Bill Harding, Mark Dorsey, & The Phenomenal Bonanzle Marketplace

1 - I can do better 2 - Jury's out 3 - Pretty darn good 4 - Splendiferous 5 - Awesometastic by 35 people | Log in to rate

Ranked #12,075 in Shopping, #114,533 overall

Bonanzle Is All About You Baby!

At Bonanzle.com Bill & Mark are working for your success as well as their own.

I have now been actively selling (and yes I mean selling) on Bonanzle.com for 220 days and I have loved every minute of it. What makes Bonanzle so fabulous?

1) Bill Harding's astounding ability to consistently innovate new tools to help me succeed

2) Mark Dorsey's unbeatable customer care

&

3) Mark & Tom's tireless efforts to keep Bonanzle a safe shopping venue for all Bonanzlers by removing counterfeits listings & listings belonging to sellers that have been less than attentive in their booths.

Bonanzle is about both the sellers and the buyers. Bonanzle is about people interacting with one another and interacting with Bonanzle.com

Bonanzle is the new online shopping experience penetrating e-commerce like no other venue has since eBay.

Bill Harding is the man with the vision and the brilliance to make it happen - Bonanzle a marketplace built with heart.

The Inspiration of Bonanzle & Its Anatomy 

What's your dream job?

The job doesn't matter. The people are what matters.

Bill Harding Founder of Bonanzle - jobster April 9th 2007

Join Bonanzle today, leave behind the negative, and reignite the passion of online selling & community spirit! Bonanzle is your opportunity for both high quality of life and selling success, because of the fabulous features and drive that makes Bonanzle an ever increasing delightful experience for its members.

What is and what is so special and unique about Bonanzle?

Bill Harding designed Bonanzle guided by the activity of trade & Community. Bonanzle isn't some out of the box software shopping venue initiated by the eBay changes intent on cashing in on eBay's abuse of its members. Bill began designing Bonanzle 2 years ago and every feature and the very concept of simplicity in usability & community guided his project's initiation and is the foundation of the Bonanzle experience.

You can read Bill's journey of creating Bonanzle on his Blog: Relentless Simplicity
http://www.williambharding.com/blog/2007/01/ starting from January 2007

Again, Bill's Perspective-

What's your dream job?

The job doesn't matter. The people are what matters.

Bill Harding Founder of Bonanzle

Bonanzle Marketplace - An Original Idea 

Simply Selling & Simply Helping

Bill Harding Founder Of Bonanzle-

Synergy: Beyond the Buzzword
Monday, May 21st, 2007

"Synergy." It's one of those words that resides alongside "Web 2.0%u2033 as business jargon whose power is diluted from misuse and overuse. But, linguistic connotation notwithstanding, I think it is a critical component of sites that are going places in the 2000's. Don't buy it? Observe:

Etsy. A site that, at its core, is doing the same thing as eBay: selling crafts between users. Given, they have done it with a better interface, but a blind decapitated monkey could create a better UI than eBay. Most sites have. What has made Etsy so much more successful than nice-looking sites like MightyBids.com is the synergy it generates between items and artists. The preponderance of well-photographed (and thus visually attractive) items on the site exist because artists tend to be better photographers than the average user. Many of Etsy's most unique and successful features "work" because the site is designed for abstract-minded individuals. Their "time machine" is a perfect example of this. The "time machine" is a flash application on Etsy that scrolls items of decreasing newness toward you through space. This feature succeeds resoundingly because of the synergies wherein A) people expect artsy features on an artsy site and B) art-related items are much more arbitrarily chosen than eBay items, so it is relevant to see random pieces presented. If eBay tried to do the same, you would get toasters and broken laptops and Nigerian get-rich-quick scams flying toward you. And it would not help you shop more effectively.

