Atomic Mall
Encyclopedia
Overview
Atomic Mall is a multi-seller online marketplaceOnline marketplace
Online marketplace refers to a type of ecommerce site where product and inventory information is provided by multiple third parties, whereas transactions are processes by the marketplace operator. Online marketplaces have become a driver of new business for online merchants that leverage them as...
based in Yakima, Washington
Yakima, Washington
Yakima is an American city southeast of Mount Rainier National Park and the county seat of Yakima County, Washington, United States, and the eighth largest city by population in the state itself. As of the 2010 census, the city had a total population of 91,196 and a metropolitan population of...
. It was launched in July 2008 by founder Mike Shannon, who had previously worked as an independent software publisher and distributor, and had developed and operated private ecommerce sites in the retail sector. As of June 2010, Atomicmall.com hosts over 45,000 established members, roughly 1/4 million active product listings, and nearly 8.4 million total items for sale with an aggregate market value approaching a quarter billion dollars.
Although many companies in this market space adhere to the online auction business model
Online auction business model
The online auction business model is one in which participants bid for products and services over the Internet. The functionality of buying and selling in an auction format is made possible through auction software which regulates the various processes involved.Several types of online auctions are...
, Atomic Mall presently offers items in a fixed-price format, making it the online
equivalent of a shopping mall
Shopping mall
A shopping mall, shopping centre, shopping arcade, shopping precinct or simply mall is one or more buildings forming a complex of shops representing merchandisers, with interconnecting walkways enabling visitors to easily walk from unit to unit, along with a parking area — a modern, indoor version...
, hence the origin of the domain name. Sellers on the site may also elect to receive offers on their items, making negotiations possible prior to completing
sales. The site's search engine
Search engine
A search engine is an information retrieval system designed to help find information stored on a computer system. The search results are usually presented in a list and are commonly called hits. Search engines help to minimize the time required to find information and the amount of information...
crawls each merchant's store when queries are entered and presents results which include all sellers' relevant items. Each seller is also
able to create their own storefront space, each incorporating a high degree of customization including banners, fonts, categories, splash messages, and even special effects.
When a product search is done within a seller's store, only items for that store are returned within the results, creating a "store within a store" effect for
shoppers. Even though a shopper's activities can easily be confined to a single seller's storefront, access to the core site remains available through links on each page,
allowing buyers to toggle between sitewide searches and centralized in-store browsing.
History
Shannon began experimenting with online salesin 1988, using bulletin board network systems such as RelayNet and FidoNet
FidoNet
FidoNet is a worldwide computer network that is used for communication between bulletin board systems. It was most popular in the early to mid 1990s, prior to the introduction of easy and affordable access to the Internet...
, several years before the internet
Internet
The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite to serve billions of users worldwide...
and worldwide web had entered mainstream use. By 1989
he had turned his hobby into a full time software distribution business, gaining valuable experience in the brand new field of ecommerce as one of its early pioneers.
With the advent of the worldwide web in the 1990s, Shannon recognized the internet's tremendous potential and expanded his software distribution business to
include web sites and ftp catalog retrieval using the (then) new technology. After expanding further by offering his products on third-party marketplace sites like
Amazon.com
Amazon.com
Amazon.com, Inc. is a multinational electronic commerce company headquartered in Seattle, Washington, United States. It is the world's largest online retailer. Amazon has separate websites for the following countries: United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Japan, and...
and eBay
EBay
eBay Inc. is an American internet consumer-to-consumer corporation that manages eBay.com, an online auction and shopping website in which people and businesses buy and sell a broad variety of goods and services worldwide...
, he began to see a need for a marketplace site which put both buyers and sellers on equal footing, and which made purchasing products as intuitive
and free of obstacles as possible. Recognizing a potential void in the marketplace for such a service, Atomic Mall was born in January 2008 as a scratch-built site, followed
by nearly six months of beta testing and development.
