Another new website maketplace tries its luck - venforo

**Clinton** · May 17th, 2012, 7:47 AM

Venforo.com will be launching shortly with a focus on higher end online businesses as their USP because "other business auction sites list 100's of low-value domain names having little interest to today's online entrepreneur"

It seems to be a venture of a Jonathan Berman whom I've not heard of before. His other properties seem to be eQwip.com and tonjon.com which he claims he developed and sold. Neither of those suggest experience in this market but he seems to have invested in custom auction software with Flippa type public commenting and other features. (Why didn't he simply use a Flippa Clone? There are millions of those scripts about!)

**akirk** · May 17th, 2012, 7:59 AM

If he has plans for a different approach / extra features etc. then starting with code he controls / knows is perhaps best - starting from a script can cause issues in the future...

Alasdair

**Thomas** · May 17th, 2012, 8:35 AM

If the two sites you listed are anything to go by, I wouldn't put much hope in this new site being successful. I've never seen 2 sites with such awful designs.

**jmb321** · May 17th, 2012, 10:18 AM

I am the founder of venforo.com. You will notice I am no longer connected with either company having sold my interests over 15 and 4 years ago, respectively. Don't believe either site has been updated by the owners since 1989 and 2008. So don't infer that the quality and design of those sites will be indicative of venforo.

We will try to address some of the functionality and focus that other web property marketplaces lack. I welcome your comments and input on what a web based business auction marketplace should have to meet the needs of buyers and sellers.

**Thomas** · May 17th, 2012, 10:47 AM

Originally Posted by jmb321

I am the founder of venforo.com. You will notice I am no longer connected with either company having sold my interests over 15 and 4 years ago, respectively. Don't believe either site has been updated by the owners since 1989 and 2008. So don't infer that the quality and design of those sites will be indicative of venforo.

We will try to address some of the functionality and focus that other web property marketplaces lack. I welcome your comments and input on what a web based business auction marketplace should have to meet the needs of buyers and sellers.

I did notice that afterwards, I was still at primary school in 1999 so the design was a little out-dated

Out of interest, what functionality do you think other marketplaces lack? Functionality has never been my gripe with any of them. Which marketplaces are you familiar with/or have been active on? I'm assuming your project was born after some bad experiences somewhere?

How are you marketing? Are you just going to spam LinkedIn and hijack other brokers posts (from over a year ago) because that's not going to make you many friends in the broker community.

**jmb321** · May 17th, 2012, 10:58 AM

Well at this stage I don't want to give away the store on functionality just yet as we under development and learning from the market. But in terms of focus I think our pricing structure will minimize low value domain name listings and engender established web based businesses. Our ideal buyer is not necessarily a "flipper" but someone who sees value in a web property and wants to build on it long term.

How would you market a new auction marketplace effectively?

**Clinton** · May 17th, 2012, 1:19 PM

Hi jmb321, welcome to experienced-people.net.

I'm all in favour of new marketplaces as I've often said on these boards, so good luck with yours but we've seen one, two, three, four, five, six and a lot more marketplaces come and go. Some of those were started by people with a lot more business experience than you and I. One or two even have massive databases to leverage.

We've had marketplace related discussions here, flipfilter's thread , LukeMoulton's thread about attracting quality sites, my thread, Luke's other thread, benitez17's thoughts on starting a new marketplace etc. Plenty there for you to "take" and I look forward to the ideas, thoughts and information you now "give" to the forums.

I have the same questions as meathead1234. It's difficult to help if you're unable to disclose much!

Originally Posted by jmb321

How would you market a new auction marketplace effectively?

Your first marketing was free - this thread will be on page one of Google by tomorrow for the venforo term,

but what's your marketing budget for the launch and for the rest of the year?

**KenW3** · May 17th, 2012, 1:44 PM

Originally Posted by jmb321

Well at this stage I don't want to give away the store on functionality just yet as we under development and learning from the market. But in terms of focus I think our pricing structure will minimize low value domain name listings and engender established web based businesses. Our ideal buyer is not necessarily a "flipper" but someone who sees value in a web property and wants to build on it long term.

Originally Posted by Vendforo.com

You will be notified when venforo, the new auction marketplace for buying and selling online businesses, officially launches.
<clip>
quality web ventures (ven) on the best online forum (foro)

So you have decided upon business-for-sale auctions and a forum combined on one site? What made you decide upon the auction format over the other alternatives?

Will the online forum be integrated with the listings?

Originally Posted by jmb321

How would you market a new auction marketplace effectively?

Marketing of any new business, whether an auction marketplace or any other start-up, requires a USP to differentiate itself from its competitors. What can you offer that is not currently available? What are you able to do best (with proof)? I'd suggest the first step is to laser-target a large, profitable demographic with a compelling reason to choose Venforo.

**jmb321** · May 17th, 2012, 1:56 PM

Wow, I don't blame you for being skeptical. Online business marketplaces seem to be the new Groupon...! Having over 35 years of experience in business I would be remiss in disclosing too much, too soon of what is to come. We are still in the early stages and under development and subject to change so anything disclosed now could be moot. So sorry for being cryptic. Suffice to say that this will not be a wordpress site or a clone but a custom site built from the ground up trying to address some of the shortfalls of other marketplaces. I have budgeted sufficiently to market the site when we launch later this year.

Clinton thanks again for the mention and for the one stop source of the forum's marketplace related discussions. I will review and "give" as much as I can considering the current state of development.

Appreciate your patience.

**Melissa** · May 17th, 2012, 4:31 PM

You want comments and input but without telling us what the site is going to be doing and how.

You want advice on marketing but without telling us what your marketing budget is.

So far there's no evidence of any understanding of online businesses, any experience with buying or selling of websites or any understanding of what's involved in running a marketplace. The only thing we know about you is a "coming soon" site and that you've been spamming LinkedIn.

Way to go!

Have you at least read the links at Clinton's post? Do you have any comments about marketplace ideas and discussions we've had here in the past?