A marketplace where sellers get paid and buyers can trust the order

Marketplaces fail on model, not on code. A product marketplace where sellers ship their own stock behaves very differently from an on-demand service platform that matches a buyer with a nearby provider, and both differ from a rental or booking marketplace. Early on we write down who sets the price, who owns the customer relationship, who handles delivery, who carries refund risk and when the seller is paid. Each answer changes the data model.

The next decision is the commission. Flat percentages are simple. Category rates, tiered rates and fees for promoted listings are common once volume grows, so we model commission as configurable rules instead of a hard-coded number. We also decide how many sellers you need to start. A launch with a small invited group of sellers is easier to support and gives you real data before you open registration. Our discovery stage produces a short model document, the seller journey, and a release plan that keeps the first version small enough to ship.

The hard part of a marketplace is money. A buyer pays once, but the amount belongs to several parties: the seller, the platform and sometimes a delivery provider. Gateway products for marketplaces exist for exactly this, and we integrate them rather than inventing our own flow. Stripe Connect and Adyen for Platforms document the pattern, and Saudi gateways that support mada, Apple Pay and local cards need to be checked case by case for split-payment and payout support. We confirm what your chosen gateway offers before we commit to a design.

Inside the platform we keep an internal ledger. Every order creates entries for the buyer payment, the seller share, the commission and any refund, so finance can reconcile payouts without rebuilding history from bank statements. Payout timing is a business rule, for example after delivery confirmation plus a return window. Holding customer funds can bring licensing questions, so you should confirm your setup with your gateway and your legal adviser, and with the Saudi Central Bank where it applies. We build the technical flow to match the structure you choose.

Most Saudi buyers browse on a phone, in Arabic, and expect cash on delivery, mada or Apple Pay. We design the buyer experience in Arabic first, with proper right-to-left layouts, Arabic search that handles spelling variants, and national address fields. Sellers often run small shops, so the seller app is built for quick photo listings and order alerts by notification or WhatsApp.

Trust features carry a marketplace: verified sellers, reviews tied to real purchases, clear return terms and a visible dispute route. On the compliance side, a marketplace holds personal data for buyers and sellers, so we design to the requirements of the Personal Data Protection Law, including consent, retention and access logging, and we host in the Kingdom when your customers or regulators expect it. Where sellers issue invoices through the platform, we plan the ZATCA e-invoicing data flow early, because retrofitting it is costly. A first release usually takes 12 to 24 weeks depending on how many seller types and payment flows it carries.