Bonanzle is still #4 on the PSU listing count this morning with 1,136,620 listings. Currently there are 27,777 users of those users, 8,208 are Bonanzle booth owners and of those owners, 406 are supporting Bonanzle members. This means that less than 5% of the booth owners are supporting members.Today when logging in, there is a new front page made up of the handpicked lists. Everything was red, assuming this had to do with Valentines Day. Everything looked new. Now I maybe wrong about this, but Bonanzle was selling Bonanzle as not the shiny new stuff. What just happened here?
Not quite sure what prompted this change of the front page. The old front page was very inviting, The pictures exploded into new ones and changed all of the time. Now it just sits there with what appears to be shiny new stuff.
It would seem to be more of a priority at Bonanzle to make a sellers page. Seem to be spending a lot of time checking and rechecking myself on what has shipped or has had feedback. To much wasted time. What has been paid for and offers that need attention. There needs to be more backend features at this time rather than a new front page.
When I became a supporting member, it was for the future of my business. No supporting members no new servers. Bottom line you can't run a business without money to do so. Not to many sales were coming in, so not to much in final value fees were being paid. The supporting member seemed to be the way to go to insure the future of my business.
As a supporting member there were a few perks. One perk is the Google Analytics, this is critical for me to see where my traffic is coming from. Wasted time is money. Another perk is that your items were twice as likey to show on the front page.
This is no longer a perk for me. I sell Pagan and Wiccan items, there is no chance in this realm that my items will be on the front page. I know this, I am not foolish.
So I did a little checking this morning on the front page handpicked lists. One list has a total of 6 of the 20 items that are supporting members. Another list has 8 supporting members items out of the 20.
So now I guess I need to consider dropping my supporting membership and spending that $24 a month in other areas of advertising. At this time with the economy the way that it is and being a small seller, it just doesn't make good business sense for me to continue to be a supporting member.
It also doesn't make to much sense for a lot of new members to become supporting members. There are less than 5% supporting members of the site and to take away something as small as front page just doesn't seem like a wise business move. Only time will tell........
All things considered the new home page format does take that particular perk away from the paying members.
ReplyDeleteTruly not understanding the thinking on this one, as it also does not keep in line with the "everything but the ordinary" tag line.
Also, in order to drive that all elusive "click through" a variety of items are needed, with the new format this is not what is being shown.
Phaedra
I have not been a supporting member but I am also wondering why the change?
ReplyDeleteNow when you look at the home page there are always a bunch of items from the same categories or very similar looking items, not really unique items. Kind of discouraging :(
Thank you for posting your opinion.
@ Chris and Etta It is very discouraging. Not to mention looking more like Etsy.com which is new and shiny. Not the way Bonanzle has been marketing itself.
ReplyDeleteThanks for posting this. I am a little confused and not too happy with this new look.
ReplyDeleteI have had this nagging feeling for a while that Bonanzle is getting away from its "simplify" philosophy and spending way too much time on giving its growing number of community members everything they want in the way of toys, but ignoring important things like searches that really work and invoicing that is top of the line.
In these times of economic hardship, what people come to Bonanzle with money to spend may not be willing, nor understand, the concept of the hand-picked lists and simply decide to go elsewhere.
I appreciate your honesty and insight.
I have to agree, BB. The new homepage, while attractive, is soooo limited for both buyers and sellers. (And maybe a little too attractive.) I love Bill and Mark's willingness to try new things, but I don't think this one is working so well.
ReplyDeleteI could go on about what I don't like about it, but suffice to say I don't think it is right for Bonanzle. And I hope Bill and Mark realize this soon and change it back to the way it was.
mrsmoondog
Ok, now I am really confused. Maybe I have not spent enough time on the homepage because I had not noticed the difference. If you hit your F5 button, it changes. I saw a mix of old and new. Do you think that has anything to do with all the new "bay" users coming over and bringing their sparkly new items? Can Bonanzle do anything about that?
ReplyDeleteI guess I missed the whole thing where they made the changes you speak about. Bummer...I have GOT to get back to reading everything because I am getting out of touch.
Thanks for the blog post.
I disagree with you completely. I am a founding member and one of the earliest booth holders on Bonanzle. I have seen a lot of changes since July.
ReplyDeleteWhat I read here is a less than positive attitude with a hearty helping of self pity mixed with a few inaccuracies. Cowboy up girlfriend, that negativity will take you down.
There has never been a commitment to have only vintage or used items on Bonanzle. If there were I would not be here because I sell new things. Bonanzle adopted the motto "find everything but the ordinary", not find everything but the new.
I don't understand what is preventing you from putting together a hand picked list of your own? Bill asked for them a week or so ago.
The added homepage exposure is a tiny part of the benefits you get from your membership. As more items are listed on the site and more members subscribe to upgrades it will be diluted even further, this is a mathematical fact of life. The promise was 'twice as likely to appear' and that is a mathematical constant.
You also have the ability to custom sort your booth display, to be a main buy page and exceptional items page featured booth PLUS a showcase booth in category pages.
The rotating positioning of your items in the left side of the page as premier items whenever a matching search is made appears far more valuable in the long term, to me, because it is targeted to search.
If this is of no interest to you then, from a strict Return on Investment standpoint you should probably consider downgrading to a Plus membership at $10 per month.
Please don't allow yourself to fall into negativity, if your items are not selling as well as you would like a careful analysis of the reasons for this will be far more productive.
@ Henrietta It's ok to disagree. However there is no "self pity" here or negativity here. Bonanzle is a selling venue for me that for now is working.
ReplyDeleteFor the most part I sell new items also, it is a mixed lot at Bonanzle of new and used.
I have made more than a couple of handpicked lists, there has been nothing to stop me
from doing so. Remember the "popularity contest" with the favorites and the "tagging"? There is nothing from preventing anyone from creating another user ID and creating their own booth of handpicked items. It is already being done.
The guys can only control so much of what happens and are far to busy to be worrying
about who is manipulating the system. My personal thoughts are the time would be
better spent on working on a sellers page and better search.
The old home page of exploding rotating pictures I thought was very interesting, not
to mention a wide variety of items, was a terrific way to "window shop".
I have to agree with Brightest and Phaedra.. seems like we are getting away from the simplest. The list of the "to do's" becomes almost overwhelming at times. Before adding all the new maybe we should focus on finishing the smaller tasks that have yet to be completed.
ReplyDelete