Over the last four years our programmers, advertisers, members, and myself have had a great time with McBidz. What once started out as an online auction site blossomed into what you see today a one stop destination on the internet to replace all the major players such as eBay, Myspace, YouTube, Craigslist, Match, & Flickr. While McBidz has yet to reach its full potential I have over time had the desire to try my hand at other endeavors and as of today am putting McBidz up for sale. The McBidz site has recently been “appraised at a replacement cost of near 100k, but will accept the best offer over 45k” so I can start my new venture which will be announced here on my blog once McBidz is sold.
I will furthermore seek a buyer who has the resources and determination to see McBidz to its full potential as everything is in place for it to grow as large, if not larger than most of the niche sites such as Facebook & Youtube. I will be blogging about more of this in the near future and my personal blog here will continue on with my new venture so stay tuned!
Over the past couple weeks I continue to watch with the rest of you the disaster unfold with the BP Oil spill in the Gulf. The question I continue to wonder is how we let this happen? Surely with their billions in profits each year they can afford safety measures to prevent disasters such as this. BP says these were in place, but failed which is why of course they should have had redundant systems so even if their primary failed the backup measures would have kicked in to prevent something like this. The bottom line is BP cares more about profits than the welfare of both the American people and our wildlife. Think about that the next time you want to go to that BP gas station. Here is what BP is pouring into our oceans each day which is now estimated to be 70,000 Barrels per day (2 MILLION 940 THOUSAND gallons PER DAY!)
Per my last post I recently purchased my new toy a CBR 1000rr which I’m having great fun on especially now that summer time is upon us. I recently went for a ride with a good friend of mine. Here is a picture I snapped when we stopped for a rest of my CBR & her Harley:
Several weeks ago when it was just starting to warm up my mind turned toward my younger days when I ran a Honda Hurricane 1000 sport bike around James Island (SC) while going to college and working the docks at the USPS. I had that Hurricane for five great years and managed to stay upright, although I had more than several close calls when the bike was sold it didn’t have a scratch on it.
Well here we go again! I just purchased my new toy a Honda CBR 1000rr which I ran up to Columbia, SC to pick up and drove it back last Wednesday afternoon. Now in my late 30’s it’s as fun as ever and already I am working on a couple of new upgrades for late next week which will include a tinted windscreen and alarm system.
Mcbidz growth through social networking has been steadily increasing over the last several months and now boasts over 30,000 followers on Twitter & almost 2,000 “friends” on Facebook. This allows us to market to the masses and spread the BUZZ daily to those who may find McBidz a better alternative than what they currently use online. While this approach isn’t new for us, it’s definitely working as we continue to see page views and membership skyrocket.
McBidz is now using Facebook advertising as well targeting Atlanta, Georgia & New York currently. We will continually assess how the ads are working and our ROI and update you through our social networking activities and here on the blog to let you know where our advertising will take us next. Another mailing blitz is planned to business owners in Florida, South Carolina, and Georgia in the near future to let them know about the explosive possibilities of advertising on the McBidz site.
B y the way don’t forget to check out our current advertisers! We have been able to attract high quality businesses to place banner ads on McBidz because of your participation.
Going into early April McBidz will be starting a new advertising blitz including mailings and possibly advertising on the social media “Facebook” to garner more attention. Even though we have seen continued growth and membership being a small fish in a very large pond getting noticed by the public at large is still our number one goal. While we see McBidz as superior & offering far more than other internet destinations we see a need to work harder creating more BUZZ for our members going into the second quarter of 2010.
I recently noticed a video posted by one of our members yesterday for a nonprofit www.unchaindogs.org . Usually I don’t go out of my way to endorse such activities, but you may want to check it out I found it pretty moving and something worthwhile. The video is below:
Wanted to drop in this morning before heading out the door and update our member “McBidzers” on the happenings at McBidz, post a highlight of the recent Super bowl, and wish everyone a Happy Valentine’s Day.
