Afternic - Official Thread

[GoDaddy]

Hello NamePros!
By popular demand, we have launched a dedicated feedback thread for Afternic, the GoDaddy-owned domain name marketplace.

We have created this thread as a way for you to tell us what works, what doesn't work, and what features you'd like to see at Afternic (please be constructive with your feedback). We're looking forward to hearing from the domain investment community to help us shape the future of Afternic.

We will also be sharing Afternic product updates in this thread.

Please note that this thread is not meant for support. Please email our support team at [email protected] for assistance.

 

[cabotower]

i understand that the longer the lease the lower a commission rate that the seller has to pay, down to 0% for the 37-60 lease. but when it comes to the buyer service fee, does afternic share that with the seller or do they keep that for processing the sale and in lieu of commission keep what is left?

 

[Bannen]

Quick and easy question (I think):

Any way to set your own keywords on Afternic parked pages?

I have not parked domains with Afternic since 2006, in the days before Godaddy owned them. Back then you could choose from a variety of templates and set your own keywords.

Looks like at the moment we cannot choose any parking templates, there's just the one. However, I am just starting to try out the parked pages... but cannot find any option to set my own keyword/s for each domain. I don't care about templates, but I do care about determining keywords...

Appreciate any feedback to clarify that.

 

[Jeff_Libert]

Some valid questions there. However, I think it's wrong to assume that people use LTO because they can't afford the cost upfront. I think you'll find many businesses prefer to pay over time in order to smooth out expenses and use their cash for other purposes. And, in particular, they make it a monthly expense rather than a once-off asset purchase which then needs to be depreciated (that point may vary depending which jurisdiction the purchaser is in).

I agree that cash flow management is essential to every business. My ONLY concern is fleshing out what will be included the the LTO contract to minimize (or shift) the risks and costs of a deal gone bad.

For example, will the brokerage commission "come off the top" or will the commission be payalbe as payments are made? Hopefully it will be the latter, but I've seen contracts that rationalize payment off the top since the commission ~~ "is earned upon successful negotiation of the deal".

Becoming a domainer who becomes a LTO domainer is a bit like a homeowner deciding to enter the business real estate rentals. One needs to be educated, or at least aware and prepared for the downside of rental properties, if they are going to be successful. Hopefully Afternic will do a good job of educating domainers about becoming a domain landlord.

 

[411domains]

@GoDaddy / Afternic

In your quest for world domination, is it too much to ask that you improve your lander uptime, so that Fast Transfer Active domains like this one will show as such and everyone can start seeing a consistent increase in sales, instead the occasional bone?

NOTE: We do not have lander issues with any other platform.

 

[mdent]

I encountered a new status message today, something is happening. Is Kevin N. the newest bot broker?

 

[NickB]

Not really expecting a response from this PR thread.....but worth noting

Why has Afternic started making you have to disable Ad Blocker's to access the site?.......

I only use it for make offer, but it's getting close, if not to the point of me delisting my domains - you keep piling on restriction after restriction to use your Brand and it really is getting to the point where it's not worth it.......

Someone wants a domain I own that badly...they will find me......without your boa constrictor, monopolistic strangle hold......

 

[Jeff_Libert]

I, too, am baffled by delayed payments. Once Afternic confirms receipt of funds I'm able to transfer domains to AfternicEscrow in minutes (with the assistance of my outbound registrar, who typically respond in minutes).

In a digital world, where a few keystrokes and mouse clicks "gets things done", I find a payment delay that runs for days . . and then a week+ . . concerning. It feels like an understaffing issue, a leading indicator of bad customer service to come.

Please don't further delay fixing this problem. Thank you.

 

[411domains]

I, too, am baffled by delayed payments. Once Afternic confirms receipt of funds I'm able to transfer domains to AfternicEscrow in minutes (with the assistance of my outbound registrar, who typically respond in minutes).

In a digital world, where a few keystrokes and mouse clicks "gets things done", I find a payment delay the runs for days . . and then a week+ . . concerning. It feels like an understaffing issue, a leading indicator of bad customer service to come.

Please don't further delay fixing this problem. Thank you.

For those who continue to experience payout delays:

Take full advantage of their feedback survey.
Those are the numbers they look at.
If accurate feedback isn't provided, very little will ever change.

Just sayin'.

 

[bmugford]

Afternic's standard policy is that the seller's funds are disbursed after Afternic transfers the domain name to the buyer. This hasn't changed. However, we are actively reviewing our policy.

I am in the same boat again.

I made a sale towards the end of last week. Pushed the domain to Afternic holding account.

In my Afternic account the domain is listed as "Transfer Complete" with no payout date scheduled.

I checked the WHOIS and it is still in Afternic's holding account.

