IT.COM

information A Visual Look At Domain Name Lander Options

NameSilo

Do you plan to use the new buy-it-now Afternic landers? You can select up to 2 options

  • This poll is still running and the standings may change.
  • No I am keeping the legacy make offer ones.

    votes
    3.9%
  • I do not use Afternic.

    18 
    votes
    23.4%
  • I plan to move a few of my Afternic listings to the new landers.

    34 
    votes
    44.2%
  • I plan to move about half of my Afternic listings to the new landers.

    10 
    votes
    13.0%
  • I plan to use the new landers for all my Afternic listings.

    10 
    votes
    13.0%
  • I am moving landers from other providers to Afternic as a result of the new landers.

    12 
    votes
    15.6%
  • This poll is still running and the standings may change.

First impressions are important. While there are many ways people might discover your domain names, probably the most important is the lander. An effective lander is attractive and professional, provides a clear route to purchase, and builds trust in the transaction. This week Afternic introduced a buy-it-now lander option. In this article, I explore that new option, along with some alternative domain name landers.

New Afternic Buy-It-Now Landers

NamePros members have for some time requested the buy-it-now price and button on Afternic landers, taking away the need to call an agent to get a price. Particularly for domain names with modest prices, the extra step of contacting an agent may discourage sales. While there were forwarding work-arounds to have landers with the GoDaddy name and price, this was not an optimum solution.

Back in December, Joe Styler shared wth NamePros members that buy-it-now landers would be coming to Afternic in the not too distant future. A few days ago he announced that the landers were operational, and shared an example. Now Afternic have sent out the official announcement of the new landers.

Here is what the landers look like with one of my names.

adapixCOM.png


The new landers are minimalistic, with an effective buy-it-now message and clear black button for completing the purchase. Purchasers who wish to contact an agent with questions are given a US Toll Free telephone number along with an international number for global use, but are not required to do so. The information at the bottom promotes delivery assurance, and the trusted GoDaddy brand that has more than 80 million domain names under management.

In introducing the new landers, Afternic described the advantages this way.

Today, we’re excited to announce our new Buy-Now landing pages as an additional option to our highly successful Lead landing pages. These new pages enable you to set a Buy-Now price and let GoDaddy handle the rest with a streamlined buying experience. Additionally, the pages offer:

*Increased global exposure with localized language, currency by region and different payment options – all in an easy-to-use format.

*Simple and powerful design. With designs optimized for mobile and desktop, we make the buying process smooth for buyers to quickly and securely purchase your domain.

*GoDaddy brand and support. Build trust and confidence for buyers with landing pages branded by GoDaddy that include 24/7 sales and support.
A few things of note. The GoDaddy branding has totally replaced any mention of Afternic on the landers. The landers do not have GoDaddy automated appraisal information included. There is no link to related domain names for sale at GoDaddy. Most domain sellers regard these positively.

The landers look great in horizontal and vertical formats, including mobile devices. The Afternic announcement notes that they have localized language and currency as well.

Implementing The New Landers

Implementing the new landers could not be easier.
  1. Make sure that your Afternic listed domain names have a buy-it-now price set.
  2. At your registrar, make your DNS settings ns5.Afternic.com and ns6.Afternic.com.
If your names are registered at GoDaddy, your can set your names for sale right within your account, making the process particularly simple. Of course your domain names can be registered anywhere and placed for sale on the Afternic system.

While some have indicated that your domain names need to be in certain extensions, or have fast transfer enabled, in my testing that is not the case. I had no problem implementing the new landers with Afternic listed names that were not fast transfer, and in a number of different extensions. The time delay seems rather variable before they display, sometimes just a few minutes and for other names the better part of a day. That probably is related to dns propagation times and possibly other factors, particularly if you recently added the buy-it-now pricing at Afternic.

If you wish to keep the legacy landers that don’t have buy-it-now pricing, keep using your old name server settings, ns3.Afternic.com and ns4.Afternic.com.

Many feel that make offer pricing is best for high-value domain names, while buy-it-now may be better with pricing of $2500 and below. Now with Afternic, the choice is yours.

If you do use the ns5.Afternic.com, ns6.Afternic.com DNS, but don’t have a buy-it-now price set, the purchaser will be presented with a form to request price information, as well as contact telephone numbers. Here is an example.

ambertCO-NoPrice.png


Brad Mugford, a successful investor with a large portfolio, has indicated that plans to do A/B testing on the new and legacy Afternic landers to see which convert better. It will be interesting to see results from such trials. GoDaddy have been testing the new landers for some time with their own portfolio.

Join The Discussion

NamePros members are actively discussing the new landers across several threads including the following”
Both Paul Nicks and Joe Styler have taken part in the discussions, with Paul indicating that there are other improvements in the works. Why not join the discussions?

What Else You Might Want In A Lander?

While reaction to the new landers has been generally positive, some have wanted one or more of the following, and therefore plan to stick with alternative landers.
  • A make offer option.
  • Lower commissions.
  • Payment plan options.
  • Camel case domain display.
  • Instant chat customer support.
  • Logo or visual presentation.
  • Descriptions.
  • Analytics on visits.
Various vendors offer landers that include some subset of these elements. I demonstrate some of them below.

DAN

DAN has set the standard for easy to implement professional landers. One can readily include make offer or payment plan options, if desired. A number of other services also offer domain name payment plans.

I show the DAN lander for one of my names below. DAN allow highlighting who is selling the name, along with the DAN domain transfer expert, while the new Afternic landers only include the broker. The seller can implement various preferences.

TalkOrbitcom-DAN.png


It is possible to upload a logo with your DAN domain names, and display traffic graphs if desired. DAN allows you to include descriptions with each domain name. It can be argued whether descriptions help or hurt — see the article Is Domain Name Presentation Important, and the discussion that follows.

There may be cases where descriptions help - such as explaining renewal costs for new extensions that have a mix of standard and premium renewals, or mentioning a word association from another language on a brandable name. Domain descriptions also give a way to indicate if you have available a pair of domain names — see the article Holding Pairs of Related Domain Names.

I don’t know the exact timing, but a new version of DAN will soon implement further features and improvements.

Sedo

Sedo have long allowed both buy-it-now pricing and make offer, They also permit domain descriptions if desired, and visual elements. There are numerous design alternatives on Sedo landers. I show one option in the Sedo lander below.

brainstormBEST-Sedo.png


Both DAN and Sedo offer statistics on visits to names there. Some of the Sedo options include that information in a prominent place. Do you think including traffic or market visits helps a lander to convert?

Epik

With Epik, each lander is in essence it’s own small website, complete with a security certificate. One can select from an array of graphic background elements, in dark or light formats, or upload your own graphic just for that domain name.

If you wish, you can add fully formatted text, including lists, links, multimedia elements, etc. As far as I know, they are the only lander option that allows links within the description. This is handy if you want to link to documents about domain transfer, renewal, etc., or to related domain names in your portfolio. If the registry has a site with real use examples, this can also be helpful. For example, the CO registry has a case studies site making it easy to find businesses using .co from any region.

Epik has the most flexible set of options for payment plans. You can adjust a starting payment, interest rate, length, etc. I show one of my Epik landers below.

guardingIO-Epik.png


As well as instant purchase, make an offer or start a payment plan, the potential purchaser can directly communicate with the seller. This can be an advantage for those who like to know their buyer and directly negotiate. The instant chat button may foster sales in some cases.

You can use Epik landers without your names registered at Epik, although the payment plan option is not possible in that case.

Epik offer a variety of tracking and performance metrics, including market visits, domain visits, and number of times that Whois has been queried for the domain name, including if there are repeated and multiple queries. You can also include your own Google analytics code in the landers.

Dynadot

Dynadot is a favourite registrar among NamePros members. Dynadot refreshed their landers not long ago. They place the clear emphasis on an instant buy now, but include a less prominent make offer option, if the seller selected to allow offers. Trust elements and a prominent Request Support button on the top right complete the lander.

envisionONE-Dynadot.png


SquadHelp White Label

Now that SquadHelp has implemented optional “white label” sites for your standard listings, this is another lander option. The commission structure is far lower than for their premium listings, yet SquadHelp handle the communication and sales process. Your own portfolio can have the same structure as the main SquadHelp site, yet when the buyer clicks on other domains they only see names from your own portfolio.

You designate one of your domain names as the portfolio name. SquadHelp instructions make this easy to do. My SquadHelp white label site mainly for Canada related domain names is still a work in progress, but if you want to see one in action feel free to visit rename.ca.

Below is an individual domain lander from a SquadHelp standard listing. The seller can select from various visual elements, or upload their own. Alternatively, one can upload or pay for a professionally designed logo.

bakehouseNET-SHWL.png


Further down the lander is a description for that domain name, keywords and emotional characteristics of the name. Payment plans from 0 to 24 months, in 3 month increments, can be offered. Whether make offer is operational is determined by the user. SquadHelp testing suggests that a buy-it-now price, along with a payment plan option, but not make offer, converts best for most names.

SquadHelp offers easy performance metrics on your complete white label site, along with a breakdown on how many times each domain name has been viewed. You can order the featured domain names, a nice feature. It is also possible to use your own Google analytics.

NameSilo

NameSilo landers offer a clean modern look. They come in 5 design choices, each with different color options. Here is one example. They support both buy-it-now and make offer price choices, along with payment plans out to 12 months duration.

manufactureONE-Silo.png


While a purchaser needs to create a NameSilo account to buy a domain name, they can leave a message for the seller without one. The seller is given basic information on those who submit a query.

Many Other Options

There are many other options, including the brandable marketplaces like BrandBucket, Alter, Rooted and BrandPa,as well as BIIX, Sav, Uniregistry, and other registrars not listed in this article.

While Namecheap do not have landers per se, you can set domains for sale on their marketplace and then use their forwarder to point to the listing.

Should you have your heart set on a pig-themed lander, the friendly folks at Porkbun have you covered with their domain landers. They are an Afternic network partner, if you prefer the style of the Afternic landers.

Various scripting services provide landers as part of a subscription. I decided that topic was too broad to include here. Others simply develop their own hosted landers, or use a third party page hosting service. Efty has a whole array of landers as part of their domain management program.

Final Thoughts

Various elements are possible in a domain lander. The article Too Many or Too Few Choices discusses whether too many options may actually result in fewer sales conversions, since the potential purchaser is frozen by choice indecision.

The new Afternic landers support one clear choice - a buy-it-now purchase. The GoDaddy branding is front and center, in fact the buyer may even think they are buying a domain name owned by GoDaddy. With GoDaddy’s huge global presence, supported by extensive advertising, the close association is a definite advantage.

There is much to think about when selecting an optimum lander. As @oldtimer commented recently “Different domains work better with different landers.“ That is exactly how I view it. There is not one size that fits all in domain landers. Think about what aspects are critical for each domain name, and set the lander appropriately.

We are fortunate to have so many excellent lander choices.The buy-it-now Afternic landers have given us all a new option that will be a great choice for some names in my opinion.

I look forward to hearing your comments in the discussion. Also, please vote in the associated poll.


I used a number of my own domains to visually demonstrate the different lander options. These are not presented to promote the domain names. I just thought it was best to not use third-party names as examples.
 
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The views expressed on this page by users and staff are their own, not those of NamePros.
Excellent! Very helpful article Bob!
 
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this is exactly what ive needed and never anted to do myself, truly great post.
 
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Another fantastic article Bob! I think you also came up with good article topic “Different domains work better with different landers.“ Would love to see a follow-up piece that discusses how to pick a lander based on the domain name. Keep up the great work!
 
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Great article Bob! Great value for everyone right here!
 
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Great overview. Thank you, Bob.
 
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Would love to see a follow-up piece that discusses how to pick a lander based on the domain name.
I have noted your suggestion, and will at some point follow up with an article just focussed on that. Thanks.

Thank you everyone for your positive comments. I hope that more will please vote in the poll.

Even though the article is long, I could not cover every option. If there are landers you really like, please feel free to share a screen shot in the comments.

Bob
 
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The Q is the sales data!!! which platform is selling the most domains!!

Q2- what the fees of each platforms?
 
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Brilliant as usual. I like the new GoDaddy BIN lander. I am looking forward to trying it out in six months.
 
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Thanks again for another educational and useful article, Bob. Still so many overwhelming choices, even if they’re improving. I agree with @spikedo that an article about what lander is best for a type of domain (e.g., brandable vs generic) or TLD (e.g., .io vs .in) would be great!
 
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Dan landers are still better in both design and options.

Although I use Epik at the moment, Im thinking about moving my names to Dan for the design of BIN + Instalments landers they have.

Another reason Im thinking about switching away from Epik is the make offer page setups.
with Dan, a buyer can easily see the min offer amount by attempting to send in an offer of 1 dollar (the error showing the minimum) which I have done myself on a lot of domains on sale there that I was interested in.
with Epik that is not as clear until an offer with info attached (name email) is sent. if their offer setup was in a way that allowed to check the min amount without sending in an offer, chances are I would have stuck with them since their design of landers is very editable and flexible.


But Afternic landers still dont justify %20 commission they charge.
I guess they have other qualities (bigger market size, more well known brand and all that jazz) that justifies it.

but design-wise its still pretty meh..
 
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Q2- what the fees of each platforms?
Yes fees are a factor. Since commissions are easily looked up, I did not repeat them in the article, but here are links with information. Note that in some cases restrictions and additional fees on payout in some cases, and also fees for various promotions, etc. if elected.
Afternic: https://www.afternic.com/sell-domains (20% for most)
Sedo: https://sedo.com/us/what-we-offer/price-list/ (15 to 20% depending on details)
DAN: https://dan.com/help/seller-guide (down to FAQs - 9% unless bring lead)
Epik: 9% marketplace sale normally (also brokerage option)
SquadHelp White Label: https://helpdesk.squadhelp.com/en/articles/4231106-white-label-marketplace-terms-conditions 7.5%
Dynadot: https://www.dynadot.com/community/help/question/domain-sale-process 5%
NameSilo: https://www.namesilo.com/Support/Marketplace 7.5%

I did not cover them in article in detail, but I think it is just 4% at Sav.

The brandable places generally are much higher.

Bob
 
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The Q is the sales data!!! which platform is selling the most domains!!
Oh yes, we all would like to know that. Simply because they have more listings, and the largest registration network, I think most assume that Afternic sell more, but we really don't know the data.

To me, it is not the total sales volume that is important, but the sales volume per listed domain. ie if one marketplace had 25 million names, and sold 25000 in a year at an average price of $2000 that is actually not as good as a different site that has only 25 thousand names, but sold 2500 names in a year at an average of $2000.

I sometimes wonder why as part of disclosure to us their customers the marketplaces do not owe us overall statistics for the year.

Bob
 
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Yeah not giving 20% to a monopoly, I pulled all my domains from Afternic.
 
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Sedo: https://sedo.com/us/what-we-offer/price-list/ (15 to 20% depending on details)
DAN: https://dan.com/help/seller-guide (down to FAQs - 9% unless bring lead)
Epik: 9% marketplace sale normally (also brokerage option)
SquadHelp White Label: https://helpdesk.squadhelp.com/en/articles/4231106-white-label-marketplace-terms-conditions 7.5%
Dynadot: https://www.dynadot.com/community/help/question/domain-sale-process 5%
NameSilo: https://www.namesilo.com/Support/Marketplace 7.5%


all these small chicken peas need to join forces to compete agst GD- that the only way to survive

GD has the marketing power-prowess
 
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Thank you, it was interesting to read
 
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I have noted your suggestion, and will at some point follow up with an article just focussed on that. Thanks.

Thank you everyone for your positive comments. I hope that more will please vote in the poll.

Even though the article is long, I could not cover every option. If there are landers you really like, please feel free to share a screen shot in the comments.

Bob
This was timely Bob...i just reached 2,884 .online domains, and i was just sharing with Andrew Allemann at DNN that i plan to randomly list 50% of my domains at Afternic, and the other 50% at Epik in order to compare both sales and "net back" or "net return" results where GD charges a commission of 20% and Epik charges 10%. I appreciate you sharing other brokers landing pages, but I'm afraid to compare more than two brokers at a time for obvious reasons.

Anyway thanks, and hopefully I can start sharing some results in a few months. You are the man Bob Hawkes!!!
 
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i moved my domains to a new afternic lander trying out for the next 6 months. I have had an experience with end-user buyers they trust GoDaddy more than any other registrar. one of my domains was listed on dan. the buyer came and asked me to move the domain from dan to GoDaddy then he will hit the BIN otherwise not.

so GoDaddy knows they earned the trust of their customers that's why they charge high. it sucks but hey if my domain is selling without any hassle I can pay even 30% of my sale.
 
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i moved my domains to a new afternic lander trying out for the next 6 months. I have had an experience with end-user buyers they trust GoDaddy more than any other registrar. one of my domains was listed on dan. the buyer came and asked me to move the domain from dan to GoDaddy then he will hit the BIN otherwise not.

so GoDaddy knows they earned the trust of their customers that's why they charge high. it sucks but hey if my domain is selling without any hassle I can pay even 30% of my sale.
I tend to agree with you. "End Users" have never heard of Dan, Sedo or even Epik. End Users might know or trust the name Network Solutions that's a Web.com company, so maybe they should get into the business? Network Solutions....do you hear me:xf.smile:
 
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I hope that more will please vote in the poll.

Great article, @Bob Hawkes! I wanted to vote, but the option that I'd choose isn't in the list. I have domains listed at Afternic, and have used their landers briefly in the distant past.

I have no plans to use them in the future. Maybe if the option said "I don't use Afternic landers," (or something along those lines) that would be the closest thing to an answer for me.
 
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Thanks Bob, a really nice breakdown of the lander options.

As per the fees, there are a number of services and options offered by each platform.

eg. GD has a sliding scale of fees depending on the domain name sale price point, while Sedo offers a discount if you use their landers or different reseller networks etc.

Then there are also escrow services.

It can be a headache trying to figure out which option to use.

It would be great if for a future article you could break all these options down into an easily digestible format.
 
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Wow!
This is genious!
The buyer is purchasing from GD, while the seller is selling through Afternic.
In case of transfer or payment trouble they both contact two different entities.
Good luck!
 
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Sedo: https://sedo.com/us/what-we-offer/price-list/ (15 to 20% depending on details)
DAN: https://dan.com/help/seller-guide (down to FAQs - 9% unless bring lead)
Epik: 9% marketplace sale normally (also brokerage option)
SquadHelp White Label: https://helpdesk.squadhelp.com/en/articles/4231106-white-label-marketplace-terms-conditions 7.5%
Dynadot: https://www.dynadot.com/community/help/question/domain-sale-process 5%
NameSilo: https://www.namesilo.com/Support/Marketplace 7.5%


all these small chicken peas need to join forces to compete agst GD- that the only way to survive

GD has the marketing power-prowess

The next Q is what is their marketing/advertising budget to promote my domains and how are they going to advertise their brands to the world compare to GoooooooooooooooooDaddyyyyyyy which is in every sports events.
 
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