A group of UA students are working together this semester to market a new app called twazer: a trusted, student, peer-to-peer marketplace for e-commerce.
“Right now students have Craigslist that they can go to for peer-to-peer e-commerce, but they can’t really trust Craigslist because it’s not really safe; a lot of kids think it’s sketchy,” said Brady Silverwood, a marketing junior.
Silverwood said users are prompted to create an .edu login when downloading the app, and must have a student email address. He said this is one of the features that makes the app safer than alternatives.
Megan Copeland, a pre-business freshman, said the concept behind this app is a good idea because students can make money in a safe way by selling things or clothes they don’t use or wear anymore.
“Another thing that kids are doing on campus is they’re using the Facebook Free & For Sale page,” Silverwood said. “The thing with that, though, is it’s safer than Craigslist, but people go on Facebook for different reasons. They don’t go on Facebook just for that, and there are no filtered searches.”
The current filters to help with search engine optimization on the twazer app are books, notes, furniture, electronics, clothes and other items. Users can also filter by price range.
“Another thing that the app does is it allows for a cashless transaction,” Silverwood said. “A lot of people around campus tend not to carry cash on them anymore; it’s all mobile-based. So through the app, you can actually set up your Venmo ID, meet with the person, and you can scan a barcode and basically pay through Venmo to that person, so you wouldn’t have to pay in cash.”
Silverwood also said twazer is location-based, and users can modify the radius of how far they are willing to search. He said that, unlike Craigslist, users can take a picture directly on the twazer app and post the item right away.
“Another cool thing that is helping safety-wise is that there is in-app messaging. So you can contact someone without necessarily having their number,” Silverwood said.
Silverwood and his partner, Alan Alchalel, a finance junior, are going to head up the twazer marketing team with interns here at the UA.
“My goal is to get people aware of what twazer is, and not feel like, ‘Oh, we’re just another startup,’ but, ‘Hey, this twazer team is doing a lot of fun stuff around [the UA]. I want to learn more about them,’ ” Silverwood said. “We’ve already got together a pretty diverse group of interns.”
According to Silverwood, twazer team interns are also members of Chain Gang junior honorary, Delta Sigma Pi business fraternity, Alpha Epsilon Pi fraternity, Kappa Kappa Gamma sorority and Zeta Beta Tau fraternity.
“I became a part of the twazer team because I see the potential in this great idea,” said Nate Hiser, a political science junior. “Not only is the idea great, but the people behind the idea are very passionate and excited about this new app. The combination of those two things made me want to get involved.”
Silverwood said the twazer team is hoping to plan a concert launch party. He said the team would get a feel for what people would like to see at a concert, whether it is EDM, country music, hip-hop or rap.
“We’ll give that info to the twazer concert team, and they’ll go ahead and get a cool artist within our price range,” Silverwood said. “There’s not going to be any Ticketmaster or StubHub that they can go through. If they want to buy the ticket they have to actually download the twazer app, and then through the twazer app … where they will be able to buy the ticket.”
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