"We think this is an amazing triple play," says Bonanza CEO Bill Harding. "First, we’re adding the tremendous stores and shoppers of 1000 Markets to our family. Second, we’re bringing a dynamic new design to the site that makes it even easier to list and buy the kind of delightful and unique merchandise both companies have always been known for. And third, we’re branding it with a household word that not only speaks to the bounty of opportunities to be found, but is also easier to remember and spell."

Bonanza certainly has a better ring to it. 

"This is an excellent match for our merchants and our growing audience of buyers," he says. "Both companies emphasize fun and easy shopping for unique products, and the merchants at 1000 Markets are known for the quality of their work and passionate commitment to customer service — traits that we admire and support."

"We are delighted to join forces with Bonanza, one of the leaders in the field," says 1000 Markets CEO Matthew Trifiro. "This will bring our distinctive and passionate merchants the power of Bonanza’s infrastructure and traffic. We believe that this combination will create one of the strongest players in social commerce."

Bonanza started enabling users to log in with Facebook and Google accounts back in June. As noted then, this could go a long way in increasing usage. 

In April, the company received a million dollar round of funding to improve its service. 1000 Markets raised $500,000 last year. Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.

1000 Markets’ inventory of about 100,000 items will be blended into Bonanza’s inventory over the next month. 

"If you’re like me you have lots of accounts on the web," says Alex Berg on the Bonanzle blog. "And remembering all those usernames and passwords can get a bit tricky; unless you keep them on a post-it stuck to your monitor.  So, we decided to let users use accounts they may have already to get more people into the Bonanzle family."

"If you already have a Bonanzle account and want to use Facebook or Google to log in from now on just make sure your Facebook or Google account shares the same email address as your existing Bonanzle account," adds Berg. "When you log in with Facebook or Google you’ll be prompted to tie the two accounts together."

Last year, we saw Bonanzle standing out among eBay competitors, and while opinions of the service are certainly mixed (not unlike those about eBay itelf), many seem to find it a worthy alternative for selling. Earlier this year, Bonanzle attracted some new funding.

Bonanzle says it may add other third-party accounts (like Yahoo) for log-in in the future.

WebProNews got an email from Bonanzle CEO Bill Harding, letting us know the company has just closed a $1m round of funding, with who he says are "many of Seattle’s top investors and entrepreneurs."

Have you sold on Bonanzle? Tell us what your experience was like.

The funding is led by Seattle angel investor, and Voyager Capital Venture Partner, Geoff Entress, and includes additional funding from Voyager Capital, Matrix Partners, Ignition Partners, Founders Co-op, Curious Office, and others from the Seattle area.

"For ‘normal’ startups, raising money from investors is usually one of the first matters to get taken care of. If not for the strong support of our community and dear old Google search, we would have needed to do this a year ago," says Harding. "But because of Bonanzle’s fast-spreading reputation (and thus sales), we have been able to bide our time and wait until we saw a deal that was simply too good to pass up."

Just as with eBay, Bonanzle’s users are quite passionate in their opinions about the site, whether that be for better for worse. We’ve had quite a range in comments about Bonanzle, just as we have with eBay, and while not all of them have been glowing, I have to say Bonanzle’s have been much more balanced.

No matter which way you feel about the site, it’s hard to deny Bonanzle is having an impact in the world of online selling. That impact has shown tremendous growth in the past, and with this new funding, it is likely to continue at a faster pace than before.

Harding looks at the funding as a way to continue growth, which he says the company owes to its sellers. "So many Bonanzle users have spent countless hours setting up their booths, marketing their items on Facebook, Twitter, and elsewhere, and have done all they can to build a successful business on Bonanzle," he says.  "For the people who have stuck with us as we’ve grown, we want to prove our commitment to doing everything in our power to ensure that the time spent booth building is rewarded with a user experience that continues to improve, and continues to deliver an ever-growing number of buyers over time."

As one would imagine, eBay is not an easy site to compete with. While it has its fair share of disgruntled users, it is still one of the top brands in online selling. In fact, recent research from Nielsen found it was one of two brands (the other being AOL) that benefited the most from an uptick in Americans’ internet habits in March.