In this situation, the seller's role is complete.

Afternic already has the payment and the domain. How long is the buyer allowed to drag their feet for?

This seems to be a common sticking point now.

Brad

 

[wwwulff]

I woke up to a nice fast transfer sale on Thursday last week and my payout is still pending even though the name was already in the buyer's account, when I woke up - It's annoying that it has to take so long to get the payouts when the buyer receives the name within minutes. (In my last fast transfer sale I got my money within 24 hours)

 

[Future Sensors]

@GoDaddy

When will you inform us about a better reimbursement policy which is actively being evaluated right now? Could you give us a time frame?

 

[GoDaddy]

Thanks to feedback from customers, including here on NamePros, Afternic is pleased to introduce Expedited Payouts for domain name sellers!

Starting with both Afternic and GoDaddy platforms, domain sellers will be paid out before the domain name is transferred to the buyer. Sellers should notice payouts being sent faster!

There will be no changes necessary for customers, but now is a good time to visit your account to check your https://afternic.com/account/admin that your payout settings are up to date!

For more information, including details of which sales will be affected at first, read our blog post: https://blog.afternic.com/expedited-payout/

 

[bmugford]

Thanks to feedback from customers, including here on NamePros, Afternic is pleased to introduce Expedited Payouts for domain name sellers!

Starting with both Afternic and GoDaddy platforms, domain sellers will be paid out before the domain name is transferred to the buyer. Sellers should notice payouts being sent faster!

There will be no changes necessary for customers, but now is a good time to visit your account to check your https://afternic.com/account/admin that your payout settings are up to date!

For more information, including details of which sales will be affected at first, read our blog post: https://blog.afternic.com/expedited-payout/

That is good news.

This can be kind of confusing.

Is there any easy way to tell what path your domain sale was from?

For instance let's take my "transfer complete" sale from last week, that is still not scheduled for payout.

That started with an Afternic broker contacting me from the email [email protected].

I had an asking price and floor price. The offer was slightly below the floor price.
I told the broker the floor price was the best I could do. The domain sold minutes later for the floor price.

I got an email from "Afternic Transaction Assurance" saying -

"Congratulations! Your domain, XXXXX, has sold...."

What path was used there?

Brad

 

[Future Sensors]

@GoDaddy @James Iles

Thanks for this positive outcome.

 

[Jeff_Libert]

Well, that's a bit of good news and a nice clean solution.

I was just about to suggest "a fix", in the absence of this announcement, that a buyer should be given a 3 business day window to initiate a transfer request, upon notice of delivery of the domain to AfternicEscrow, to a registrar of the buyer's choice - AND THEN, failing to act promptly, the buyer's domain would be dropped into a new GoDaddy domain account under the buyer's exclusive control - at which time it would be up to the buyer to handle any future transfer.

I prefer the announced solution, since it honors the idea that the seller has fulfilled his/her obligation and therefore ought to be paid. The seller shouln't have to wait, potentially for an unlimited time, for the buyer to "get down to business". Foot dragging, due to buyers going on vacation or haggling with a webdev or attempting to resell the domain, etc. should not become a burden placed on the seller in any way.

Nicely done. Thank you.

 

[Constantin S]

@GoDaddy

If we use the ns1/ns2.dan.com or ns3/ns4.afternic.com is the LTO option still going to appear on the GoDaddy site when someone searches the domain? or we must use the ns1/ns2.afternic.com for that?

 

[bmugford]

That is good news.

Show attachment 243079

This can be kind of confusing.

Is there any easy way to tell what path your domain sale was from?

For instance let's take my "transfer complete" sale from last week, that is still not scheduled for payout.

That started with an Afternic broker contacting me from the email [email protected].

I had an asking price and floor price. The offer was slightly below the floor price.
I told the broker the floor price was the best I could do. The domain sold minutes later for the floor price.

I got an email from "Afternic Transaction Assurance" saying -

"Congratulations! Your domain, XXXXX, has sold...."

What path was used there?

Brad

When is this going to start?

@GoDaddy @James Iles

My "transfer complete" Afternic sale has been in that status for around a week now.

It still appears to be in GoDaddy's holding account, with no payout scheduled.

Brad

 

[Jeff_Libert]

@bmugford - I'm in the same boat. Domains transferred 8 & 9 days ago. I've contacted Transaction Assurance, even citing the new policy. Still no movement on payment. So much time has passed that there's even a live website on one of the transferred domains.

Some is broken in Transaction Assurance.

UPDATE: I'm done dealing with TA. I sent TA a link to James' blog post and still no action. So, I just contacted Afternic Customer Service, expressed my frustration with TA, asked the CS rep to escalate the issue with TA, and I asked for an email confirming my contact - with my advice that if this isn't moved today that I want this matter moved up the management chain of command.

