services BrandBucket's Michael Krell Resigns

[Silentptnr]

BrandBucket sent out their January newsletter and it seems that Michael Krell will be leaving the company. Michael who is one of if not the most prolific seller in the history of the site will be leaving effective January 31.

http://tldinvestors.com/2018/01/michael-krell-is-leaving-his-position-at-brandbucket.html

And @Grilled got a mention!

 

[Silentptnr]

Interesting that this would come out during Namescon.

We will see where his future leads him.

 

[offthehandle]

Based on his insider info he could start his own brandable market place site. Maybe he will start a competing marketplace, that isn’t slanted in favor of various sellers? A site that ranks in SEO and favors correct search results for the end user customers, NOT certain sellers is what is needed.

 

[Weber]

Based on his insider info he could start his own brandable market place site. Maybe he will start a competing marketplace, that isn’t slanted in favor of various sellers? A site that ranks in SEO and favors correct search results for the end user customers, NOT certain sellers is what is needed.

Likely not anytime soon if there was a non-compete agreement.

 

[offthehandle]

Likely not anytime soon if there was a non-compete agreement.

The brandable industry needs an open platform that ranks in search for the correct user search results based on what the user searches for. I have looked at the subject market places results enough to know they are skewed in favor of a few. The results on a first page were not even relevant when I have done this in the past, yet showed names of the insiders and owners- everyone knows who they are. As an end user, that causes frustration. Like if you search google and get ranked results that are not what you are looking for.

Here is an example- I will do it right now. First page results for the word 'TECH". All I wanted in search is to find names with "tech" in them. That was my "User intent" in goo gle speak. Guess who owns XEFIO? WTF does XEFIO have to do with TECH? Nothing. Why is it there? Look who owns it. And what about CAQY have to do with tech? or Cagzo? Stupid names, sorry if whoever owns they reads this, no offense.
Then if you keep searching- buried down further other other pages are other tech names, more relevant to user intent.

Then 8 pages down TechSpout, Techius and TechBella. All more relevant and Better than Xefio. or CAQY.

 

[urljunky]

I’ve noticed just about EVERY huge domain auction/sales site plays favorites. Very obvious.

You wouldn't be in business long if you didn't put your best foot forward. Any profitable company that depends on sales for revenue will always put their best out first. And if they are doing their job right that best changes per geo location, industry down to the individual potential buyer. it's just smart business. Of course they are going to tell their employees or domain owners what they want to hear so they don't feel offended or treated less than the next person, but in the end it comes down to sales and performance. and if your are not increasing one of those what are you doing there? IMO

 

[urljunky]

Wow after saying that I just realized I need to fire myself! lol

 

[Pat8]

it's just smart business. Of course they are going to tell their employees or domain owners what they want to hear so they don't feel offended or treated less than the next person, but in the end it comes down to sales and performance. and if your are not increasing one of those what are you doing there?

Sounds good for short term money making but in the long run only the business that make customers happy will survive.

 

[London555]

The real question is who cares and why? Mr Krell came on here pushing BB many times and may have cost many domainers money in the process. As we posted before no one makes money with BB other than the true insiders and apparently Mr Krell was not as inside as he thought.

 

[wwwweb]

No, I don't think that he got fired, is just what you wish for. The last domain listed by MK at brandbucket was on 31 august 2017, so over 3 months before the email sent by Margot, Michael refused to list any more domains there and he was listing them at his own marketplaces, so it was Michael's decission not to list anymore. I think that he wanted more power, because he was investing a lot in names and owned over 7k names and Margot didn't wanted to let him run things as he wanted.

Kind of contradicts the email which goes out of its way to say his names will stay, but given the fact he still buys, and is not listing is very good indication it is not amicable.

These self made bransdable sites are a dime a dozen now, wouldn’t take much to open his own, but BB does offer a higher targeted traffic source he would be hard pressed to replicate without spending on a major ad canpaign.

 

[boker]

Kind of contradicts the email which goes out of its way to say his names will stay, but given the fact he still buys, and is not listing is very good indication it is not amicable.

