Value-added services are the paid extras a marketplace sells on top of its core job of matching buyers and sellers: featured listings, seller plans, shipping labels, buyer protection, insurance through a partner, analytics and more. For the large marketplaces, these value-added services are now one of the main sources of revenue. This guide lists marketplace value-added services examples that work, explains how to package and price them, and shows which ones suit a classifieds site and which need a transactional marketplace where payments go through the platform.
Part of the guide Making money from your marketplace
What are value-added services in a marketplace?
A value-added service (VAS) is anything beyond the basic listing, search and contact or checkout that helps buyers or sellers reach their goal faster or more safely. Most are optional: the basic service stays free or cheap, and users pay for the extras they want. That is what separates a value-added service from a fee that feels like a tax.
They do three jobs at once:
- Revenue. Sellers pay for reach, buyers pay for safety, professionals pay for tools.
- Retention. A seller who relies on your analytics or your monthly plan is less likely to move to a rival site.
- Trust and keeping deals on the platform. Verified profiles, guarantees and protection give users a reason to complete the deal with you instead of swapping phone numbers and leaving. Marketplaces call this leakage disintermediation.
Value-added services are one of several ways to earn from a marketplace. For the full picture, see the guide to marketplace business models.
How big value-added services have become
Value-added services have grown from a side income into one of the main revenue sources for large marketplaces. In the latest results, optional services were often the fastest-growing part of revenue, while income from core marketplace fees stayed flat or shrank.
| Marketplace | Value-added service | Latest reported figure |
|---|---|---|
| Amazon | Advertising (mostly sponsored listings) | $19.81B in Q2 2026, up 26% year on year, compared with $46.78B from third-party seller services |
| Etsy | Services revenue (on-site Etsy Ads, shipping labels and other optional seller services) | $876.3M in 2025, up 11.3%, while marketplace revenue (transaction, listing and payment fees) fell 0.7% to $2.01B, partly because Etsy sold Reverb in June 2025 |
| eBay | Promoted listings and other advertising | $596M of advertising revenue in Q2 2026 alone (2.7% of GMV), of which $570M came from first-party ads, up 25% |
| Fiverr | Services revenue (managed services and other paid offerings beyond transaction fees) | $34.6M in Q2 2026, up 2.0%, while marketplace revenue fell 15.5% to $63.1M (in full-year 2025, services grew 50.9% to $133.4M) |
| Airbnb | Services and relaunched Experiences (both launched May 2025); paid guest travel insurance | In Q4 2025, almost half of experience bookings were not attached to a stay. Airbnb typically charges about 15% on Services and about 20% on Experiences. In Q2 2026, travel insurance revenue rose over 60% year on year, with insurance offered in 12 of its largest countries |
Sources: Amazon Q2 2026 results (Jul 30, 2026); Etsy 10-K for 2025; eBay Q2 2026 results (Aug 5, 2026); Fiverr Q2 2026 results (Jul 29, 2026) and full-year 2025 results (Feb 18, 2026); Airbnb Q4 2025 shareholder letter (Feb 12, 2026), Q2 2026 shareholder letter (Aug 2026) and service fee page.
The pattern: paid visibility is the most profitable value-added service. Sellers already want to sell more, so paying to appear first needs little explanation, and the platform's cost of offering it is close to zero. Etsy shows why this matters. In 2025 its gross sales fell 5.3%, yet consolidated revenue still rose 2.7%, because its optional services grew 11.3%. Its 10-K says advertising revenue rose by $62.2 million, mostly because sellers paid more per click on Etsy Ads, while transaction fee revenue fell by $16.8 million. Sellers still pay the required fees on top (as of October 2026, per Etsy's fees policy): $0.20 to list an item, a 6.5% transaction fee, and a 12% or 15% fee when a sale comes from Etsy's Offsite Ads. Airbnb shows the other route: add a new type of service next to the core one, so you reach customers who would never have booked the original product.
