Zopa planning to introduce borrower listings
On August 13, Zopa solicited feedback in an online chat for a new feature they’re calling “Zopa Listings”. If you’re familiar with what a listing is on Prosper (basically, a public and personal request for a loan), then you know what a Zopa listing is.
The differences between a Zopa listing and a Prosper listing are few. Zopa has adopted a similar set of features for listings, including:
- Pictures
- Description
- Friends
- Endorsements
- Questions & answers
- Public bid history
One of the only differences is that Zopa listings are active for 12 days by default, whereas Prosper offers 3, 5, 7, and 10 day options. One of the complaints from Zopa members who commented on the new design was that he didn’t like the idea of tying up his funds for 12 days waiting for the auction to end.
Kudos to Zopa for soliciting feedback on the upcoming feature in advance, although they could have done a better job of cleaning out any Prosper artifacts that were still in their mockups. For example, the “Funded/Forecast” graph that’s prominent on Prosper listing pages is also shown prominently on the Zopa listing mockup.
We’ll see if Zopa makes changes based on member feedback as they develop and release this feature over the next few months. This may be the feature that allows Zopa to follow through on their long awaited launch in the US market, which is slated for some time this fall.