Flippa: Enjoy my $9 because I will not be a returning customer

[saturn60]

I tried them based on a recommendation I received and overall it was a pretty bad experience, not to mention a waist of $9.

The sign up process was confusing and when I tried to find their customer service phone number for assistance with setting up my account, it turns out it doesn't exist, all I could find was a contact form to provide my contact info, not even a live chat option. In my opinion, any website that takes your money should have some form of live support.

During the listing creation process they try to sell you on upgrade options, which would be normal, except their upgrade fees are not $10 or $20, they're hundreds of dollars more!

Once my listing went live, I was surprised to see there was no description summary or thumbnail picture showing up on my listing in the search results. I assumed that my listing would include those features since when you click on "domains" from the homepage, nearly all the listings in the search results have those features. It's clear now that those listings are upgraded, but if you're new to the site, unless you're really paying attention, it's not clear that standard listings don't have those features.

I priced my domain with a starting bid of $10 and a reserve of $299. The domain only got 1 $10 bid and as the auction was about to end, I get a message from Flippa: We suggest you lower the reserve to $11 and if you do that we'll (reward you by) emailing the watchers on your listing. So they're pressuring me to sell the domain for around $11 even though the listing has a $9 listing fee + 10% success fee?

Lets do the math: If the domain sells, even if it's for a ridiculously low price, Flippa can collect the 10% success fee. No sale = No success fee for Flippa.

So the domain ended unsold, but don't worry, they have a backup plan to get more money from me. I am offered the option to "Buy a privacy upgrade". For $20 I can hide my listing from search engines like Google and the general public, for $30 I can make my listing no longer be visible to the public. Feel free to disagree with me, but I think it's pretty sleazy for Flippa to try and monetize the privacy concerns of their paying users.

 

[Archangel]

I haven't read all of this thread. It sounds to me like you're whining about Flippa. Well,duh: unless you have a great domain, FLIPPA IS NOT FOR YOU. You get what you pay for, and your domain has to be worthy of that $9. Upgrades are good but they won't help if you have a bad domain. Moving along, you can't just post a name on auction and wait. You need to do some marketing on your own. All of this said: Flippa won't likely miss you. List your domain on eBay, BIDO or something. THEN bitch and complain about how terrible of an experience you get.

 

[saturn60]

Personally I disagree with your opinion, but thankyou for sharing it.

If you don't like my opinion, don't get cute and thank me for it. Most of what I shared were facts surrounding my experience using Flippa, that's got nothing to do with anyones opinion.

They have these optional extras for your listings, just like eBay and any other marketplace do. These are marketed for high end domain names which will sell at a much larger profit - in these cases the upgrades are worth it.

The last I checked ebay doesn't start their premium extras at $250.. Plus, ebay doesn't charge $9 to list an item, only a final value fee if the item sells.

And ebay doesn't find crazy ways to extract money from sellers, like making them pay huge fees to add a single picture to their auction listing or creating premium features that are based on sellers privacy concerns.

 

[SeriousName.com]

You got a $9 lesson, not to shabby if you look at it that way.

 

[James Rodman]

if you dont like flippa dont use it. why are you getting mad at other people on here for telling the truth? lmao

 

[saturn60]

Of course $9 isn't a big loss, but I was expecting more interest on my domain than I'd get listing it on ebay and that didn't happen.

 

[alcy]

I was told the good news is that if your thing sells not, you pay not again the $9 for relists. and this forever. even when I am on my deathbed I can relist it for free. it does not get any more forever than this.

so I think this is good news! I have limited experience with flippa, only sold my first ever domain and only domain so far, on flippa, a handreg, for $70. paid them their cut of $7 and everyone happy.

it was smooth and their nice csr congratulated me on my first sale too.

that being said, when you have a 1000$ worth domain for sale you do not pay $300 in listing upgrades for it... u don't even think about it.. in fact, you don't even really look at it period.. but when you are lucky ebough one day to own a name worth $1 000 000 then you will probably wonder why you are only paying $300 to showcase it and get a great sale worth a lot of money for it... so you see.. einstein was right.. everything is relative.

