Interesting thread from *2007*:
(2007, remember? the 'HUGE-SUCCESS'-in-Europe era for Dubli)
This is from the PowersellersUnite site, highlighting some experiences a Spanish seller had on the 2006/2007 version of the Dubli "Global Trading Platform".
(of course there were also some Dubli associates present in that thread):
* Dubli The New "eBay" on Internet *
some quotes (in brown and red):
------------------------------------
post # 14, July 2007 (seller)
Well we've had our shop on dubli since october last year - and apart from a couple of false sales (people who clicked on buy by mistake) not a thing and hardly any visits - accordingly to OUR tracker.
It is not free- shops are being charged to people at 49€uros a month! and everything seems to cost extra (just like Ebay but without the buyers! lol) and getting anything dealt with by shop support seems to be like getting blood out of a stone - several long days for an acknowledgement of your enquiry and then most questions unanaswered. Sometimes they just dont answer at all.
Not good news for sellers - the only good thing about them is the advertising put out by the promoters to get more promoters for the mlm!
------------------------------------
post # 15, July 2007 (Dubli B.A.)
Sorry that you feel that way.
I have also a shop, but until traffic is coming I am not opening my shop, besides the basis shop is only 9 Euro a month, and if you don’t promote your Dubli shop yourself to a start it would take some time to get costumers no matter what they say.
About support, they always answer me and always send a confirmation mail first.
Forget the mlm part, not that it doesn’t work, but if you don’t like mlm or know how to build a downline then just don’t do it.
------------------------------------
post # 16, July 2007 (seller)
I am sorry I feel that way too, But after waiting 9 months to see if the shop will germinate - I do not have any expectations that anything will imporve.
When iawas sold it - I was told there would be a campain at the end of the year, then in March and now ??? i have asked this question from support and from people at a level in the organisation who should know as they make the decision - and have received NO reply to these questions and ahve observed no important change to the website.
It is no good to tell people who have 49Euro shops about 9Euro shops. They have already been sold. The expenses have been incurred and I dont think that 9 months is just a beginning with the vast amount of money that dubli has available for publicity.
I do not, as an independant shop owner feel any need to advertise Dubli's web site - nor do I feel the need to advertise for Ebay or anyone else' site when they already charge for the advertising on their site. That is their job.
I am aware that Spain has quite a number of unhappy independant shopkeepers. They were sold to them by the happy promoters from October 2006 onwards and they were not sold as a "wait two years and see" offer. And the promoters were not instructed to sell them on this basis.
You must forgive me if I am not impressed if you tell us that we are going to be "lucky" and have some support from the company now! We should have had this publicity since it was launched. I dont like losing money - however little it is.
I am quite sure that, as one of their avid gang of capital raisers, your own shop needs are dealt with by support. I can only speak for myself and other indepdant shop keepers in this country and in other countries too. We have found the support system and administration system on this ecomerce site as appalling as our sales results from it and we have not found it cheap, for a site that does ñnot seen to have caught on in the marketplace.
Not to be recommended if you are a professional seller looking for a site to sell your merchandise,I regret
------------------------------------
post # 18, July 2007 (seller)
Many have tried! This is the site that was quoted in the German Financial Press recently as the Prize Winner for the Worst EBay Clone of all Time Award
"Just more snake oil. " Remember the eyes?!!
Thanks Mo, now I dont feel so bad about wasting the money!
------------------------------------
post # 21, July 2007 (Dubli B.A.)
I cant promise you anything but let me try to help you, I’m quit convinced I can give you an opportunity to talk to Carlos Oestby vice president of Dubli if you want, he is fluent in English, Spanish, Danish, besides other skills.
------------------------------------
post # 22, July 2007 (seller)
Oh Boy,
It is rather like talking to a brick wall talking to dubli promotors at times!
First of all, if you are going to put my site link - please at least spell it right so it doesnt get a site not found message!
