Hello Elench,
I do see your posts frequently on the dark side of Obay. I do come on these forums most days, but rarely make any comment. I only responded to rpm because its wrong that he should be ignored when he'd got an idea, he'd costed it sensibly and was just looking for some sort of response.
Yes I also gave up posting after the 'idiot' kept destroying any debate!
Where do I begin?? - firstly any 'forward looking' company would automatically have an 'advertising/marketing budget', they may also have a department that specifically deals with marketing/PR activity. Budgets should be in the region of 1.5 to 2.5% of sales revenue. Since I have no knowledge of ebids revenue - how do I know what they have to spend?
My area of expertise was press advertising, creative and promotional brochure design. I will admit to having little experience of web or social media platforms, but I am fully aware they are used with great success. I have built websites, but have not created anything for years.
My real gripe here is members want to see some evidence of the owners doing something, making some effort to increase awareness, yet what do they see?? ....nowt!
Ebid is invisible ...and sorry to say it, but it will remain so and eventually it will become tarnished and rust away like some of its members! Its already growing a reputation with those who leave - who then say, ebid "...oh yes but nothing ever sells there". This can (and will) be more destructive than had these 'new' members not arrived in the first place!
Before anyone can say what needs to be spent - you need a budget. Above all you need a structured plan, an in depth report on where it would be best to spend any money that may be available.
To give a cost is extremely difficult, media type, size of advert, frequency, Which Publication, National/Local, Digital?, PR supported - there are so many variations. Where would they start UK, US ...It really is how long is a piece of string.
To keep it simple personally I would merely look to put a small display advert in as many publications as I could possibly afford. Get a very basic ‘Dealer Block’ created and use it in every possible type of media that was open to me.
THE MOST IMPORTANT THING IS BRAND AWARENESS !
...and as everyone says, hardly anyone has heard of ebid.
Until that changes you are wasting your time.
I’ve just seen the other two posts - I will comment on those in due course.