 

[Archangel]

That's the case no matter where you go. Seems to me that you have unrealistic expectations: ANYTIME YOU LIST A DOMAIN FOR SALE, at any venue, without having a way to make it stand out from the crowd, WILL RESULT IN YOUR DOMAIN DOING ANYTHING FROM BAD TO TERRIBLE. It's like that no matter which auction platform you use. So why are you singling out Flippa? Why not eBay or BIDO or GoDaddy or Afternic or...?

No, unlike what you believe, you aren't making a point and are bad-mouthing a company for doing what every company in its niche does. Stop being a soursport.

Of course $9 isn't a big loss, but I was expecting more interest on my domain than I'd get listing it on ebay and that didn't happen.

 

[donname]

What is at issue here is exposure, not the $ 9 basic listing.
Personally I think with a basic list the main audience are resellers, with the upgrade you have more possibilities to reach an end user because the exposure is exponentially greater. logically if you have a premium domain practically sells itself.
If you have a domain of $ 50 is logical that the commission sale is proportionally greater (20%), at this point maybe it logical, according to my view, would that Flippa should not set a minimum ($ 10), if you set the percentage (% 10), for listings in general anyway if these small sales are effected not affect the prestige of Flippa to Top Domains, this road already doing well.
For the rest Flippa has an excellent attention and improves if you pay more upgrades.

 

[tomcarl]

You paid $9 for a service, the service was given. The market had no interest in your name. I don't understand how Flippa is in the wrong here.

If you list a good domain with a reasonable starting bid, there will be somebody that's going to place a bid, then somebody else, etc. Once the bids accumulate, your $9 listing will get more exposure. But, that didn't happen.

It wouldn't be fair to not charge you $200 or more and have your domain sit next to domains that people have invested hundreds and thousands in and are looking to get the most of what it's worth.

There are investors weeding through lists of thousands of domains every day, if your domain had any real liquid value to someone at the time it would've been bid on, but sometimes flukes do happen. I listed a solid one word .info that didn't get any bids (I think because I had a reserve) - But now I have it on FreeMarket and the bid is up to $380, sometimes it's about the listing being in the right place at the right time, sometimes it's your domain: Flippa offers free re-list I believe so if you were to list again with the same results, it's not the marketplace that's not good, it may be your domain.

 

[jamesosix]

i do dislike the fact i have to pay to hide the listing of MY domain from search engines. That's plain morally wrong imo. That said, you could probably submit a "forget me" request to Google to have the page removed from the index.

Otherwise, I do think Flippa is a pretty good site to sell domains on (and this coming from somebody who has zero sales after a few attempts). Its not an exact science, but the names that I have listed in the past, have not sold, but the free relist is always there. I get what your saying about the fact it doesn't help attract traffic to the page, but that really is up to you too. For $9 and free lifetime relisting, I don't think that is bad at all tbh. Maybe its just not the right time yet for your domain to sell. Maybe it was not worth a big sale? Naturally, I don't know, but don't get put off by your first listing.

Also, regarding the upgrades, they are expensive, but if they were cheap low quality domains would dominate all the promoted sections like the featured home page listing. Its expensive to weed out the low value domains I believe.

 

[cron]

The truth is Flippa isn't doing much with relations to marketing at all. They simply care about their upgrade payment, listing fee, success fee and that is all.
Whether you sell or not, they are profiting. If you are going to list your domain there for $9 be ready to market it yourself and to also bring your own clienteles on board, keeping in mind that still own 10% share of your earnings.
This is total foul play.

 

[Electric-Shadow]

That's harsh to say they don't care. Flippa do read these forums, act on and respond to customer feedback. They seem very open to it too, what more can you ask for in a company these days even if there's room for improvement? As there is with most things. They nor anyone else can please everyone all at the same time.