Secondly, in common with ALL the people who were sold shops last year and up to a few months ago this year, I was sold the shop with promises of publicity campaigns etc etc. We have been constantly told in several countries by our promotors that there were campaigns in the pipeline. Well it is a very long pipeline! lol
Now you are telling us that there is a campaign and we are lucky to have it!!
Forgetting the 9Euro a month shop which is a very recent novelty, for one minute. Many of us paid 49€uros for a year, special offer. We have received bills for extras which were until very recently hidden - and although I have had some of mine taken off as a favor(!) but I have never achieved my objective of getting the wretched shop back to the 49Euro shop I ordered.
The set up for the old and new shops is exceptionally difficult - even admitted by the head of support in one of his very rare replies.
Despite requests to dubli, including an email to your VP and Marketing Director - I have never received an answer to my questions about plans for publicizing this site.
The friends and colleagues I have who are owners of dubli shops (both free or paid) have all complained about the appalling quality of the support system for vendors - especially the paying customers. they are well known for their inaccessibility and unwillngness to deal with problems in the right language or with any speed.
I am one of the very few who has been able to speak to anyone (so I am reliably informed). But in general letters go unanswered - especially if one writes to someone higher up in the chain. In fact when I commented that my company had never sold a thing since we bought the shop (in a letter about other problems) - their comment was "Unfortunately, we have no influence upon your sales figures". Not the sort of reply one would expect from a newish site looking to grow! lol
I think it totally unreasonable that any independant shop owner should be asked to promote the dubli.com site. I dont promote Ebay -I just pay and they promote my stuff as with other ecommerce sites.
Why on earth should I want to put a link to dubli on my company's own web site? I am a seller of my own products - dubli.com is an investment in a new sales area that has been a time consuming failure, and a very unpleasant experience.
You even go as far as to say that you have not opened your free shop (part of your mlm promotors package). Then why didnt your leaders make it quite clear to everyone involved from the beginning that these shops should not be opened until the site worked and were not expected to work for a long time. Why have they taken our money? - including those that are paying 49Euros monthly (aprox 67 US$)
Why havent dubli.com taken the opportunity they have had during the past 9 long months to promote their ecommerce site, instead of their money raising promoters site - dubli network? It is barely known apart from its mlm money promotion business. It does not appear in the search engines when you search for products.
It is not for the shortage of money available for sure - they are always telling us how much money there is - and a lot of nonsense about going public etc. i.e. publicity for the money making side and none for the product itself which has hardly been developed since its opening in October last year. (There have been tweaks to the site - but nothing serious).
The mlm part of your business has been heavily criticised by many internet marketing professionals in many coutnries because of the obvious neglect of the ecommerce site. And its intentions as a serious ecommerce site are doubted for this very reason. It is run by some professional mlm'ers, not e commerce experts. (BlueBuy was an EBay power seller, not some major ecommerce site as is implied in the dubli publicity) It has been criticized as an mlm business and as an ecommerce business and and defended by the mlm promoters with more publicity propaganda but NEVER with facts and NEVER by by independant sellers.
As far as helping me specifically, I appreciate your offer, apart from the promotor who sold me the shop (now disappeared from the internet!) it is the first genuine offer of help I have received from inside dubli. However, with only a few months to run for my shop contract, I doubt very much whether they are very interested in helping - I have been asking since January this year! lol I expect they will just be glad to get rid of me so that I dont ask any more uncomfortable questions in this forum! lol
------------------------------------
post # 24, July 2007 (seller)
I suggest if you think it is better to phone you had better send some telephone numbers. None of the pormoters I know even have them and Dubli.com does not have a listing in the telephone directories for the Berlin offices in Berlin.
Customer Support have advised me that they are not permitted receive incoming calls or give out the number. The rare occasions that they have called after I made a major fuss - the number is hidden.
Give me the solution to that one and i will be able to pass the number on the anyone with shop problems
------------------------------------
post # 25, July 2007 (Dubli B.A.)
I have forwarded this topic to the leaders I know and will let you their answer when I have one.