According to Harding, there will be increased speed at which the company can fix bugs and create a better user experience. Among Bonanzle’s first priorities is a plan to make sure everything works that "real users" expect it to. The funding should help with resources in this regard.

Do you think Bonanzle has what it takes to bring real competition to eBay? Share your thoughts.

Just as with eBay, Bonanzle’s users appear quite passionate in their opinions about the site, whether that be for better for worse. When we last covered the site, the comments poured in ranging from incredibly supportive to downright nasty. No matter which way you feel about it, you can’t deny the site is having an impact in the world of online selling, and that impact is on the rise. It’s got a ways to go before it reaches eBay-status, but the numbers are consistently climbing.

Bonanzle maintains that unlike other marketplaces, its traffic growth of over 5,000% since launch has been attained through a completely grassroots effort. The company has not received any venture capital or angel funding. An average of 10,000 members join the site every month, according to the company.

"I attribute our rapid growth to buyers and sellers having an unmet need for a marketplace where individual people matter, and where the selling fees don’t drag down businesses," says Bill Harding, Bonanzle’s founder and CEO. "We will continue to add features to make it easier for our buyers to find everything but the ordinary, and we’ll throw in a good amount of fun while we’re at it."

Bonanzle is currently developing an API, which should be out by the end of the month. This will allow third party developers to create tools, which could further fuel Bonanzle’s growth. The company also recently launched an affiliate program called the "Syndicated Seller" program.

According to the site Power Sellers Unite, Bonanzle is a little over 100,000 listings away from becoming the top alternative to eBay. Right now, it is only behind eBid, and of course eBay itself.

eBay appears to even be recognizing Bonanzle as legitimate competition. A new survey from the company asked participants which other websites they use  to sell items, and it listed Amazon Marketplace, Overstock, Craigslist, personal website/online store, and Bonanzle.

Bonanzle is currently developing an API that will allow third party developers to develop tools to enhance users’ Bonanzle experience. This is expected to launch by the end of September. Bonanzle also recently launched an affiliate program called the "Syndicated Seller" program.

Bonanzle previously told WebProNews that it doesn’t really focus on competing with eBay. They said this competition was something that was probably paid more attention to by users than themselves.

When we first looked at Bonanzle, we found out that it had been voted the best eBay alternative, and that the site had reached a million listings in six months. In December, the site was quoted as having 170,000 unique visitors.

In a conversation with Bonanzle’s founders, they told me that the number for December was closer to 280,000. That was nearly half a year ago. A quick look at Compete.com data shows that the site has grown quite significantly in terms of unique visitors since then.

In January, Bonanzle’s founders showed me a Google Analytics graph putting the site at about 435K unique visitors. This is nearly twice what Compete showed for January. Compete had Bonanzle at 522K for April.

Bonanzle co-founder Mark Dorsey told WebProNews the number is closer to 850K. Any way you look at it, that is significant growth.

Now that is nowhere near what eBay gets, but eBay is a very well established brand that has over a decade under its belt. Bonanzle is just a couple years old, and many people have not heard of it. At this rate, however, I think there is a good chance that they will.

Bonanzle Founder Bill Harding says they’re not focused on traffic though. In a recent blog post, Harding says that the company is more interested in the end-to-end buying experience on the site. Recent changes at the site reflect a shift in focus from traffic to such an experience. Harding lists them as follows:

- Item traits for improved item search and browsing

- Related search suggestions, and auto-completion of search terms

The company told WebProNews that it really doesn’t focus on competing with eBay either. "Our ‘competition’ with eBay is probably something that is paid closer attention to by our users than us," the co-founders said in a joint email back in February. "That said, we do think that for Bonanzle to matter in such a crowded alternatives environment, we need to distinguish ourselves clearly from eBay and similar sites."

At this point, it seems the sky is the limit for Bonanzle. Whether they are focusing on driving traffic or not, it will be interesting to monitor the site’s continued growth.

