By Angela Anderson and Grace Copperhite
If both sellers and buyers stick by these tips and unwritten rules of Depop, together we can make our online community stronger and more productive for everyone.
1) Overprice
As a seller, make sure that your listings are priced reasonably so that others are willing to purchase your items. For both parties, it is important to take the item’s quality and wear into consideration; buyers do not want to pay over retail price for your used items.
That being said, remember to consider the brand, quality, and effort that goes into creating a listing. Some sellers use Depop as a full-time job and spend hours driving to and rifling through clothes at thrift stores to create an online thrifting experience for their buyers. Take the seller’s effort into consideration and avoid “lowballing,” or offering to buy at a price point much too low for the quality of the item.
Quality of the item and brand often play a huge role in pricing, so remember to be fair when negotiating a price. Buyers, you can’t expect to purchase authentic designer items for a ridiculously cheap price. However, it is also important to keep in mind that sellers shouldn’t be up-charging used items just because they’re “trendy” and “vintage.”
Most importantly, be willing to negotiate. Sometimes, sellers market their items as “rare” (see our Brandy Melville section) to up the price and scam buyers. Remember that your buyers are smart, and if they take our advice, will definitely reverse image search your pictures to get a proper idea of what they should pay for the item. Willingness to negotiate will lead you to great reviews and repeat buyers!
2) Over-tag
Tagging should be relevant and accurate to the listing. No one wants to scroll through a bunch of posts that are not specific to what they’re looking for. Never tag as a brand that the item is not, since that is false advertising and will lead to your listings being deleted. Overtagging spams the buyer’s feed and makes it harder to find specific items.
3) Don’t be Fooled by “Rare” Items
Many times, sellers purchase clothing that is still available from online stores as soon as a collection drops, and try to upmark the prices by calling the item “rare.” In particular, Brandy Melville has a sort of cult following of buyers seeking “rare” Brandy items, many that can still be purchased, or are listed on Depop for a much higher price.
Always check the retailer before purchasing a “rare” item to ensure that you won’t be a victim of a scam.
4) Trading is not Protected by Depop
Trades are a very dangerous exchange that promises to have a dollarless swap of two items, with both sides paying for shipping. However, since these trades do not involve money, the transaction is not protected by Depop, and neither is buying outside of the app with different payment methods such as Venmo or Cashapp.
5) Use “ISO’s”
“ISO’s” are listings people post with no intention of selling the item. “ISO” stands for “in search of,” so people who post their “ISO’s” are looking for sellers who have the items they want. Though the idea of using “ISO’s” to find sellers seems harmless, other buyers sometimes do not understand what an “ISO” is and try to buy the listing.
“ISO’s” also show up on the Depop discover page, so any buyer can see that an item they might be interested in is up for sale- only to be disappointed that it’s just an “ISO.” They spam user feed and don’t really do much because sellers do not actively seek out people with “ISO’s.”
6) Steal Photos
If you want to use someone else’s content, always message sellers and see if it’s okay with them first. Stealing someone’s pictures is unprofessional and can usually result in a bad look for your page if the original seller finds out.
To combat others stealing your photos without your permission, you can watermark your photos to ensure that no one else uses your content. Though sometimes watermarks can get in the way of viewing all of the details of the photo, sellers who watermark are often more than happy to privately send potential buyers pictures of the item without the watermark.
7) Fall for Giveaways
There are many sellers who run “giveaways” on their Depop store. These are some sort of competition entry to receive free items, in exchange for promotion. Sellers who run giveaways will ask other Depop community members interested to repost a listing of theirs, share their account on their page, and even sometimes pay money to enter. It is highly unlikely that you will be the winner of the giveaway, and it is likely a scam.
8) Lowball
Lowballs are offers made by buyers that are much less than the price the item is listed at, and are rarely accepted by sellers. From a seller’s standpoint, lowballs are disrespectful and inconsiderate of the work that went into their post. As a buyer, be respectful of the time and effort a seller dedicates to creating a listing: including buying the item, taking photos, editing them, and writing descriptions. Most sellers are happy to negotiate and lower a price, so communicate your request with them in a mindful manner.
9) Ask for a Hold
Asking a seller to put an item on hold prevents them from making sales, as it is not guaranteed that the buyer on hold will ever purchase the item.
Depop technically has no such thing as a hold, meaning anyone can instantly purchase an item and ignore the “hold” in the listings descriptions, causing the first buyer to miss out on buying the item.
Depop’s modern twist on thrifting and reselling apps has proven to be extremely popular, and reaches a wide audience of sellers and buyers worldwide. As responsible Depop community members, let’s work together to keep the app safe and fun for all.
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