 

[cocaseco]

I never noticed the options to hide past option and agree that there should not be a fee for that. I'm not even sure that that would be defendable as once the auction ended we are no longer in a contract. I'll have to think on that one, and read their TOS. Anyway, regardless of legality its a crappy business policy. I cant think of other popular sites having your unsold products available forever, if at all. Let alone offering to pay for the service. In order to be made whole, following an unsuccessful auction, they need to scrub the data. I think there could also be a legal claim that my product is now damaged because a buyer could see what i tried to sell it for and that it didn't sell and use that information to reduce his offer. yes there may be other ways to get that data, but you didn't pay for the disservice. I'm not practicing but I do think that someone could win a change in this policy, perhaps damages.

But other than that I like Flippa and as a buyer, consider it one of my daily "must check" sites. I like the free listings as one more exposure point, and I like their selection of developed sites.

 

[Archangel]

I do agree it's pretty lame to charge us to keep our listings safe from SERPs. But I'm actually happy with the high fees for upgrades. Had they been cheap, you'd see way too many shitty domains being featured.It's an automatic quality check: if a domain is WORTH OWNING, it'll have a pricey upgrade; if it's a reg-fee POS, it'll be buried in the $9 listings.

 

[James Rodman]

If your domain is a good domain people will find it no matter what. doesnt matter if its premium or basic. feel.com is listed on flippa as basic and bidding is up to $50,000 on it. blame your domain not the marketplace.

 

[AFernald]

Flippa is a great marketplace. It is extremely easy to use and the support is great. The only way to sell a bad domain on Flippa is to pay for the $349 super premium listing. Otherwise no one sees it through the hundreds of other crappy domain listings. I'm guessing yours was just another bad domain in a sea of thousands.

If you have a good domain on the other hand. Then people will find it

 

[S-B]

The truth is Flippa isn't doing much with relations to marketing at all. They simply care about their upgrade payment, listing fee, success fee and that is all.
Whether you sell or not, they are profiting. If you are going to list your domain there for $9 be ready to market it yourself and to also bring your own clienteles on board, keeping in mind that still own 10% share of your earnings.
This is total foul play.

Flippa is simply a platform for selling domains and a great one at that. If you want the full-service treatment where everything is done for you, submit your domain for premium brokerage.

 

[Nazz]

What you pay is what you get..

$9 will not get you much exposure , that is why many people will encourage you to upgrade your listing.. That is of course, if your domain is worthy of an upgrade..

 

[cocaseco]

Flippa is simply a platform for selling domains and a great one at that. If you want the full-service treatment where everything is done for you, submit your domain for premium brokerage.

A lack of public empathy for customers problems has been the downfall of more than one Internet company. And no comment whatsoever on the privacy issue? My trust/respect for Flippa just dropped a bit.

 

[JyotiG]

I think Flippa is a great platform and their email support is awesome. They are always eager to help and prompt in replying. I have sold a couple of domains there and there are some that have not been sold but I don't blame Flippa for it. I even Received a response from Kevin Fink when I emailed him regarding few of my domains and he was really helpful. They do take feedback seriously and are constantly trying to improve their platform.

 

[S-B]

A lack of public empathy for customers problems has been the downfall of more than one Internet company. And no comment whatsoever on the privacy issue? My trust/respect for Flippa just dropped a bit.

What privacy issue? Did I miss something in the thread?

 

[jdab]

It's also worth noting that Flippa now has a live chat feature.

 

[Nazz]

That's a positive, though users would definitely abuse the feature.

 

[cocaseco]

What privacy issue? Did I miss something in the thread?

Yep...last line, and also a couple assorted posts along the way.

 

[Genius327]

Flippa has changed my life entirely since I joined them. The level of exposure they have provided to my websites has resulted into awesome growth in sales over the past couple of months, for which, I can never thank them enough!

And on top of that, they have enabled me to save enough money go on a trip to HK two weeks from now.

Incredible experience with Flippa! :D