I contacted Bill Harding and Mark Dorsey, co-founders of the site that was recently named Best eBay Alternative of 2008 to ask them about their strategy for competing with the well-established brand of eBay.

"Our ‘competition’ with eBay is probably something that is paid closer attention to by our users than us," they tell me in a joint email. "That said, we do think that for Bonanzle to matter in such a crowded alternatives environment, we need to distinguish ourselves clearly from eBay and similar sites."

"Our main point of distinction is that we’re trying to create a marketplace where people matter.  On other ecommerce sites, there generally isn’t a compelling reason to visit unless you have a specific item you want to buy or sell," they add. "We have tried to create a more social atmosphere, where it’s easy to meet and talk with people who share your interests in items. 

Bonanzle has real time chatting built right into every "booth," as well as real time messages you can send to anyone on the site. Users can create lists of their favorite items that others can browse and comment on, a feature they say is extremely popular. "And you can see where in the country any user is from, so it’s easy to meet and talk with people who live nearby you," they note.

Based on what the two had to say, the environment Bonanzle has created is one of openness and positivity. "All of these features lead to an environment where the level of anonymity is much lower than eBay, and we’ve found that with lower anonymity, people have more positive attitudes," they explain. 

"We call our community one of the friendliest online — if you sign up and say ‘Hi, I’m new’ in the forums, you might well receive 25 welcomes within a couple hours.  People really seem to enjoy each other’s company, and we try to keep our site’s policies as open as possible to promote that."

As for the growth of the site, the compete.com data referred to in this article may have been a bit understated. "Compete has been very accurate at measuring our monthly percentage growth, but not very accurate on getting the actual numbers right," they tell me, providing a new graph from Google Analytics showing traffic at slightly over 280,000 unique visitors for the month of December.

They also provided me with the graph below for January that shows over 435,000 unique visitors.  "We’ve now got more than 26,000 users and 1,072,320 items.  Total unique visitors for January were 435k, an increase of 55% over December (our lowest monthly growth percentage so far, but all of our competitors whose traffic is available on Quantcast show traffic declines in January, which makes sense, given that it’s the month after the busiest shopping month of the year). 

But still, Bonanzle continues to grow rapidly. After WebProNews ran the last article, the site attracted over 1000 new users in one day, according to Bonanzle co-founder Mark Dorsey. Based on the 100+ comments WebProNews received on that article, plenty are eager to continue spreading the word of Bonanzle too.

The future is looking pretty bright for this site right now. Let’s hope they can continue to keep up the good spirits of the site’s users in a way that eBay once did during its own rise to fame.

Bonanzle is a site that reached a million listings in 6 months and was voted the best eBAY alternative according to Examiner.com. Many of these listings and votes no doubt came from disgruntled eBay sellers looking for a fresh start from a site with less controversial policies.

While I have seen a lot of sites mentioned as possible alternatives to eBay. I have not seen any mentioned nearly as often as I have seen Bonanzle mentioned. Now it’s getting a little exposure too, which is exactly what any eBay competitor needs the most. eBay’s brand has simply proven too strong to be overtaken, and that will likely continue for some time, but as some of these other lesser known sites get more attention, things could start to change. Mashable’s running a piece on Bonanzle. Jennifer Van Grove writes:

One of the fastest growing eBay alternatives just hit a major landmark and chances are you’ve never heard of them. Bonanzle, which combines an online marketplace with social media features, has now had one million items posted to their site – an impressive feat given it just launched late last year.

While eBay is struggling to keep their footing, Bonanzle is growing exponentially with over 170,000 unique visitors in December.

Read the comments on any number of eBay articles around the web and you will no doubt see glowing testimonials for Bonanzle. The site’s users have spoken and almost seem to be recruiting other sellers who feel they’ve been wronged by eBay. And the number of those who feel wronged seems to be bigger than ever. Although I should be clear that there are still many people happily selling on eBay.

Bonanzle looks like one to keep an eye on. Hopefully they have paid attention to the grumblings of the people that have gotten them to this point and can avoid any similar turbulence in their own future.