Marketplace value-added services examples
The services below are grouped by what they sell. Each one notes who pays and whether it needs payments to go through your platform.
1. Paid visibility
Featured listings, top-of-search placement, "bump to top" refreshes, highlighted or labelled listings, and home page spots. Sellers pay per listing when they want more reach. Etsy Ads, eBay promoted listings and Facebook Marketplace's sponsored listings are the large-scale versions. On a small site the simple version works the same way and needs no payment flow between buyer and seller. The guide to listing fees, lead fees and featured listings compares these options in detail.
2. Paid posting for commercial users
Keep private listings free and charge where the listing is worth money to the poster: cars, property, jobs, services. Craigslist still runs on this model: it charges $5 for dealer, car and services listings and $10 to $75 for job posts, while most other posts stay free (Craigslist posting fees).
3. Seller plans and memberships
A monthly plan for dealers, agents and power sellers that bundles more listings, priority placement, a richer profile (logo, gallery, video), better analytics and faster support. This is how property portals and job boards make most of their money. The section on packaging below shows how Rightmove grows it.
4. Seller tools and data
- Performance dashboards: views, contacts, click-through and conversion per listing, as Airbnb gives hosts occupancy and market data.
- Market insights: price comparisons for similar listings, demand by category, popular search terms.
- Marketing tools: promotional discounts, bundles, social sharing with tracking links, email campaigns to past buyers.
- API access and integrations for professional sellers who manage stock in their own systems, as with the eBay Developer Program.
These usually sell best as part of a higher seller plan rather than one by one.
5. Trust services
- Verified profiles and badges: ID checks, business registration checks, professional certifications. Airbnb matches profiles with government IDs; TaskRabbit runs background checks on taskers.
- Seller reputation programs such as eBay's Top Rated Seller badge, which reward reliable sellers and help buyers choose.
- Dispute resolution: mediation when a deal goes wrong, as Freelancer.com offers for project disputes.
6. Payments, escrow and buyer protection
Holding the payment until the buyer confirms the deal removes the main fear of buying from a stranger. Upwork holds funds in escrow until freelancers deliver; eBay's Money Back Guarantee and Etsy's Purchase Protection refund buyers when an order doesn't arrive or doesn't match the description. These services only exist on a transactional marketplace, because the platform must hold the money. Insurance and protection plans are covered in their own section below.
7. Shipping and fulfilment
Discounted shipping labels (Etsy), full storage and delivery (Amazon FBA), or delivery partnerships for bulky items. They reduce the work for sellers and make delivery more reliable for buyers. Shipping labels are part of the services revenue that kept Etsy growing.
8. Financing
Payment plans, loans or buy now, pay later at checkout make high-priced items easier to buy. They are run by a financing partner, and they make sense once you have enough transaction volume for the partnership to pay off.
9. Professional and managed services
Doing part of the job for the user: professional photos, listing writing, inspections, valuations, or a fully managed hiring service. Fiverr's services revenue, which includes managed services and grew 50.9% in 2025, is built on this kind of offer. Rightmove's Online Agent Valuation tool is a lighter, automated version.
10. Education and community
Seller handbooks (Etsy's Seller Handbook covers photography, pricing and marketing), webinars, templates, forums and events for members. These rarely earn much on their own, but they raise the quality of listings and make a paid plan feel more complete.
Which value-added services suit classifieds and which need a transactional marketplace
The biggest dividing line is whether money between buyer and seller goes through your platform. On a classifieds site, buyers and sellers meet and pay each other directly, so you can only sell services to the person placing the ad, or partner services that don't need you to hold money. On a transactional marketplace, you handle the payment, so you can also sell protection, shipping and financing, and take a transaction fee or commission.