Our new servers are performing as expected and handling the increased traffic more efficiently while using only a small percentage of their capability. As noted in previous blog entries our old servers were maxing out and slowing down the site, so with our recent upgrades McBidz is prepared for growth well into the future. Our social networking numbers continue to explode on Twitter and Facebook leading to increased traffic on both the McBidz site and blog. I’m answering your emails you send to me as quickly as I can so please be patient as I answer them personally it takes a little time.
While most Americans were pulling for the Saints in this year’s Super bowl the nod was definitely in favor of the Colts. What a nice surprise to see the Saints pull this one off! I have attached the highlight reel located on our video section “McVidz” for your enjoyment: {FYI: “Who Dat” is the New Orleans Saints slogan thus the blog headline}
Ok McBidzers we have just completed a three day upgrade to our servers here at McBidz.com We were noticing some lag when we started taking a look at our popular McVidz video section and indeed our servers crashed twice within the last three months because of too many members playing videos at the same time. This will be our 3′rd upgrade to our servers this year; our guys were working literally around the clock for 3 days to get us back online configuring the scripts to the new server specs. So what we have now are two servers running the site as well as “off-site” backup servers which do complete backups of the entire site nightly in case of a major malfunction on our main servers.
Have you noticed our new advertisers? Sirus Radio, 1-800-flowers, Tri-City New Balance, Hanes, & Wine.com. Please be sure to check them out as well as our long standing brands we have had on McBidz for months now. Our advertisers continue to believe in the future of the McBidz brand and we want to be sure to show them good traffic.
Stay safe and keep spreading the BUZZ on McBidz. Don’t forget to DIGG us www.Digg.com !
Welcoming the New Year yesterday afternoon with a large group of friends at an oyster roast in Summerville, SC had me reminiscing what we have accomplished here at McBidz in 09’. Completed the complicated process of finishing up the programming for such a huge site, gaining national exposure through our TV ads and social networking activities, tens of thousands of new member “McBidzers” and the launch day activities we rolled out in both New York’s “Time Square” and Atlanta Georgia’s “Underground” on the same day with two large street teams in each location.
As mentioned in the previous post several days ago the plans for 2010 are even more aggressive. Our webmaster, several programmers, and I had discussions on our traffic levels and started to turn the talks towards advertising for both large & small business here on McBidz. Even though we have had a number of well known companies advertising here (iTunes, Hotwire, Tiger direct, 1800petmeds, Netflix, & Microsoft) we feel it is now time to expand our sales group throughout the country and have current openings in SC, NY, Ca, & Fl for an Outside Sales account Executive, here is a current ad posted in NY http://newyork.craigslist.org/mnh/sls/1530151153.html. This will further benefit our membership as we continue to expand and solidify our position as the one stop on the internet to accomplish all tasks.
Wanted to take a moment this Christmas Eve and wish all of our member “McBidzers” a SAFE & HAPPY Christmas and New Years. 2010 will be an even bigger year for us than 09′ as we have aggressive growth plans in the works which will continue to include advertising on large cable networks throughout the United States. We didnt get to as many regions as we wanted to with our advertising this year, but the areas we did place our TV spot in did very well and resulted in tens of thousands of new members.
While I was looking through the videos this morning on our video section “McVidz” I found this little gem below good for a quick laugh.
Since we started using a large affiliate network McBidz has branched out substantially from our USA base and now boasts members from all around the globe. This has not only allowed us to grow quickly, but now our “McBidzers” can stay connected to members in other countries by using our social network which has seen heavy use as of late.
McBidz continues to advertise on cable TV and use other social media such as Twitter to continue to spread the BUZZ. Our followers on twitter are now approaching the 25,000 mark & we try to place updates on a regular basis. Christmas is coming up fast be sure to keep spreading the word & DIGG us when you get a chance www.Digg.com .
Charles F. McCracken
