Potential Income Stream, Selling On Bonanza

While scanning through a facebook group that is geared towards online selling I stumbled across a post talking about a website called bonanza.com that was an alternative to selling on Ebay. Now, this isn't the first time I've seen people talk about different sites to sell on and usually I merely pass them by. Why? Because Ebay is a Goliath, and at this point there is no David to take them down. This time I was intrigued for a few reasons, which we'll talk about.

First it caught my eye because the person commenting was having a positive experience with the site, and a couple other comments had good things to say as well. Next it caught my interest because you can import your listings from Amazon and Ebay as well. Which the seller was saying they had sold some Add-on items from Amazon through Bonanza. Ok, that was enough to get me intrigued. Reading through all the comments it seemed as if about half the people like it, and about half either hated it, or felt it was a waste of time for a small amount of sales. Reading through different forums, blogs, and review sites that pretty much seems to be the consensus. About 50/50 on whether or not people like it. After reading all this and playing around on their website I've decided that I'm going to give it a try, and here's why:

1. Being restricted to just 5 items a month through Ebay makes it hard to get rid of the things I already have around the house. This gives me another venue to (hopefully) sell a few items.
2. I don't have anything listed with Amazon FBA yet, so basically I've been relying on Ebay, which has proven to be a mistake now that they've cut down on how many items I can list.
3. It's mistake to have all your eggs in one (or even just two) baskets, especially in the online world.
4. There are NO insertion fees, and I'm only charged a final value fee of 16% I believe. 

I seriously have a bunch of stuff just sitting around my house right now that I can't rid of. It won't sell at garage sales, or it would sell to cheaply, it doesn't qualify for FBA or I bought it specifically to sell on FBA. Being stuck at just five listings on Ebay means I will continue to have this stuff forever! So if I can manage even a couple extra sales a month with Bonanza then it's that much more stuff out of house, and money in my pocket. 

Relying on only one income stream, whether offline or online is risky and a terrible idea. What if you lose your job tomorrow? What if Ebay says forget and shuts me down period? What if Amazon changes their rules, and I miss something, and my account gets shutdown? All these things and more can and do happen, every day in fact. Just the other day I read an article where a guy had a successful ebay business, but then others caught on and began to undercut him in price, eventually forcing him to quit because he wasn't making enough money (which also points to why you must always adapt to changes!). Next he re-built a similar (again, not much adapting and changing) business but through Amazon FBA. Next thing he knows, BAM, he's hit with a claim of selling fraudulent merchandise, his seller account is closed, his inventory is stuck at Amazon, and eventually he was sued over the matter. Moral of the story: Never rely on merely ONE venue of selling/making money AND always be aware of changes (especially online) and adapt and change with them.

Another reason I liked this venue is because of the NO insertion fees. This means I can list 20 items (or more) and not be billed a penny by Bonanza until an item sells. Virtually it is risk free for me to try. The traffic for Bonanza is not huge, especially compared to giants like Ebay and Amazon, but it has shown a small and steady increase over the past few years, so that is promising. Going on their site it seems to be a cross between Etsy and Ebay in it's design and set up. 

So far I have not listed anything, or bought anything. Mostly I've done some research on a few items, seen what HAS been selling, and just exploring. As I begin to use the site and put some listings and such up I will write a few more companion articles to this one on the experience. Again, I'm not expecting a bunch of sales or profit through them, but any little bit helps, and I feel better knowing that I'm not just sticking with one or two venues to profit from.