Duli.com and dublinetwork.com is two very different things, dubli.com is the portal and dublinetwork.com is the mlm part.
------------------------------------
post # 29, Aug 2007 (seller)
Hi All,
Still dont have my answer from Rexer or anyone else. I don't know if anyone here reads Spanish, but I have been following this forum from Spain and they are saying that, rather than being a new auction site, it has been around for quite a while and that Dubli is a Multilevel Marketing Scam
The Dubli Unofficial Forum
{{originally linked to a spanish forum, no link there anymore, see explanation further down - keesje}}
Maybe that is why nothing's selling! Looks like Snake Oil might be their product after all.
Back to the drawing board to find an auction that is trying to sell our stuff!
------------------------------------
post # 42, Oct 2007 (seller)
Hello All,
I see the Dubli debate has revived with the arrival of yet another Dubli promoter at PSU.
I am afraid that, as far as us sellers are concerned, nothing has changed. The "auction site" still remains nearly totally unknown by and unpublicized to the virtual buying public. This is after a year of operation (officially - it had actually been going for quite some time and unsuccesfully before it was re"launched" as the "new EBay".)
The site continues to give bad or zero results for sellers. The suppòrt system is still a waste of time and they are still sending out bills to sellers without satisfactory justification. There is no international or regional publicity in spite of many promises made since its launch. Just unfullfilled promises.
The only "noise" now is from the DubliNetwork promoters (The MLM) who are still trying to sell licences to sell licences in Dubli.com at 500,00Euros a shot. with a free basic shop thrown in.(extra for photos etc etc like EBay but without the customers)
This MLM business now appears to be totally separate in the minds of these guys from the auction site. It is rare that one hears more than "it will take time". The main income they try to sell to future licence holders is that of selling licences. This is now looking like a very dubious operation as MLMs have to have comissions paid primarily out of product sales (i.e. virtual shops sold to sellers) in order to operate legally and as the site hasn't really grown in over a year - this cannot be the case.
PSU is probably not the place for a deep discussion on this side of Dubli and is better left to the anti scam forums.
But, it is fair to warn future sellers that it would seem that Dubli.com has simply been a "set up site" to serve the vested interests of a group of people who are basically MLM racketeers who use some very suspect promotion techniques for their licence selling (the well known dark side of the MLM world).
If the auction site survives, it will be a long and slow process and unless they start to promote it - is a complete waste of time for anyone hoping to use it6 for professional selling. According to all available information, on and offline, the present ownership of the MLM and Sales Directors of the auction site are people with a long history of failed MLMs who got out when the going got rough and the money dried up - leaving clients high and dry. They then appear with a new "opportunity" shortly afterwards (this will be their 6th I believe).
International? In Spain - where their primary MLM sales force are based - it is considered by many to be a cover-up for a pyramid and there has been quite a scandal. The forum which I discovered and gave a link to earlier was full of information. It has been stopped by threats both legal and to the personal safety of the owner. Although the legal threats are valueless - the personal ones were outrageous. -The forum owner has been the recipient of the same strong arm tactics that were seen in Germany (the "home" of the auction site) earlier this year.
Here the well known German writer on Auction Sites Axel Gronen was threatened with everything from legal threats to death threats for his legitimate criticism of Dubli .com
So a long way of saying - sorry folks - this is not an auction site to be taken seriously - just a very risky MLM. with auction site to go with it.
Harsh words? Well most of us can accept a failure of an advertising medium - but no-one likes to be conned. These people give online auction sites a bad name.
------------------------------------
So.... not such positive experience it seems.
Furthermore, the e-commerce side of the business model Dubli THEN had was COMPLETELY different than it is now....
THEN Dubli was MAINLY a true eBay clone with individual sellers with individual shops etc,
and at that time WITHOUT any REVERSE AUCTION games.... (and without much buyers either)
So even if they did have SOME success back then with THAT business model, it's a totally different game now....
all the "HUGE SUCCESS" claims are referring to the time they had this NOW NON-existent (and apparently NON-succesful) business model...