| Value-added service | Classifieds site | Transactional marketplace | Who usually pays |
|---|---|---|---|
| Featured listings, bump to top, labels, home page spots | Yes, the main source of income | Yes (sponsored listings) | Seller, per listing |
| Paid posting in chosen categories | Yes | Rarely (listing fees instead) | Commercial sellers |
| Monthly seller plans | Yes | Yes | Dealers, agents, shops |
| Banner and display advertising | Yes | Yes | Local businesses, ad networks |
| Analytics and market insights | Yes, inside seller plans | Yes | Professional sellers |
| Verified badges | Yes, if you can run the checks | Yes | Seller, as a fee or part of a plan |
| Partner referrals (insurance quotes, inspections, transport, financing) | Yes, as a referral or affiliate deal | Yes, built into checkout | The partner pays you a referral fee |
| Escrow, buyer protection, guarantees | No, unless you add payments | Yes | Buyer fee or your commission |
| Shipping labels and fulfilment | No | Yes | Seller |
| Insurance sold at checkout | No | Yes, through a licensed partner | Buyer or seller |
For a classifieds site, start with paid visibility and paid posting for commercial users, then add seller plans once you have regular dealers or agents. The step-by-step guide to monetizing a classifieds website covers the setup. Trust can still be built with manual verification badges and clear safety advice, and partner services such as insurance quotes for cars or inspections for equipment can be added as referral links.
For a transactional marketplace, paid visibility still comes first, but the payment flow lets you add buyer protection, shipping and financing. These cost more to run, yet they are also the strongest defence against users taking deals off your platform.
Which value-added services to launch first
A smaller marketplace does not need AR try-ons or in-house financing to start. Ranked by effort against payoff:
- Paid visibility (featured or top-of-search listings, "bump" refreshes). These are cheap to run, are paid for by sellers, and scale with your listings.
- Charging commercial users (pay-to-post in high-value categories, monthly plans for dealers or agents).
- Trust services (verified badges, escrow, buyer protection). These cost more to run, but they also make it less likely that users take deals off your platform.
- Logistics, financing and insurance. These are worth adding only once you have enough transaction volume for the partnership costs to pay off.
Before you build anything, check what your users actually want:
- Ask them. A short survey (Google Forms, Typeform or SurveyMonkey) or a few calls with your most active sellers.
- Watch behaviour. Google Analytics or Hotjar show where users drop off and which categories get the most contacts.
- Look at competitors that serve the same users and note what they charge for.
- Test with a small group before a full launch, and compare take-up between two prices or two packages.
How to package and price value-added services
The same service can sell well or badly depending on how it is packaged. Two public examples show what works.
Rightmove: growth from add-ons and top packages, not more advertisers
Rightmove, the UK property portal, earns most of its revenue from monthly fees paid by estate agents and housebuilders. Its results for the six months to 30 June 2026 show where the growth came from:
| Metric (H1 2026) | Value | Change |
|---|---|---|
| Revenue | £225.8m | +7% vs H1 2025 |
| Average revenue per advertiser (ARPA), per month | £1,726 | +£117 / +7% vs H1 2025 |
| Agency ARPA | £1,636 | +8% vs H1 2025 |
| New Homes ARPA | £2,247 | +7% vs H1 2025 |
| Agency branches advertising | 16,591 | +1% vs December 2025 |
| Underlying operating margin | 69% | 71% in H1 2025 |
Total membership was flat, yet revenue rose 7%. Rightmove says the ARPA growth was mainly product-led: average products per agency branch rose 14% year on year. 36% of independent agents subscribe to its top "Optimiser Edge" package, and the share of new-homes developments on the top "Ascend" package went from 28% in December 2025 to 36%. Its Online Agent Valuation product had Rightmove's fastest-ever revenue growth from a new product and helped send about 50% more unique valuation leads to estate agents. Premium features sell when they produce leads the advertiser can count.
Amazon: one plan per item, one per month
Amazon's seller pricing page (checked October 2026) offers an Individual plan at $0.99 per item sold, or a Professional plan at $39.99 per month. Professional adds bulk listing and inventory tools, access to Amazon Ads, automated pricing, B2B selling and selling through apps and APIs. The two plans cost the same at about 40 sales a month, so the subscription only pays off for regular sellers.
