Today GameGavel is one week from hitting its 2-year anniversary. So instead of waiting to send this email on “the day”, I am sending it out now as I hope it will spark new readers to register and help us hit our goal of 4,000 registered members our first two years. It appears we will hit this # right on target.
Thanks to all of our members. And by all I mean all 3,913 (including over 200 new members who just signed up this month) of you – whether you have been consistently using GameGavel since we launched or just poking your head in every now and then to make sure we are still alive and kickin’. In two years GameGavel has grown considerably not only in just the # of registered members but also in the staggering # of unique visitors the site is now seeing on a monthly basis. And more and more of these visitors are registering when they see something they want to buy.
Many of you have been hesitant to list with any consistency on GameGavel due to our low level of traffic. Well, now the time has come that our biggest problem, at this stage is not for lack of traffic (now approaching 80,000 unique visitors/month and 400,000 page views) but lack of new listings. I have been working hard to spread the word of GameGavel through lots of channels. Many of you show your support by helping to spread the word to your friends, forums or your online communities and that is something that I am extremely thankful for and will continue to depend on as time goes by. We all want an alternative to Ebay and we are all working together to cement GameGavel as that alternative.
Our efforts are paying off in a big way. Here is a link to our latest 30-day Google Analytics statistics, which are showing proof that GameGavel is growing significantly:
http://www.gamegavel.com/forum/showthread.php?p=14433#post14433
Our stats for two years are showing we have listed 263,141 items, sold over $180,000 in merchandise and are averaging over 60,000 searches for items each month.
A couple new things that will be put into place are some site advertising, again, with the sole purpose of generating some consistent revenue to drive back into GameGavel’s functionality and promotion. This will benefit all of us using the site and help us continue to always operate without listing fees and low selling commissions.
We will be upgrading our forums to Vbulletin 4.0 Publishing Suite, in the next day or so, which will once again give the forums a new facelift but more importantly will now include a built-in blog engine so now anyone wanting to blog can do so easily in a great venue filled with gamers interested in what they have to say. It may also be a cool way to promote your auctions to the readers of your blog.
And finally, we are working on GameGavel.co.uk, which will be our first attempt at a country specific offshoot. This is a tricky undertaking that will take some time to develop. Here is a sneak peak at what will be the logo for GameGavel UK:
http://www.gamegavel.com/forum/showpost.php?p=14048&postcount=5
As I mentioned before, what the site needs now, more than ever, is listings. In addition to our efforts to keep spreading the word, Google Shopping Feeds are now consistently running and many of our sellers are seeing a higher level of sales. Google Shopping is responsible for a large % of our monthly unique visitors and it’s your listings that are bringing them in. Even more listings will mean even more people flooding into GameGavel. Here is a link showing our Google Shopping listings as of today:
http://www.google.com/products?q=gamegavel&hl=en&aq=f
If you have been meaning to try GameGavel now is the time to try. Free listings are back and will never go away so there is absolutely no risk to list some items. None. We all want an alternative to Ebay. One that is dedicated to gaming, has free listings and low fees, and has traffic.
We have that now in GameGavel. We just need your listings - plain and simple. Try listing some items on GameGavel and on Ebay. Use both sites. Link your free GameGavel seller store to your Ebay store and pass buyers back and forth. Using a combination of GameGavel and Ebay is a smart thing to do, especially if you don’t want to rely solely on GameGavel for all your sales and you want to start depending less and less on Ebay. Start slow and I am sure after a while GameGavel will be your site of choice for the majority of your buying and selling.
This next year is continuing to show tremendous promise for GameGavel and its members. We will be continuing to upgrade and improve the site based largely on feedback from you. And let’s all thank the CGE team for coming back in 2010. This is the first CGE to happen since GameGavel has been in existence and I am looking forward to meeting many of you that weekend.
Now to celebrate by having some green brew and a crock-pot full of jazzed up corn beef. Happy St. Pattys day to all of you and here’s two another two years of whittling away at you know who
J
Erin Go Bragh
So Cal Mike, Founder
GameGavel.com