs for products, services and other advice are being expressed during these conversations. For example, a member of a social network might ask their friends for a hotel recommendation – perhaps in a location that their friends are familiar with, but they are not.
Where a user has created a request and specifically invited vendors to respond in addition to their friends, this demand is passed to Xpollen so that vendors are able to respond.
Whose requests am I seeing on the Xpollen home page?
The Xpollen home page shows live requests that are being created in Social Media applications. The requests are real and are appearing on the screen in real time. Only requests that consumers have given permission for a vendor to respond are shown. You will be able to see where a request has been made, the request category and description, the guide price and when the request was made.
To respond to the request, you need to register with Xpollen.
What are the benefits of registering?
A member of Xpollen will be able to search the live database of requests to focus on all requests in a particular product category, a given price range or a specific location. Once you have found the requests you will be able to make direct responses to the customers.
Who can register to use Xpollen?
Anybody can register, all you need to supply is some identifying information so that we can pass the details of your responses to the consumers. All consumers will remain anonymous even though you can see their requests, this allows us to protect the identity of consumers and lower any risks to them.
How much does it cost to register?
Registration is free! Which means that you will be able to browse the listing of requests for your products in your area at no cost. In fact, we go even further – to allow you to see how valuable Xpollen can be, WE WILL GIVE YOU 10 FREE CREDITS to get you started
How do I find requests relevant to me?
Once you have registered (or logged in if you are already a member) you will see a selection screen. On the left you can use the dropdowns to narrow down the category of requests you are interested in. You only need to pick the top level, but the more levels you pick, the more specific the list of requests will be.
If you are looking for particular keywords – maybe brands or styles – you can enter the terms into the keywords box in the center of the screen. You can also use the Boolean operators to refine your search further.
Below this, use the postal code and radius fields to specify the location of where these offers come from. You may want to search for potential customers within 100 miles of your store or you can just leave it blank to see all requests.
Finally where customers specify a price, you can select the request price range you are interested in responding to. Remember, often consumers will put in the lowest price they can imagine.
Finally, just click on the 'Find Requests' button
How can I respond to a request?
Once you have specified your criteria and found requests (remember, this is a new system and certain categories may not be requested just yet) you will see a listing of requests. You will be able to see the list in full, with all the descriptions.
Use the checkboxes on the right to select individual requests all to select them all – these are the requests you will want to send a response to. You can select one at a time and create a very personalized response, or you can select many and respond to them in one go with an identical response. Then click on the 'Make Offers' button
What is the best way to create a response (offer)?
Once you click on the Make Offers button you will see a screen where you can describe the offer as will be seen by those who created the requests you selected. We are limiting you to 250 characters to make it quick and easy for the person to read. As they will be seeing your offer alongside other vendors, make this text as compelling as you can.
You can then enter any special promotional codes that will give a discount and allow you to track the offer you created.
You can then create a special URL for the offer – this will be displayed in addition to the URL you provided when you registered.
You can then specify the valid dates for the offer and a price to further entice your customer.
If you have a physical store, we will calculate the Google map link based on the zip code you provided at registration. You can also include the phone number and email you provided at registration by checking the appropriate boxes.
At the foot of this screen, the display will show you how many credits you will need to make this reponse. If you have enough credits, you can click on the 'Make Offers' button and you will be done. From here you can search for more requests and make responses or log out.
How much does it cost to respond?
Responding to one request will cost one credit. The price of the credits varies depending on how many you buy at a time. Your first 10 credits are free. If you buy in 10's the credits are 10 cents each. The more you buy, the bigger the discount, we'd like you to buy more of course, but start small and see how you go, you've got very little to lose.
How do I buy more credits to respond to requests?
At the top right of the screen you will see how many credits you have remaining. Just click on the 'Credits' link and you will be taken to a screen where you can use Paypal to buy more credits – you can use your Paypal account or just use a major credit card.
What happens when I respond?
The next time the person who created the request that you responded logs in to their Social Media account, they will see your request. They will be able to respond to it by clicking the link you provided or they may email you or visit your store.
Remember, consumers in Social Media will be asking both vendors and their friends for advice, so your offer will also be seen by friends who sometimes want the same thing.
How do I know my customers are coming from Xpollen?
We suggest that you use an exclusive offer code, that way, when a customer provides this offer code, you know they found you through Xpollen. This way you can see how much value Xpollen is providing.
Are all the requests current?
When the consumer creates a request, they specify the end date for when that request is removed. Until then, we consider it current, however we do archive requests after 90 days. You will also be able to see when that request was created.
Remember, sometimes consumers put requests out there for things they will be needing in the future, so it may be worth responding anyway.
Is there anything else like Xpollen?
Not that we know of today, so give it a shot, you've very little to lose.