Packaging rules that follow from this
- Sell one-off extras to occasional sellers and plans to professionals. A private seller will pay once to feature a sofa; a car dealer wants a monthly plan with many listings and priority placement included.
- Use three tiers at most, such as basic, professional and premium, and make each one clearly different. Put analytics, API access and priority support in the higher tiers.
- Make the top tier a real step up. More than a third of Rightmove's independent agents and new-homes developments pay for the highest package.
- Tie each tier to an outcome you can measure, such as views, contacts, leads or appointments. A tier that only adds badges is hard to sell for long.
- Grow revenue per member, not just member numbers. Rightmove grew revenue with flat membership by selling more products and upgrades.
- Price against what a sale is worth. A featured spot on a car or a house can cost far more than one on a used phone. Charging to post or feature in chosen categories lets you price each one separately.
- Keep it optional and clearly labelled. Etsy's own filing calls its services "optional". In the EU the Digital Services Act also requires platforms to label ads and say who paid for them, so promoted listings need a visible "Sponsored" or "Featured" tag.
For plan design, renewals and churn, see the guide to subscription marketplaces.
Insurance for online marketplaces
Insurance and protection plans deserve their own section, because they are often misunderstood. Many marketplaces say "insurance" when they mean a guarantee they fund themselves. Poshmark's Posh Protect, TCGplayer's Safeguard, StubHub's FanProtect Guarantee and Grailed Purchase Protection all promise buyers a refund or replacement when an item is lost, fake or not as described. In practice marketplaces use three models.
| Model | Who pays | Example (current terms) |
|---|---|---|
| Platform-funded guarantee | The marketplace, out of its commission | Poshmark's Posh Protect: refund if an order never ships, or the item is damaged, wrong, not authentic or not as described. Buyers must open a case within 72 hours of delivery; otherwise payment is released to the seller. Items that just don't fit or aren't the buyer's style are excluded. |
| Buyer-paid protection fee | The buyer, as a fee added at checkout | Vinted: "zero selling fees" for sellers; a Vinted fee is added to the buyer's transaction to cover a "safe, smooth experience". |
| Licensed third-party insurance | Built into the price or the host's plan | Turo: in the US, UK, Canada and France, trips are "automatically insured by one of our third-party insurance providers"; host plans reimburse eligible repairs up to the lesser of the car's actual cash value or $200,000 in the US (Turo S-1/A, Nov 2024). |
The protection-fee model can carry a whole business. Vinted charges sellers nothing and earns from buyers. According to its 2025 results (April 9, 2026), GMV grew 47% to €10.8 billion, with €1.1 billion in revenue and €62 million in net profit. Vinted doesn't say how much of that revenue comes from the buyer fee alone, but it shows that buyers will pay a visible fee when the protection is clear and easy.
Insurance can also shape your pricing. Turo's filing explains that the fees it charges guests vary with the trip's risk and the host's settings, and that the price of protection depends on the host's settings and the cover the guest chooses. At the time of that filing Turo had about 3.5 million active guests and 150,000 active hosts. It withdrew its IPO registration in February 2025. Airbnb takes the add-on route: guests buy travel insurance when they book, and its Q2 2026 letter reports that revenue up over 60% year on year.
Why protection brings repeat revenue
Protection works on both sides of the deal. Buyers who were refunded once come back because they know the next purchase is covered. Sellers are protected against shipping damage, lost parcels and false claims. And because the protection only applies when the deal is paid on your platform, it is one of the best reasons for users not to go around you. It also makes buyers more willing to buy expensive items, where the fear of losing money is highest.
How to add insurance or protection to your marketplace
- Hold the money first. Every one of these schemes depends on payments going through the platform, so the marketplace can refund or release funds. If buyers and sellers pay each other directly, you have nothing to guarantee. Escrow or marketplace payments come before any protection promise.
