The Winners of the 10 Day Squidoo eBay Challenge 2008 are...

Bela’s Boutique and Kim Giancaterino!

Lensmaster katiyana (with a little help from Squidoo HQ) ran the 10 Day Squidoo eBay Challenge this past week and boy was it a HUGE success!

There were a ton of fabulous entries and it was a close race but Bela's Boutique and KimGiancaterino managed to edge out the competition for the win! Both lensmasters got a free ipod, Lens of the Day AND they were featured as a case study in Seth Godin's talk at eBay Live 2008!

I had the opportunity to ask both of the winners how they felt about winning the contest and here's what they had to say:

Bela's Boutique (an eBay powerseller) won with Scott Barnes Cosmetics Showcase, here's what she had to say:

I am pretty new at Squidoo.  I actually had never heard of it before until I joined OSI Rockstars in January.  I took a webcast class on Squidoo and thought I would give it a try. I did one lens (Crazy Ramblings of an Obsessed Makeup Junkie) and it was fun, so I started a few more but never really got around to finishing them. Then I saw a post in the Rockstar’s forum about SquidBids and the 10 day Ebay Challenge. I figured what the heck. If I win great but if not then I have 10 new lenses to promote my store and new items!

I worked feverishly for about five days (I decided to do it late in the contest). I think my husband thought he had become a Squidoo widower he never saw me as I was locked up in our computer room!  I about fell over when I saw that one of my lenses was in the finals. I certainly didn’t expect that since I was so new to Squidoo. The next day I woke up and had all these comments on my lens congratulating me for winning. I actually thought someone was messing with me because I hadn’t heard anything from Squidoo.  I was, AM so excited!! I have never won anything before and to be used as an example at EBay Live is just so awesome!!!  Now I am addicted to Squidoo, need to make more lenses!! I am in the process of making them for all my friends right now!  Thank you so much!!!!!!

KimGiancaterino (an eBay buyer) won with The Monkees Merchandise on eBay, here's what she had to say:

I can't think of a better marketing marriage than eBay and Squidoo. Many of my 170 lenses are monetized with eBay modules, but until katiyana's eBay Challenge, I didn't fully appreciate the power of the eBay module. The contest forced me to think about new ways to build lenses around eBay. I have a popular lens about classic TV theme song lyrics, so I decided to build lenses for 10 of the shows featured on the lens. I discovered that eBay was the mother lode for classic TV merchandise! With a little clever search term tweaking, I was able to find DVDs, videotapes, books, cast photos, music, autographs, toys, games... even action figures! The Monkees date back four decades, but there are active eBay auctions for all of the band members even today. This doesn't surprise me a bit. When I joined eBay in April 1999, my goal was to procure missing volumes for my childhood Nancy Drew collection. Not only did I find the books I needed, but I met some wonderful people all over the world. Soon I was buying and selling all sorts of items. eBay is an amazing resource for sellers, and I will definitely be adding more eBay modules to my Squidoo lenses in the future. I'm still in shock that my Monkees lens was chosen as Lens of the Day. My deepest thanks go to Seth Godin and the phenomenal HQ staff for creating and sustaining the community of Squidoo.

So stop by and Congratulate Bela's Boutique and Kim Giancaterino for a job well done! For even more information on the contest and winners check out the SquidBlog post, On Makeup and Monkees!

To create your own SquidBids lens visit SquidBids for eBay Sellers!