These self made bransdable sites are a dime a dozen now, wouldn’t take much to open his own, but BB does offer a higher targeted traffic source he would be hard pressed to replicate without spending on a major ad canpaign.

I have a bad habit to check what others are buying, mostly guys who I think are doing good in certain niches, so I have checked in the last year what MK was buying as well. At 1st september he stopped buying to much and stopped listing anything at BB. So, he's not buying to much, a small procent from what he was buying before. Also, his portofolio at BB gets smaller with a few domains day by day, probably just what he sells or doesn't want to renew. The idea is that he's not buying as much as before, so probably he will change the niche or maybe he will do it as a hobby. It will be interesting to see what he choosed instead of brandables and how profitable was to invest in 8k names. He was one of the big sellers, but he was investing much more than the average domainer in his brandable domains, so I would like to know how profitable it was for him.

 

[wwwweb]

I have a bad habit to check what others are buying, mostly guys who I think are doing good in certain niches, so I have checked in the last year what MK was buying as well. At 1st september he stopped buying to much and stopped listing anything at BB. So, he's not buying to much, a small procent from what he was buying before. Also, his portofolio at BB gets smaller with a few domains day by day, probably just what he sells or doesn't want to renew. The idea is that he's not buying as much as before, so probably he will change the niche or maybe he will do it as a hobby. It will be interesting to see what he choosed instead of brandables and how profitable was to invest in 8k names. He was one of the big sellers, but he was investing much more than the average domainer in his brandable domains, so I would like to know how profitable it was for him.

Lol I outbid him on a domain at NameJet
last week, so maybe he is finding it expensive to replace inventory, as the marketplace is more crowded, and huge names, and taryn have really upped their buying budgets. You could be right about dropping some of those brandables that were on fire 2 years ago. Good analysis. BB did allow him to spend more, as he was selling thru more, but carrying 8K names is like $70k a year, $1.5k a week, not fun by any means.

 

[urljunky]

Sounds good for short term money making but in the long run only the business that make customers happy will survive

No that is long term. And of course you have to treat your customers good, or at least make the customer feel they are being treated nice.

 

[ThatNameGuy]

Seems like there are all sorts of conflicts of interest on many sites in domaining, including bidders (shill), registrars (front running) and even website managers/owners (monitoring domains for profit). As an industry there should be a way to clear all of this up ...

This is exactly why I'll be marketing my domains directly to end users. This whole industry is one BIG JOKE starting with GD's appraisals. However, I intend to use GD's appraisals to market many of my domains directly to end users. I'm not sure how Will Ferrell could portray this industry on SNL, but if he could, it would be a HUGE HIT!....should have something to do with FakeDomainNews.com or FakeDomainNews.live.

Bulloney

 

[imadoer]

I noticed weeks ago he had some names on undeveloped.. So I thought to my self if your the man at bb why use a different marketplace to sell your stuff. So now that makes sense to me.

Well now with him out the way maybe there will be room for the little guy to make some sales

 

[hookbox]

Come on guys, read between the lines. It's pretty obvious that something is amiss when Krell doesn't release his own statement and Margot does it for him.

 

[BrandMart]

It's time to move on to Brandpa now

 

[OmarVG]

Come on Omar .. lol .. I think you've got a fantastic dictionary .. made out of strong weed .. and then smoked it .. lol

FYI I Don't smoke week or any other drugs. I DONT DO DRUGS. Those are my dictionary words 100% clean of any illegal substance.

Iam just Brutally Honest! LOL my personality may dislike to certain people...

 

[Ategy]

LOL my personality may dislike to certain people...

Yeah .. that was something that I actually COULD read between the lines! lol

 

[Rajnish Prasad]

All those Brand prefix marketplaces are worst to nothing...

Just wastage of Time & Money..

All those Pa, da, Ma, Na and so on....

Riduculously Pricing the Domains which makes no sense...

Crappy Domains you will see priced at xxxx.75, xxxx.25.