- Find the risk. List what actually goes wrong on your marketplace: shipping damage, parcels that never arrive, fraud, items not as described, damage during a rental, product liability.
- Start with a narrow guarantee. Cover "not received" and "not as described", set a short claim window like Poshmark's 72 hours, and list exclusions clearly. A predictable guarantee costs little and removes most buyer hesitation.
- Charge buyers only when the value is visible. A protection fee works when buyers can see what it covers at checkout. A hidden surcharge tends to damage trust instead.
- Don't call it insurance unless it is. Damage and liability cover for high-value goods, vehicles or rentals is normally provided by a licensed insurer, as Turo does. Arranging insurance is regulated in most countries, so partner with a third-party insurer or broker rather than promising cover yourself.
- Explain it and support it. Put the terms on a simple page, show them at checkout, train your support team on claims, and track complaints to improve the policy.
On a classifieds site, where you don't hold the money, you can still offer insurance through a partner: for example, a link to car insurance quotes on vehicle listings, or rental cover on equipment listings, paid as a referral fee by the insurer. The partner sells and runs the cover; you send them interested buyers.
Challenges and how to handle them
- Cost to build and run. Payment flows, APIs and protection programs are expensive. Start with services that cost almost nothing to run, such as paid visibility, and add the costly ones when volume justifies them.
- Users who resist paying. Some users see extras as a barrier. Keep the basic service useful on its own, explain what each extra delivers, and show results such as extra views or contacts.
- Operational load. Verification, disputes and claims need people and clear rules. Automate what you can and use partners for the rest.
- Too many options. A long menu of add-ons confuses sellers. A few clear extras and a small number of plans sell better.
- Scale. Make sure a service still works when the number of users grows tenfold, both technically and in support time.
Selling value-added services on a Yclas classifieds site
If you run a classifieds site or niche marketplace on Yclas, the paid-visibility and seller-plan services above are built in. Sellers can buy featured listings (a badge, first place in results and a spot on the home page), bring their ad back to the top, or buy boosts that package featured days and moves back to the top. As the owner you can sell monthly seller plans, charge to post in the categories you choose, and sell extras such as Urgent and Highlight labels, home page Spotlight places and paid renewals, plus banner and AdSense space. The Make money wizard in the site admin switches this on in four steps. Payments go straight to your own Stripe or PayPal account (19 payment providers are supported), and Yclas takes no commission on any plan. Services such as insurance, inspections or verification are ones you arrange with partners. You can try it with a free 15-day trial; plans are on the pricing page.
Frequently asked questions
What are value-added services in a marketplace?
They are optional paid extras on top of the basic service of listing, searching and contacting or buying. Common examples are featured listings, seller plans, analytics, verified badges, buyer protection, shipping labels, financing and insurance through a partner.
Which value-added services make the most money?
Paid visibility. At Amazon, Etsy and eBay, sponsored or promoted listings are the largest value-added service, and they cost the platform very little to run.
Which value-added services work on a classifieds site?
Featured listings, bump to top, labels, home page spots, paid posting in chosen categories, monthly seller plans, banner advertising and partner referrals. Services that need you to hold the payment, such as escrow, buyer protection and shipping, need a transactional marketplace.
How should I price value-added services?
Sell one-off extras per listing to occasional sellers and monthly plans to professionals, price by category according to what a sale is worth, and keep the number of tiers small. Test two prices with a small group before a full launch.
Can an online marketplace offer insurance?
Yes, but in most cases through a licensed insurer or broker. A marketplace can fund its own guarantee, add a buyer protection fee at checkout, or partner with an insurer for damage and liability cover. A classifieds site can refer buyers to an insurance partner for a fee.
How do value-added services stop users leaving the platform?
Protection, guarantees and seller tools only work when the deal stays on your marketplace. That gives buyers and sellers a reason not to swap contact details and complete the deal elsewhere.