I do not want to bring trouble to any TA employee but it's pretty clear that either the TA department is overworked / understaffed or TA suffers from some other problem affecting TA's ability to get things done.

Pardon my obvious expression of frustration, but for heaven's sake, there's a live website on one of the transferred domains. Push the darned payment button.

Sigh . .

 

[bmugford]

@bmugford - I'm in the same boat. Domains transferred 8 & 9 days ago. I've contacted Transaction Assurance, even citing the new policy. Still no movement on payment. So much time has passed that there's even a live website on one of the transferred domains.

Some is broken in Transaction Assurance.

UPDATE: I'm done dealing with TA. I sent TA a link to James' blog post and still no action. So, I just contacted Afternic Customer Service, expressed my frustration with TA, asked the CS rep to escalate the issue with TA, and I asked for an email confirming my contact - with my advice that if this isn't moved today that I want this matter moved up the management chain of command.

I do not want to bring trouble to any TA employee but it's pretty clear that either the TA department is overworked / understaffed or TA suffers from some other problem affecting TA's ability to get things done.

Pardon my obvious expression of frustration, but for heaven's sake, there's a live website on one of the transferred domains. Push the darned payment button.

Sigh . .

So my Afternic sale is still in "transfer complete" status a week later. The domain is still in Afternic's holding account.

Meanwhile, I sold a domain on Dan.com yesterday.

Dan.com accepted the push this morning and sent payment a couple hours later. That payment is already in my bank account.

What is going on?

@GoDaddy @James Iles?

Brad

 

[Jeff_Libert]

So my Afternic sale is still in "transfer complete" status a week later. The domain is still in Afternic's holding account.

Meanwhile, I sold a domain on Dan.com yesterday.

Dan.com accepted the push this morning and sent payment a couple hours later. That payment is already in my bank account.

What is going on?

@GoDaddy @James Iles?

Brad

One would think that in a digital "one click" world (Amazon) the whole transfer->payment process would go that smoothly . . everywhere . . especially when it involves an entity the size of GoDaddy and people with long standing in the domainer community. #SMH

P.S. - I was looking to move my entire domain portfolio to GoDaddy but my ongoing customer service experience with Afternic TA and now with delayed payments via SmartName has me in a holding pattern.

That said, the CS experience isn't nearly as bad as the one I had, several weeks back, with another well respected (I thought) parking company, an experience that proved to be a doozy. I discovered that my traffic domains were spawning zero click landers, ones that were loading #prn sites (#PrnHub), browser jacking download sites, etc. FYI, there was nothing . . nada . . about the highly commercial domains that would explain or justify such nonsense. Lord knows I immediately packed my bags and moved, as it was clear that no one was minding the parking store at that time.

Sign. The past 2 months have been an interesting ride. I think I'm suffering a bit of PTSD - Potentially Traumatic Stressful Domaining :p

 

[pinkdragon]

Guys, please wait your turn.

I sold a domain at Afternic on 29.06, it was a negotiated lead. I pushed the domain into their Dynadot escrow account, on 30.06 the domain was in their possession.

I guess it was a long weekend in the US, but on 07/09 the whois was updated (the domain was renewed until 2029). This means that the domain is now in the buyer's account.

After 3 emails, one to [email protected] (as suggested in this thread) and another 2 emails sent to [email protected], the payment date is still not scheduled.

I have no idea what else I should do to get the money. I probably have to wait for autumn to come ... maybe then I will receive the money.

 

[Rhinnnn]

Live look at the tech that seemingly powers GoDaddy's payout system:

 

[bmugford]

While dealing with another offer that came from [email protected], I asked them about the status of my "transfer complete" sale.

I was told -

"On (DOMAIN SOLD), the TA Team is working to get the transfer info from the buyer as soon as possible and then they’ll be able to start the payout process.

So, it is clear the payout is still based on the buyer accepting the transfer.

Can you please clarify when we can expect these announced changes to take effect?

@GoDaddy @James Iles

Brad

 

[Future Sensors]

@bmugford My gut feeling says that Afternic considers the new procedure only applicable to new transactions (after their announcement), without also retroactively speeding up past transactions. I sympathize with you, because I've been through it myself. It's quite frustrating.

 

[bmugford]

@bmugford My gut feeling says that Afternic considers the new procedure only applicable to new transactions (after their announcement), without also retroactively speeding up past transactions. I sympathize with you, because I've been through it myself. It's quite frustrating.

It would be nice for them to clarify that, or at least provide a date when the new policy will take effect.

I just agreed to another sale, so assuming the buyer pays, we will see how that one proceeds.

Brad