I still wonder their 2 Digit Decimal pricing..where did the hell they make such appraisals.. .75, .25

 

[Silentptnr]

All those Pa, da, Ma, Na and so on...

LOL

 

[ResoluteDomains]

I have a bad habit to check what others are buying, mostly guys who I think are doing good in certain niches, so I have checked in the last year what MK was buying as well. At 1st september he stopped buying to much and stopped listing anything at BB. So, he's not buying to much, a small procent from what he was buying before. Also, his portofolio at BB gets smaller with a few domains day by day, probably just what he sells or doesn't want to renew. The idea is that he's not buying as much as before, so probably he will change the niche or maybe he will do it as a hobby. It will be interesting to see what he choosed instead of brandables and how profitable was to invest in 8k names. He was one of the big sellers, but he was investing much more than the average domainer in his brandable domains, so I would like to know how profitable it was for him.

Beware of how you're checking though...

Maybe you already are aware of this, and if so then I apologize in advance, but if not - GoDaddy (where he registers much of his names) is phasing out rich WHOIS data. If you look at my portfolio, on Whoisology.com for example. I have a fraction of the domains that I used to have registered to my standard email address. But that isnt true at all. Apparently Whoisology isnt getting the full WHOIS information from GoDaddy on a large chunk of my portfolio. So it looks like I dropped 2/3 of my names. I havent.

Likewise, if we look at Michael's portfolio on Whoisology for the September 2017 archive, it shows 4,287 domains. If we look at the previous archive (June 2017) then it shows 8,039 domains. Why? My guess is that Whoisology can no longer associate in September 2017 his email address with nearly 50% of the domains that were listed in June 2017.

There are threads on here about GoDaddy restricting WHOIS data.

I wonder if that is what you're noticing when you say he stopped buying too much?

Of course, it could be that he's thinned out his portfolio however the GoDaddy WHOIS thing definitely needs to be considered.

 

[boker]

Beware of how you're checking though...

Maybe you already are aware of this, and if so then I apologize in advance, but if not - GoDaddy (where he registers much of his names) is phasing out rich WHOIS data. If you look at my portfolio, on Whoisology.com for example. I have a fraction of the domains that I used to have registered to my standard email address. But that isnt true at all. Apparently Whoisology isnt getting the full WHOIS information from GoDaddy on a large chunk of my portfolio. So it looks like I dropped 2/3 of my names. I havent.

Likewise, if we look at Michael's portfolio on Whoisology for the September 2017 archive, it shows 4,287 domains. If we look at the previous archive (June 2017) then it shows 8,039 domains. Why? My guess is that Whoisology can no longer associate in September 2017 his email address with nearly 50% of the domains that were listed in June 2017.

There are threads on here about GoDaddy restricting WHOIS data.

I wonder if that is what you're noticing when you say he stopped buying too much?

Of course, it could be that he's thinned out his portfolio however the GoDaddy WHOIS thing definitely needs to be considered.

I didn't checked any whois service because I know you can't trust them, it's much more accurate to check everywhere where he is listing his portofolio, his own marketplace, BB marketplace and other places. Also, there are domainers who own up to 20k domains, but they don't have a namepros account and not to many of us know them, for example, one guy own's around 19k domains, mostly org acronyms, without any presence here but there are ways to check what he buys daily, so you can have more info about what's selling. The idea is that after a domainer will buy something he will list it somehwere for sale...if you find out ways to check where he will list them, than you can have some extra info and in our business any extra advantage counts.

 

[ResoluteDomains]

... after a domainer will buy something he will list it somehwere for sale...if you find out ways to check where he will list them, than you can have some extra info and in our business any extra advantage counts.

very true!

 

[1Darko]

All those Brand prefix marketplaces are worst to nothing...

Just wastage of Time & Money..

All those Pa, da, Ma, Na and so on....

Riduculously Pricing the Domains which makes no sense...

Crappy Domains you will see priced at xxxx.75, xxxx.25.

I still wonder their 2 Digit Decimal pricing..where did the hell they make such appraisals.. .75, .25

Sounds like Panama

 

[Rajnish Prasad]

Sounds like Panama