Seems Dubli is (again?) not totally honest about their past "suckses" ...?
------------------------------------
post # 14, July 2007 (seller)
Well we've had our shop on dubli since october last year - and apart from a couple of false sales (people who clicked on buy by mistake) not a thing and hardly any visits - accordingly to OUR tracker.
It is not free- shops are being charged to people at 49€uros a month! and everything seems to cost extra (just like Ebay but without the buyers! lol) and getting anything dealt with by shop support seems to be like getting blood out of a stone - several long days for an acknowledgement of your enquiry and then most questions unanaswered. Sometimes they just dont answer at all.
Not good news for sellers - the only good thing about them is the advertising put out by the promoters to get more promoters for the mlm!
------------------------------------
post # 15, July 2007 (Dubli B.A.)
Sorry that you feel that way.
I have also a shop, but until traffic is coming I am not opening my shop, besides the basis shop is only 9 Euro a month, and if you don’t promote your Dubli shop yourself to a start it would take some time to get costumers no matter what they say.
About support, they always answer me and always send a confirmation mail first.
Forget the mlm part, not that it doesn’t work, but if you don’t like mlm or know how to build a downline then just don’t do it.
------------------------------------
post # 16, July 2007 (seller)
I am sorry I feel that way too, But after waiting 9 months to see if the shop will germinate - I do not have any expectations that anything will imporve.
When iawas sold it - I was told there would be a campain at the end of the year, then in March and now ??? i have asked this question from support and from people at a level in the organisation who should know as they make the decision - and have received NO reply to these questions and ahve observed no important change to the website.
It is no good to tell people who have 49Euro shops about 9Euro shops. They have already been sold. The expenses have been incurred and I dont think that 9 months is just a beginning with the vast amount of money that dubli has available for publicity.
I do not, as an independant shop owner feel any need to advertise Dubli's web site - nor do I feel the need to advertise for Ebay or anyone else' site when they already charge for the advertising on their site. That is their job.
I am aware that Spain has quite a number of unhappy independant shopkeepers. They were sold to them by the happy promoters from October 2006 onwards and they were not sold as a "wait two years and see" offer. And the promoters were not instructed to sell them on this basis.
You must forgive me if I am not impressed if you tell us that we are going to be "lucky" and have some support from the company now! We should have had this publicity since it was launched. I dont like losing money - however little it is.
I am quite sure that, as one of their avid gang of capital raisers, your own shop needs are dealt with by support. I can only speak for myself and other indepdant shop keepers in this country and in other countries too. We have found the support system and administration system on this ecomerce site as appalling as our sales results from it and we have not found it cheap, for a site that does ñnot seen to have caught on in the marketplace.
Not to be recommended if you are a professional seller looking for a site to sell your merchandise,I regret
------------------------------------
post # 18, July 2007 (seller)
Many have tried! This is the site that was quoted in the German Financial Press recently as the Prize Winner for the Worst EBay Clone of all Time Award
"Just more snake oil. " Remember the eyes?!!
Thanks Mo, now I dont feel so bad about wasting the money!
------------------------------------
post # 21, July 2007 (Dubli B.A.)
I cant promise you anything but let me try to help you, I’m quit convinced I can give you an opportunity to talk to Carlos Oestby vice president of Dubli if you want, he is fluent in English, Spanish, Danish, besides other skills.
------------------------------------
post # 22, July 2007 (seller)
Oh Boy,
It is rather like talking to a brick wall talking to dubli promotors at times!
First of all, if you are going to put my site link - please at least spell it right so it doesnt get a site not found message!
Secondly, in common with ALL the people who were sold shops last year and up to a few months ago this year, I was sold the shop with promises of publicity campaigns etc etc. We have been constantly told in several countries by our promotors that there were campaigns in the pipeline. Well it is a very long pipeline! lol
Now you are telling us that there is a campaign and we are lucky to have it!!