The first item sold on Atomic Mall was an oscillating bronze pedestal fan, which found a buyer on June 10, 2008. The first non-employee registered member was user Falcon,
who has neither purchased nor posted any items for sale.
Atomicmall.com launched publicly on July 1, 2008 with its original 61 Charter Members. These members provided Shannon with valuable suggestions for key site features, security and overall usability. Charter Members are rewarded for their input with lifetime
discounts on final sale fees (FSF), an increased listing limit, a unique store badge and other benefits.
By January 2009, Atomic Mall had nearly 6,500 active members and 120,000 listings. Its relatively quick growth caught the attention of many online sellers who had become disenchanted with established marketplaces and auction sites, and were
looking for alternatives to help recover some of the profits being lost to rising listing, final value and payment processing fees. By April of that same year, membership had nearly doubled
, with listing counts enjoying steady growth as well. Many of these new Atomic Mall sellers discovered the site through
polls and posts created in online forums and discussion groups like Powersellers Unite, leading to periods of site-to-site transitioning which seemed to ebb and flow according to the prevailing sentiments at the time involving the venue(s)
which were under fire. Typically these transitions and boycotts resulted from policy or administrative changes which proved to be unpopular with members at the various established marketplace sites. These periods of unrest
seemed to have little effect on the bottom lines of the larger auction
Auction
An auction is a process of buying and selling goods or services by offering them up for bid, taking bids, and then selling the item to the highest bidder...
sites, but did benefit smaller sites like Atomic Mall by simultaneously increasing their brand
awareness and seller bases.
Site Fees
Atomic Mall contains a fairly comprehensive array of ecommerce and inventory management features, allowing many sellers to utilize AM as their primaryinternet presence for the showcasing of their products and services. The site has no listing fees, and selling fees are performance-based, meaning there are no fees
assessed if no sale is made. For successful transactions, final sale fees are calculated using a sliding scale, with a range of 6% to 0.75% of the final
transaction value,
with a minimum FSF of 10¢ on completed sales.
Gold account-holders are able to list up to 2000 items with no monthly fees, while higher listing limits are available with upgraded account levels carrying a monthly subscription fee.
Public Response
On January 24, 2010, Auctionbytes.com held an open survey in which online sellers were asked to rank 15 auction and marketplace sites based on five criteria:- Profitability
- Customer Service
- Communication
- Ease of Use
- Recommendation
After the results were published, Atomic Mall placed third overall, beating several of the more established venues like Amazon.com
Amazon.com
Amazon.com, Inc. is a multinational electronic commerce company headquartered in Seattle, Washington, United States. It is the world's largest online retailer. Amazon has separate websites for the following countries: United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Japan, and...
, eBay
EBay
eBay Inc. is an American internet consumer-to-consumer corporation that manages eBay.com, an online auction and shopping website in which people and businesses buy and sell a broad variety of goods and services worldwide...
and eCRATER
ECRATER
eCRATER is a free online marketplace and an ecommerce website builder based in Irvine, California. It was launched in the early fall of 2004 by Dimitar Slavov...
. In the individual categories, Atomic Mall
finished 2nd in Communication, 3rd in Customer Service and Ease of Use, 6th in Recommendations and in the middle of the pack in Profitability.
The future
Founder Shannon has commented publicly that a type of auctionAuction
An auction is a process of buying and selling goods or services by offering them up for bid, taking bids, and then selling the item to the highest bidder...
format is likely to be introduced to Atomic Mall at some point in the near future, with the site poised to make use of their atomicauction.com domain. Details are few at
this stage, but Shannon has revealed that the auction format will be unique and unlike the more traditional formats found on existing sites. In addition to auctions, it is
rumored that a major redesign to the product view page is in the works, as well as several less drastic site upgrades to enhance checkout flow and site visibility.
See also
- Pheebay (July 7, 2008). AtomicMall.com Is Another Alternative For Fed Up eBay Sellers. Pheebay. Retrieved on June 22, 2010.