Biznik. A site that takes one part business, one part indy, and seasons to taste with charm. As Etsy::Classifieds, Biznik::Networking - that is, the world doesn't need another business networking site. But powerful synergies exist when you take friendly, benevolent, like-minded indy service providers, and mix them with users possessing business acumen. The result is monthly get-togethers like "Biznik Happy Hour" which is a networking event advertised as "Not a room of business card pushing suits," and which, over the course of the last six months, has nearly tripled in size, to the point that the event has outgrown the otherwise-terrific Liberty Cocktail bar. Why does Biznik work so well? Because its users naturally want to talk to and help each other, and if you're talking to and helping someone, you want to get to know them, and if you get to know them, you'll more likely to want to help them. And every time this cycle happens, the site itself becomes better because more people join and more advice is posted. The bottom line is that Biznik fosters an environment that perpetuates helpfulness, and is led by founders who embody the generous, user-first indy spirit that is manifest in so many members of the site.

As I continue to gather data and start putting the words into Business Plan 2.0, it has become very clear to me that this type of synergy is exactly the reason that Bonanzle will work. The classified ads sector is saturated, and the online auction space is beyond saturated. For a new site to make any significant inroads in this environment, there must be a strong synergistic undercurrent that leads users to the site and the site to users and users to users and the site to other sites. Fortunately, that is precisely how the plan is working out.

The Bonanzle Community and Its Importance To your Success 

How The Bonanzle Community Helps You Be A Success

I can say it even more simply: I have found no truer representation of the meaning of life than "to really love the people you love." Your family is a great starting point. But if you sit down and think about all of the people who you would sorely miss if they were gone, the list is many times longer than family. To the extent that I can follow a meaningful, long term, intelligent goal, I do hereby proclaim it to be my goal to be sure that each person who I'd miss knows the extent of their awesomeness.

Bill Harding Founder Of Bonanzle - buquisha Live Journal December 12th 2006

The Bonanzle community has developed into a warm, caring, supportive, and helpful group of people. The Bonanzle discussion boards are filled with encouragements, helpful tips shared with one another, congratulations for the positive experiences of others, and a welcoming of new Bonanzlers with an enthusiasm and spirit I have never witnessed or experienced before in my life.

Bonanzlers are family in that we depend on the help of each other in our success. Reciprocity is the cornerstone of successful selling on Bonanzle, which isn't surprising when you consider the quote of Bill Harding above and the foundational concept of Bonanzle.

Community activities leading to success on Bonanzle:

Handpicked Lists- The handpicked list are created by other sellers choosing your items to be on their list. The value of your items being chosen are

1) Rotation on the Bonanzle Home Page
2) Available for viewing in the list of the handpicked lists on category pages
3) Can be visited by way of a link on the buy page
4) When sellers are browsing listings to be a part of their list your items are being seen by other members gaining exposure

How do you increase the likelihood of being featured in someone's handpicked list?

1) By making lists yourself
2) Visiting other booths
3) Actively participating in the community discussion boards so people know who you are
4) Participating in Buying & Selling Games

Tagging - community activity of tagging items as- Bazaar, Beautiful, Funny, Cool, and/or Well Priced.

Benefits to your success

1) eyes on your items that may lead to your items being included in a handpicked list
2) being featured in exceptional items list, which is highlighted and linked from the buy page
3) meeting other Bonanzle members
4) having fun browsing Bonanzle

How do you increase the likelihood of your items being tagged?

1) By tagging the items of other sellers
2) Participating in the discussion boards
3) Participating in community buying and selling games

In general participation greatly increases your potential for success on Bonanzle & Significantly improves your experience selling on Bonanzle-

"Why does Biznik work so well? Because its users naturally want to talk to and help each other, and if you're talking to and helping someone, you want to get to know them, and if you get to know them, you'll more likely to want to help them. And every time this cycle happens, the site itself becomes better because more people join and more advice is posted."

Bill Harding Founder Of Bonanzle

Bonanzle - Designed With You In Mind 

Bill Harding - Founder Of Bonanzle
Books for a Better World, Pt. 1
Monday, July 23rd, 2007

There are a couple books (literally, two) that I find myself quoting from on a very regular basis. Today, I come to speak of the book that takes about an hour to read and years to fully assimilate.

But before I reveal the identity of this book, a question: when was the last time you started using a new application (for the sake of this blog, "applications" includes web sites) and felt like the architect of said application truly cared about your experience?

Speaking from personal experience, it never occurred to me why certain applications felt "better" and "worse" to use. Nor did I ask myself why frustrating applications had ended up being designed as they were. Now I reflect on both regularly, and the reason is Don't Make Me Think by Steve Krug.

Before I go any further, I should probably throw in fair warning: after reading this book, my reaction to using poorly designed software has changed from a mix of frustration and confusion to simple anger. If I waste more than five minutes finding a basic piece of functionality in an application, this now generally leads to severe annoyance. There is a fair chance that you, too, will revile the authors of your poorly designed software after reading this book. Therefore, if you are a person of action with a strong sense of justice, think twice before reading a text this potent.
dontmakemethink.jpg
But if you think you can deal with the truth, here's what you'll learn:

The premise of the book centers around the fact that users are very busy people who have neither the time nor the will to give an application as much attention as designers think they will. Krug asserts that when encountering a new application, the human impulse is to scan a page in about 1-3 seconds, make a best guess what will get them where they want to go (in Krug's words, "satisfice"), and muddle along from there. He points out that designers should take care not to waste users' milliseconds through making unclear links or leave them stranded in an application without a clear sense of where they are. He goes on to do some exercises where the reader sees examples of well-organized sites (i.e., Amazon) and poorly organized sites (buy the book and see them).

What's more, the book is chock full of pictures and great examples. As I've come to know other Internet entrepreneurs within the community, I have found myself repeatedly citing examples in this book, as it seems to take most applications at least an iteration or two before they can get enough user feedback to create a UI layout that makes sense. Without this book and a strong sense of responsibility to your user, an application can quite easily never get things right.

With this book explained, you can now look forward to hearing the exasperated tales of applications that drive me bonkers, like TopStyle. This application earned itself an express ticket to my bad side today when, after handily reporting files with CSS errors in them, it provides no clear path of how to fix (or even view) these errors. Clicking on a specific error in a list of errors just jumps directly to the top of the file that the error resides in, not to the error itself. Brilliant.
__________________________________________________________________

There are two user roles in a marketplace and success is only possible if both can be pleased.

A marketplace is not a marketplace if there are not any products to "market" so Bill's first task absolutely had to appeal to the selling users - the users with the products. After the people with the products arrive then come the people who are looking to buy a product.

The Picture of Listing Simplicity-

Simply Listing A Product For Sale On Bonanzle 

Any seller familiar with the OTHER place is well aware of how much listing products can drain your time. Also those familiar with the OTHER place know the consequence of "improving" Too Much!! Of course the fall out of the "improvements" at that OTHER place rob you of even more time. Then on top of that all those "glitchy" Improvements" are so "improved" upon they require weeks of revisions and more problems it is a never ending cycle of eBay. Does that sound like an application with YOU IN MIND, nope and I can tell you it doesn't feel like one either. The time involved coupled with the certain frustration of listing over there really begs the question of why we list there at all? .

Bill Harding designs with Bonanzle's users in mind

The listing Template image - that is it - nothing complicated, one interface not multiple layers of settings in different modules with additional pop up drop down crap. Just what you see in the picture



Takes about a minute to list an item on Bonanzle. Really stunningly simple and quick- I think Bill was thinking about me when he designed the listing template & that makes me feel special!

The Quick Post on Bonanzle Presented by Bill Harding 

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Setting Preferences For Selling On Bonanzle 

Quick, Easy,& Intuitive

Set Up Your
Shipping Method
Payment Method
Schedule Local Pickup Times
Make a Coupon
Offer Freebies
Create Combined Item Discounts
Create Your Custom Categories

If You Have An Upgraded Membership
Set Up Google Analytics
Submit 3 Images For Features Positions on Category Pages
Handpick the items you want on your landing page (booth front)

All Of the Above Can Be Done Right On This *1* Page

________________________________________________________________

Click the center tab at the top of your preference worksheet and schedule a Bonanza



Quick, Easy, Intuitive Simplicity

Bonanzle The Quintessential Marketplace 

What Is Good For The Seller Is Good For The Buyer Which is Good For The Seller & The Buyer

Many can conceptualize the logic that participants in a marketplace all need to be satisfied, but what elements are needed to create a mutually beneficial market for everyone??

With the Simplicity of listing and managing your Bonanzle Booth your time can be used for activities that benefit the marketplace as a whole - such as making this lens. All of the community activities I mention above are the elements for Bonanzle marketplace exuberance. Ok - I'll tell you how, and I apologize now for yet again having to highlight the what not to do (s) of eBay.

Over there we pay to have our items showcased and we expect that to actually happen. However, those of us who have been paying for the POSSIBILITY of exposure know that not only are we being robbed by the distorted strategy of a deranged CEO, but the buyers are too. John Donahoe has no idea what is on the auction floor. Sure users setting the categories for their items provides an extremely generic and quite possible way off the mark product search returns too. Really it's anyone's guess what search might return on eBay. JD's strategy does not result in happy buyers because they can't find anything good, nor does this result happy sellers who are paying to have their items NOT found .

So the seller is actually paying for what now is truly a gamble with a service "provider" and the buyers really aren't seeing the most delightful items possible, because the selection presented is based on what's best for what eBay believes is best for it. Neither the buyer nor the seller are of any consideration other than how much money eBay can rob us of or force us to rob our own customers to rob us of more - I am referring to the shipping fee fiasco. In essence, on eBay we are nothing but a commodity and tool paying to be used- that is all members not just sellers.

The fact that on eBay we actually put money on the table leads us to the logical expectation that we should receive more than the receipt for our eBay fees for our efforts. The galling reality is your/our dollar doesn't really buy us anything on eBay. Bonanzle doesn't charge for us to list our items, so our expectations for exposure of our items are up to us to enhance. The tools to enhance our Bonanzle Visibility are in fact the very things that create the great buying experience.

Sellers are buyers right? So we know what we would buy and what we won't . What better way can some of the best of 1,000,000+ items be distinguished from the rest than by consumers deciding what the best is? When we tag, create handpicked lists, & favorite booths we are bring the best to the top for buyers to more easily see.

Again, another what not to do. eBay's new failure of attempting to present us with items based on our user history results in numerous idiocies. Such as: Counterfeit products being displayed to me on the eBay home page. Brands of products or low quality items I have never shown any interest and my own items are sent to me in eBay's "suggestion" for me to purchase emails that are supposed to be personalized to my buying experience. These absurd suggestions are even stalking me on search pages in the new eBay failing to work at all search experience.

How does Bill Increase the probability (significantly) of having items presented to buyers that are actually appealing? As I mentioned above the community chooses items for hand picked lists, we tag items, and we favorite items. In other words, actual people are deciding what are desirable appealing products- in contrast to eBay's broken algorithm and the absurd assumption that any formula can substitute human perception and basic observation of what the listing actually is.





All of these community activities promote your booth and provide an excellently delightful buying experience. And an equally satisfying selling experience. The success of selling is in your/my hands not Bonanzle's. What you will get out of selling on Bonanzle is equal to what you are willing to put into your own success. Participating in Handpicked Lists, tagging...result in both a more appealing atmosphere for buyers and more visibility for your booth and this is where you will find your success!!

The Journey Of A Brilliant Concept 

Relentless Simplicity - the Tech Blog

Welcome to 800 Steps to Entrepreneurial Success
Monday, January 29th, 2007

Business consultant Karrie Kohlhaas pointed out to me today that the really successful entrepreneurs understand that all that work done to build a business for success isn't really building a business at all. It's building you.

In that spirit, I now embark upon my entrepreneurial self/business building. My site proper details my steps to this point, but all I have left from the sum of those experiences is a bunch fragmented memories. With this blog, that changes. The idea here is to chronicle the process of how big stuff happens, bit by bit by itsy bitsy bit.

What I expect will result from this exploration is a series of observations on the challenges and thrills of hatching a plan. Ideally, these observations will form a pattern from which meta-patterns will eventually manifest themselves. Through the back and forth of coalescing and isolating the meaningful lessons I come across during this journey, I reckon I'll end up with either 800 steps to entrepreneurial success, or freezer-burn.

- Bill Harding Founder of Bonanzle
Relentless Simplicity
The Chronicle's of Bonanzle

Bill Harding  

"Business is the ideal outlet for my type of brain -- the type that can not be turned off and needs a constant stream of new and challenging ideas to function optimally. To keep balanced and engaged, I am constantly in search of other people who have started successful businesses or who have a good idea for a venture they need help with."

"Hello and thanks for visiting the site. I'm Bill Harding and I like hatching plans, snow days, and long drives. I hate unlabeled streets, getting stuck in bear traps, and the smell of my hands when taking off rubber gloves."

"I am highly motivated by absurd ideas, genuine people, and ginger ale. Beyond that, I shall leave exploration of the enigma that is William Bates Harding's personal side to the pundits and concerted site searchers. Suffice to say, I really love the people I love, I find fun in most everything, and every year of my life so far has been better than the one before it."

From His William B Harding Website created to accomplish this goal-

Tuesday, September 26, 2006

No. 1 Bill Harding
Current mood: nauseated
As we ambled through Kirkland suburbs, drinking our 24 oz. of hangover juice otherwise known as "Steel Reserve" on Saturday night, Adam and I reflected on how we really got our shit together. He's got a cool new job doing cool new things, I have my "Viva La Martha" t-shirt. "These achievements stand to be reckoned with," I argued, wincing as I drank the tepid, mealy brew.

But it was about then that it struck me that there was a difference between the pedigree of Adam and I, for Adam is the owner and proprietor of http://myartiscool.com. And more to the point, if you type his name into Google and click "I feel lucky," it is Adam that you will learn about. There was a point, in 1994, I believe, when you could fake the funk with a strong analog presence. A "charming personality," "ravishingly good looks," or some such, that could get a man through college with coolness intact in my day. But nowadays, if you aren't the top Google result for your own name, then what the hell kind of goomba are you?

The evidence against me is damning:

WHEREFORE clearly, I am not the top Google result for my name. Any of them. Bill Harding; William Harding; Magnum, the Duke of Decadent Lovin': all will take you elsewhere;

WHEREFORE the man that does possess the top Google result of "Bill Harding" is the most prodigious tool that has stood on two feet;

WHEREFORE my thoughts have for weeks illuminated the blogosphere, which otherwise stands as a wasteland of less valuable, less interesting, and less espoused-by-me opinions;

WHEREFORE I should continue looking down on Dan Posluns, who earned the distinction of being the top-ranking Dan Posluns years ago, and who, drunk with the power of being being the top-ranking Dan Posluns, has plastered pictures of himself, his family, and his numerous vapid escapades to said site, which I visit willingly on a regular basis;

I hereby find myself guilty of being Google-ranked at the 8th degree. Since being convicted of this shameful blunder, I have since began serving my sentence of five years web hosting at the newly registered http://www.williambharding.com, and I intend to begin paying off the lobbyists forthright so that I might begin to ascend above the incumbent doofus holding tight to the #1 Bill Harding slot.



He Just Makes Me Smile - thank you Bill

Stirring Up Online Shopping  

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Relentless Simplicity - Bonanzle Tech Blog 

Bill Harding

The making of Bonanzle an ongoing project chronicled by Bill Harding founder of Bonanzle

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Bonanzle's HomePage Handpicked 

The Brilliant Bill Harding & Mark Dorsey developed yet another original idea. The handpicked list Bonanzle homepage.

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Bonanzle Everything But The Ordinary 

Bonanzle :: Buy and sell unique items with the friendliest community online.

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