Forgetting the 9Euro a month shop which is a very recent novelty, for one minute. Many of us paid 49€uros for a year, special offer. We have received bills for extras which were until very recently hidden - and although I have had some of mine taken off as a favor(!) but I have never achieved my objective of getting the wretched shop back to the 49Euro shop I ordered.
The set up for the old and new shops is exceptionally difficult - even admitted by the head of support in one of his very rare replies.
Despite requests to dubli, including an email to your VP and Marketing Director - I have never received an answer to my questions about plans for publicizing this site.
The friends and colleagues I have who are owners of dubli shops (both free or paid) have all complained about the appalling quality of the support system for vendors - especially the paying customers. they are well known for their inaccessibility and unwillngness to deal with problems in the right language or with any speed.
I am one of the very few who has been able to speak to anyone (so I am reliably informed). But in general letters go unanswered - especially if one writes to someone higher up in the chain. In fact when I commented that my company had never sold a thing since we bought the shop (in a letter about other problems) - their comment was "Unfortunately, we have no influence upon your sales figures". Not the sort of reply one would expect from a newish site looking to grow! lol
I think it totally unreasonable that any independant shop owner should be asked to promote the dubli.com site. I dont promote Ebay -I just pay and they promote my stuff as with other ecommerce sites.
Why on earth should I want to put a link to dubli on my company's own web site? I am a seller of my own products - dubli.com is an investment in a new sales area that has been a time consuming failure, and a very unpleasant experience.
You even go as far as to say that you have not opened your free shop (part of your mlm promotors package). Then why didnt your leaders make it quite clear to everyone involved from the beginning that these shops should not be opened until the site worked and were not expected to work for a long time. Why have they taken our money? - including those that are paying 49Euros monthly (aprox 67 US$)
Why havent dubli.com taken the opportunity they have had during the past 9 long months to promote their ecommerce site, instead of their money raising promoters site - dubli network? It is barely known apart from its mlm money promotion business. It does not appear in the search engines when you search for products.
It is not for the shortage of money available for sure - they are always telling us how much money there is - and a lot of nonsense about going public etc. i.e. publicity for the money making side and none for the product itself which has hardly been developed since its opening in October last year. (There have been tweaks to the site - but nothing serious).
The mlm part of your business has been heavily criticised by many internet marketing professionals in many coutnries because of the obvious neglect of the ecommerce site. And its intentions as a serious ecommerce site are doubted for this very reason. It is run by some professional mlm'ers, not e commerce experts. (BlueBuy was an EBay power seller, not some major ecommerce site as is implied in the dubli publicity) It has been criticized as an mlm business and as an ecommerce business and and defended by the mlm promoters with more publicity propaganda but NEVER with facts and NEVER by by independant sellers.
As far as helping me specifically, I appreciate your offer, apart from the promotor who sold me the shop (now disappeared from the internet!) it is the first genuine offer of help I have received from inside dubli. However, with only a few months to run for my shop contract, I doubt very much whether they are very interested in helping - I have been asking since January this year! lol I expect they will just be glad to get rid of me so that I dont ask any more uncomfortable questions in this forum! lol
------------------------------------
post # 24, July 2007 (seller)
I suggest if you think it is better to phone you had better send some telephone numbers. None of the pormoters I know even have them and Dubli.com does not have a listing in the telephone directories for the Berlin offices in Berlin.
Customer Support have advised me that they are not permitted receive incoming calls or give out the number. The rare occasions that they have called after I made a major fuss - the number is hidden.
Give me the solution to that one and i will be able to pass the number on the anyone with shop problems
------------------------------------
post # 25, July 2007 (Dubli B.A.)
I have forwarded this topic to the leaders I know and will let you their answer when I have one.
Duli.com and dublinetwork.com is two very different things, dubli.com is the portal and dublinetwork.com is the mlm part.
------------------------------------
post # 29, Aug 2007 (seller)
Hi All,
Still dont have my answer from Rexer or anyone else. I don't know if anyone here reads Spanish, but I have been following this forum from Spain and they are saying that, rather than being a new auction site, it has been around for quite a while and that Dubli is a Multilevel Marketing Scam
The Dubli Unofficial Forum
{{originally linked to a spanish forum, no link there anymore, see explanation further down - keesje}}
Maybe that is why nothing's selling! Looks like Snake Oil might be their product after all.
Back to the drawing board to find an auction that is trying to sell our stuff!
------------------------------------
post # 42, Oct 2007 (seller)
Hello All,
I see the Dubli debate has revived with the arrival of yet another Dubli promoter at PSU.
I am afraid that, as far as us sellers are concerned, nothing has changed. The "auction site" still remains nearly totally unknown by and unpublicized to the virtual buying public. This is after a year of operation (officially - it had actually been going for quite some time and unsuccesfully before it was re"launched" as the "new EBay".)
The site continues to give bad or zero results for sellers. The suppòrt system is still a waste of time and they are still sending out bills to sellers without satisfactory justification. There is no international or regional publicity in spite of many promises made since its launch. Just unfullfilled promises.
The only "noise" now is from the DubliNetwork promoters (The MLM) who are still trying to sell licences to sell licences in Dubli.com at 500,00Euros a shot. with a free basic shop thrown in.(extra for photos etc etc like EBay but without the customers)
This MLM business now appears to be totally separate in the minds of these guys from the auction site. It is rare that one hears more than "it will take time". The main income they try to sell to future licence holders is that of selling licences. This is now looking like a very dubious operation as MLMs have to have comissions paid primarily out of product sales (i.e. virtual shops sold to sellers) in order to operate legally and as the site hasn't really grown in over a year - this cannot be the case.
PSU is probably not the place for a deep discussion on this side of Dubli and is better left to the anti scam forums.
But, it is fair to warn future sellers that it would seem that Dubli.com has simply been a "set up site" to serve the vested interests of a group of people who are basically MLM racketeers who use some very suspect promotion techniques for their licence selling (the well known dark side of the MLM world).
If the auction site survives, it will be a long and slow process and unless they start to promote it - is a complete waste of time for anyone hoping to use it6 for professional selling. According to all available information, on and offline, the present ownership of the MLM and Sales Directors of the auction site are people with a long history of failed MLMs who got out when the going got rough and the money dried up - leaving clients high and dry. They then appear with a new "opportunity" shortly afterwards (this will be their 6th I believe).
International? In Spain - where their primary MLM sales force are based - it is considered by many to be a cover-up for a pyramid and there has been quite a scandal. The forum which I discovered and gave a link to earlier was full of information. It has been stopped by threats both legal and to the personal safety of the owner. Although the legal threats are valueless - the personal ones were outrageous. -The forum owner has been the recipient of the same strong arm tactics that were seen in Germany (the "home" of the auction site) earlier this year.
Here the well known German writer on Auction Sites Axel Gronen was threatened with everything from legal threats to death threats for his legitimate criticism of Dubli .com
So a long way of saying - sorry folks - this is not an auction site to be taken seriously - just a very risky MLM. with auction site to go with it.
Harsh words? Well most of us can accept a failure of an advertising medium - but no-one likes to be conned. These people give online auction sites a bad name.
------------------------------------
So.... not such positive experience it seems.
Furthermore, the e-commerce side of the business model Dubli THEN had was COMPLETELY different than it is now....
THEN Dubli was MAINLY a true eBay clone with individual sellers with individual shops etc,
and at that time WITHOUT any REVERSE AUCTION games.... (and without much buyers either)
So even if they did have SOME success back then with THAT business model, it's a totally different game now....
all the "HUGE SUCCESS" claims are referring to the time they had this NOW NON-existent (and apparently NON-succesful) business model...
Seems Dubli is (again?) not totally honest about their past "suckses" ...?
(keep an eye out for part x? of Dubli's "huge" success in Europe, which will highlight thoughts and experiences re. Dubli from members of a German MLM board in 2006/2007/2008).
.
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