Well some of you will have seen my posts about the incompetence at the Binville sign up...this may explain the reason...From Bidville sign up page:

As of 9/11/06, Bidville is not accepting applications from international sellers. To sell on Bidville, you must be located in the USA or Canada. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause. If you registered prior to 9/11/06 and have an active Seller Account, your service will not be affected.


May I be the first to congratulate them at this very wise move

Well, that's just a bummer. I really feel for you guys in the UK. There are plenty of other successful and growing sites, though, so don't let it get you down.

So true Becky. I can think of 5 right off the bat. And some much more successful than BV!

Bid-alot is a really good one!!! UK, CAN and US!!! Based in England and staffed in US!!! Nigeria blocked. So you will not get those MO order scams!!

What about just being a bidder? can Int'l people sign up now and only have a buy account?

Or just maybe that has to do with their VIP program, which can only validate USA and Canadien accounts.

Now that you mention it, it is possible that the VIP program will not accept international folks. But, that is completely different from registering as a bidder or seller.

As a seller, you must be able to place a verifiable credit card on file.

To receive VIP status, you must have a home phone number on file. That number will be called by an automated system. it will leave a number to call back with for verification.

For just a buyer, I can't think of any special requirements. I might be wrong on that since it's been a while since I signed up.

HonestJoesAuctions wrote (View Post): › According to Alexa, Bid Alot doesn't even make the top 100,000 list. BidVille is at 28, 285 or so. It has a long way to grow.

Looks like bid-alot is growing. Not sure when you checked, but I looked at it a couple weeks ago and it was higher than that, so out of curiosity I looked again today.

Here's what I found for today's date:

Traffic Rank for ecrater.com: 28,553
Traffic Rank for bidville.com: 28,922
Traffic Rank for wagglepop.com: 60,536
Traffic Rank for bid-alot.com: 62,419
Traffic Rank for blujay.com: 83,807
Traffic Rank for hibidder.com: 159,066

The more disgruntled sellers leave eBay for elsewhere, the more these other sites are growing and being promoted. Will they ever have eBay's traffic? Probably not, but they don't have to in order to be sucessful. Being successful is more than traffic, it's got to do with making your customer happy, which many of these sites do. Happy customers stay, and spread the word to their buyers, friends, family members, blogs, etc. All eBay has done is alienate people, and their popularity is waning.

I did make a mistake and left out the hypen, but heres the number I got today..


Bid-alot ranking

Hyphen is very important. And yes, we are very much in the top 100,000. We broke 100,000 alexa in Dec 2004, during our 1st year of operation.

And if you notice, we have lost approx 30,000 points... that means that 3 months ago we had 30,000 more points..... putting us at about 30,000.

Now if you look at the charts for the 2 year with bid-alot and bidville comparison... bidville is on a decline since the beginning of 2006. While Bid-alot did have a spike, it has maintained an average.

And the charts are about 2 days behind real date. So I would think that Alexa's other numbers are also about 2 days behind.

Bidville is almost as old as ebay, but bidville does absolutely no marketing or advertising. If Bidville did some marketing, link backs and a bit of national advertising, it could very well be a contender to ebay. And should have been ages ago.


Bid-alot's 50.5 page hits per user is also down about 31% on the 3 mon change and bidville's 4.2 page views is up 29%.

Also, world events can affect alexa scores, even if the site itself has had no increase or decrease in site traffic.


ps.. thanks Tastefully!

You know, I was one of the first members of Bidville, so long ago..and i've been hearing about how BV was going to grow, going to be 'a contender' for years-every time it sells, every time Ebay raises fees, everytime the stock goes over 10 cents!
The simple fact is that if Bidville was going to become anything, it would have done it by now. It does have user friendly software, I agree. The boards are as addictive as, and similar to, soap operas. Unfortunately software doesn't matter if the only people coming to the site are the ones there to read the latest drama in the cafe.
The phrase that used to tickle me and now simply seems sad is the familiar 'use the shameless plugs' . Do people not realize that you cannot get new customers by using a form of advertising only the members know about and see?
This is the thing that has kept Bidville from succeeding-their closed society mentality. They have their circle of acceptable members; and any new member who dares stray off their posted path is promptly tarred, feathered, and railroaded out of town...then once again they can return to their smiley-athon, their selling to each other, and their dreams of the big time.
if you have any doubts that I know of what I speak, read the few remaining forums there now. The new owners did away with the community gossip-gripe-gimme forum fondly known as the cafe, and folks are threatening to quit! They are closing their dozen or so auctions and leaving because they can't play anymore!
That pretty much sums up why BV will never be a contender...

Texas,

I agree with you that as long as the chat room mentality remains there, those poeple will not have sales. But, my sales have been good since I've returned to listing, and I've had 80 + hits on some item in 6 days or less.

Then I look at your track record. You had 14 feedbacks in less than 30 days, and over 1800 total. AT BIDVILLE. So you must be selling things also.

Don't let the few whiners over there get you down. There are whiners everyplace you go. Keep listing your items, they will continue to sell, and you will still reap a ton more profit from them than if you had them listed at hesgay.

you're right about that to some extent. I did pretty well at BV. However, I sell a whole lot more at yahoo! Especially dollar wise.

That's not what bothers me about BV. The bullies bother me, which is why I left for a year-voluntarily, not because I was banned, as people might have you believe.

I have always liked the site, the ease of listing, the categories. I like that they would let us organize sales, and do some occasionally off the wall things as promotions. But I gave up believing long ago that BV would ever make it even as big, revenue wise, as Yahoo. So far, none of the owners since Dr. Ed have really been interested in seeing BV grow-they buy it for a tax write-off, to sell, or whatever, and keep ignoring the real needs of the site, one of which is advertising.

But I also realize that BV has a reputation of being a 'flea market' type site, or a sports cards site. People are not willing to list quality collectibles there, because they know they won't sell. I tried it for a year, listing some really fine pieces. I watched them sit for a year because no serious collectors come to BV. If they sell at all, it's because someone is giving them away and another seller buys them to list at Ebay!

But the most serious problem BV has is the bullies who harass and belittle anyone who comes there with fresh ideas, who questions the status quo, who dares to be different and individual! So many fine dealers have come and gone over the years because they are not willing to bow down to the arbitrary rules and regulations of the board rulers.

I had hopes when the cafe was closed that people would read the writing on the wall and back off the nonsense on the boards and the browbeating of newcomers. I am still in hopes that the new owners will put a stop to this stuff...but judging by the posts in the seller forums, No one has any intention of giving an inch. Not even if it's to the betterment of their beloved BV.

Just my opinion, which ain't worth shucks!