The Reeves Report: Bonanzle Turns Up The Heat Vying For Christmas Shoppers

With only four months remaining until Christmas, Bonanzle merchants are turning up the heat in their booths vying for holiday shoppers. Stocking their shelves to the brim with top of the line products, Bonanzle merchants are striving to offer something for everyone, including "everything but the ordinary". Antiques, vintage items, handmade / custom items, unusual attic finds and even some new products are in the line up.

While in the comfort of your own home, 24/7, experience the Bonanzle difference. Grab a cup of coffee or your favorite beverage and browse the wonderful selection of products offered. If you have a question, you can email, Quick Text or live chat with the merchant right in their booth. Bonanzle merchants are a very social bunch so you may also make new friends while doing your Christmas shopping.

Many Bonanzle merchants offer coupons for a percentage off of their everyday low prices to help shoppers stretch their shopping dollars. See an item that you like but would like to get a better deal? Check the listing header for the OBO button (Or Best Offer). Click the OBO button and follow the instructions to send the merchant an offer. Once the merchant gets your offer, they can accept or counter-offer. Many Bonanzle merchants are willing to accept any resonable offer - so go for it! You'll be surprised at the savings!

We took a quick peek around Bonanzle and we found some very interesting Christmas decorations, cards and the like. If you need holiday decor or paper products, you can find them on Bonanzle. Here is a small sample of what we found (the pictures are clickable):

$Christmas countdown banner$

Bill Harding founded Bonanzle which is based in Kirkland, Washington. Previously, Bill was lead developer for five years at Kirkland-based gaming firm Amaze Entertainment. Bonanzle's creation began in January 2007 when Bill decided to create a site where people could sell a lot of items quickly, and give buyers combined offers and better deals while keeping the site as simple as possible.

After a year and a half of development, Bonanzle (Bonanza.com was taken) released a beta site version in June 2008. Bonanzle went public in September 2008. At that time, the site had between 10,000 to 20,000 unique visitors. Bonanzle has experienced explosive growth with the only marketing of the site being word of mouth.

Bill created Bonanzle to be very socially interactive to create an environment where people could talk about what they are buying and selling. Being built around hard-to-find collectibles, the social aspect allows people to share and learn about their special items. Buyers can ask questions or just visit with a merchant through email, Quick Text or live booth chat.

Bonanzle makes a commission of three to five percent on each sold item. They also offer premium subscriptions that allow sellers better placement for their goods on the site. There are no listing fees, no fees to have a booth, no fees to place pictures in a listing or any other fee that sellers have become accustomed to on other sites. Lower selling fees means lower prices for buyers!

Listing on the site is easy. Bonanzle has a cropping tool built in so that sellers can zoom in or out on their product pictures to fit the listing. Below is a video of how to list products but there has been an upgrade since the video. Sellers now add traits to their items while creating the listing.

Sellers can offer several payment options including PayPal, Google Checkout, Checks, Money Orders, RME and etc..

On July 22, 2009, Bonanzle introduced their affiliate and syndicated seller program. From Bonanzle's Blog:

Here are some more Q&A details about the Syndicated Seller and Bonanzle Affiliates program.

What's the difference between a "Syndicated Seller" and a "Bonanzle Affiliate?" A "Syndicated Seller" is a Bonanzle seller who has signed up to offer referral fees when their items sell to a buyer who was referred via a Bonanzle Affiliate. A "Bonanzle Affiliate" is a web site or blog that has signed up to receive commissions when they refer paying buyers to Bonanzle items. You can sign up as a Syndicated Seller here or as a Bonanzle Affiliate here.

Can a Syndicated Seller also be a Bonanzle Affiliate? Technically, yes, but do you really want to pay commission fees to yourself? The only circumstances under which you, as a seller, would benefit from being a Bonanzle Affiliate is if you have a web site and you plan to refer your visitors to the items of other Bonanzle sellers. If that sounds like something you'd be interested in, you can sign up at our Affiliates site.

Does the Bonanzle Affiliates Program affect anything about my shopping experience on Bonanzle? No. Whether you are a Syndicated Seller or not has no bearing on search results or any aspect of the experience people will have when they're shopping at your Bonanzle store. The only difference is that our affiliates will send more buyers directly to your items.

When I sign up as a Syndicated Seller, how many more sales will I make? At first, probably not very many, because it will take time for us to build our network of Affiliate Partners. But in the long run, depending on what you offer as a referral fee, the sky's the limit for how this might affect your buyer traffic.

I Have More Questions. What Do I Do? Try reading our Syndicated Seller FAQ.
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A Few Bonanzle Statistics:

At this time there are 89,832 users on Bonanzle.
There is a total of 2,229,046 items listed on Bonanzle.
Most Bonanzle buyers come to the site via Google search.

Visitor Statistics From Site Analytics: