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services What are best alternatives to DAN? (Since GoDaddy has bought & ruined the service as expected)

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Can anyone recommend some good alternatives to DAN that don't have such high commission fees? DAN user interface is still nice, but Godaddy really screwed the pooch with increase on commission fees from 9% to 15% and 25% for not using their nameservers. I guess that's no surprise. Too bad DAN sold out for an exit paycheck. Bummer.

I guess Efty is in a prime spot to add DAN users like me who are looking to jump ship.

Any ideas or recommendations? Thanks!
 
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This is the worst approach! At least keep everything directed to Dan and pay 15%. What you're doing now will just lead to 25% commission

I know that 15% commission will be valid for sales made through DAN's own landing page.

The current commission rate for Afternic's Distribution Network participation is still 20%
After February 1, they will increase it to 25%
 
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If living in the U.S., there is more simplicity dealing with marketplaces here. I believe there are issues of foreign tax potentially needing to be withheld, as well as potential currency conversion and other fees. Has anyone in the U.S. dealt with those issues with Daaz or a similar overseas marketplace?
Dan is Europe country too.
 
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Have you done some kind of testing?
According to Reza from Dan.com in a twitter post he mentioned more then 60% of sales happened on landing page.
Why pay 15% if we can do same with Daaz.com for only 5%.

You sure he said that? I am pretty sure he said 55%-60% comes from Afternic and 40%-45% from optimized sale landers.

Do we know Daaz landers are optimized? And even if they are, here is the math:

Afternic/dan lander: combined commission 15%

Daaz:

60%*25%+40%*5%=17%.

55%*25%+45%*5%=16%

Incidentally, this explains why GD raised the outside ns commission to 25%.

Without that, Daaz or similar would have 13%-14% combined commission instead of 16-17%.
 
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Dan is Europe country too.
Weren't they also located in Atlanta, Georgia before? I don't see that on their website now, though.
 
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if you own valuable domains (those that get queries each year), Efty is great

if you have a portfolio of average domains, you wont sell jackshit with efty
you must use the biggest marketplaces Afternic/Sedo network using a registrar that is a partners of both premium network
this will give you huge coverage and steady sales in a 1 to 3% depending on the quality of your portfolio

if you have a portfolio of brandables domains, use squadhelp/brandbucket/Brand.... Price your domains considering their higher commissions.

crying about commission is really stupid, if they could bring me 10% sales on my portfolio, i'll gladly give them 40% commission

dont focus on the commission, but on the profits from your portfolio. this is the way business works
 
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if you own valuable domains (those that get queries each year), Efty is great

if you have a portfolio of average domains, you wont sell jackshit with efty
you must use the biggest marketplaces Afternic/Sedo network using a registrar that is a partners of both premium network
this will give you huge coverage and steady sales in a 1 to 3% depending on the quality of your portfolio

if you have a portfolio of brandables domains, use squadhelp/brandbucket/Brand.... Price your domains considering their higher commissions.
Thanks for bringing up the distinctions. The choice of a marketplace might best be determined by the quality and type of names you are trying to sell.
crying about commission is really stupid, if they could bring me 10% sales on my portfolio, i'll gladly give them 40% commission
There is still the underlying question if the higher sales price, used to offset the commissions, impedes sales. In your experience, you feel that that isn't the case?
 
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Have you done some kind of testing?
According to Reza from Dan.com in a twitter post he mentioned more then 60% of sales happened on landing page.
Why pay 15% if we can do same with Daaz.com for only 5%.
Because Daaz is an unknown entity to 99% of the public. Most would trust a registrar over an unknown site.
 
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Because Daaz is an unknown entity to 99% of the public. Most would trust a registrar over an unknown site.

So, in Europe, Daaz in your opinion does not have much name recognition?

Internationally, have there been certain smaller registrars that are now getting much more prominence? For example, are Dynadot or Sav having more of a presence? Or even Epik, despite the recent issues?

Granted, Dan and GoDaddy might still be most prominent, but it would be good to recognize any upcoming trends at the moment.
 
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There is still the underlying question if the higher sales price, used to offset the commissions, impedes sales. In your experience, you feel that that isn't the case?

if you are selling domains to end-user, usually they have an interrest in this domain and are willing to pay at this time

domainers overthink these things,
usually most domains who sell on Afternics/Sedo are great deals
and when there is interest the budget can increase to match a reasonable sales price
if you are selling domains in the 1000-5000$ range, these marketplaces increase your exposure and your sales volume

my experience told me to stick to registrar that are partners in both premium networks Afternic/Sedo
 
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So, in Europe, Daaz in your opinion does not have much name recognition?

Although I am in the domain industry and follow this forum closely, I have come across very few domain names directed to Daaz. Maybe 1 in 1000.

About a year ago, even though I made the adage "The website and landing page of Daaz look like they were designed with Frontpage", they did not take any steps to improve their presence. That's why DAN became DAN and sold for millions, that's why godaddy is overwhelming power in the market.
 
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I have a client who is big in saas space and aws premier partners and i was pitching the opportunity.

Here were my take aways
- ssl and lightning fast landing pages with sso buttons from Google one tap and FB and others for offers. They have done this many times in the past.
- unlimited domains with an xls upload in bulk

Landing page
Basic
- pick from one of the templates

advanced
- they wanted me to check the possibility if content generation through openapi is of any interest as that will allow the domains to rank automatically after few months. Link exchanges will add extra dollars. The site will have home page (landing page builder) - does it make sense?
- free logo and business cards with t-shirts etc like brandable

- 24/7 live chat support (from Bengaluru India though)

Coming to integrations with payments.
- buy now - add commission to buyer or split or seller alone
- have some arbitrage built in with minimums set and share 50% on it. It is like virtual sales guys for us.
- 5% for buy now and 8% for lease to own if own leads
- 10% if it comes from network as they pay 3% to affiliate for promotion

Did I cover most of the needs?
 
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Because Daaz is an unknown entity to 99% of the public. Most would trust a registrar over an unknown site.
Even Sav.com, Dan.com and Epik.com is unknown to endusers. #justsaying
Dan.com is now with Godaddy.com logo so it's different now but they have raised commission because of that only that's why we are looking for options and Daaz.com seems best to me.
Daaz.com have 227 rating in Trust Pilot.
 
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I just opened a Sav account to check out the interface. Seems mature and has lots of features. 4% commission on sales off their landers. As easy to import as domain,price. Does anyone have experience with Sav they could share?
Done a lot of work with SAV. Only 1 decent sale over the last 2 years with the BIN option.
 
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Done a lot of work with SAV. Only 1 decent sale over the last 2 years with the BIN option.
Well, you do wonder if the registrar marketplace venues will start picking up, with the recent changes.

What concerns me is whether the marketplaces actually harm the number of sales, by trying to add on Afternic sales at checkout. So far, at a different registrar, I'm finding that this is being done occasionally with the domains. In other words, a buyer may be ready to buy your domain, click the checkout, and then be offered to add an additional domain from Afternic.

This probably hurts the marketplace's chances of a sale, IMHO. Why try to offer multiple options, when already a decision was made to buy the one domain? This may be useful to double check with your Sav marketplace domains.

Perhaps the registrar marketplaces need to immediately reconsider their strategies. Otherwise, they might find themselves losing even more business with the GD/AN/Dan aggressive moves?
 
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What concerns me is whether the marketplaces actually harm the number of sales, by trying to add on Afternic sales at checkout.
This is really, really bad. What if the buyer sees a different name for less money that is "good enough" in their opinion and decides to buy that name instead?
 
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This is really, really bad. What if the buyer sees a different name for less money that is "good enough" in their opinion and decides to buy that name instead?
Precisely. First of all, getting one sale is better than no sale. Starting to add alternatives, after someone has hit the checkout button, seems unwise. One wonders how many sales have been lost thanks to this practice?

Considering also now that the Dan distribution network may add even more domains to the system, this may make it even harder for the registrant trying to sell THEIR domain in THEIR registrar marketplace. This does make one question a registrar's loyalty to their own customers, rather than to a distribution network.

Are they Registrar marketplaces becoming futile for sales? Or are there other marketplaces that clearly do not do this, and may be more effective as a Dan or AN alternative?
 
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I log in to Dan recently and see that some domains are not listed on Afternic, i do it manually, after some time it say with red Failed to List or something like this, in the (i) message shows Failed to some unknown non Compliance, I contact support they tell me this is because Trademark or other thing that infringes GD policy.
I check for trademark on those domains but I found nothing.
So now you will have such surprise from GD, to me I don't care much, in recent days my 6th sense plus my domains at Dan tells me "I FEEL SOME VOID" this tells me that there is nothing fore me at Dan and I should move them to my own website and not waste time, because I will have no sales due to GD they will decide now who sells what, like Google decides what to show in searches no matter of your SEO.
 
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I should move them to my own website

If you are only going to sell through your own website, won't you miss the opportunity to benefit from the Afternic's distribution network?
 
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If you are only going to sell through your own website, won't you miss the opportunity to benefit from the Afternic's distribution network?
I don't feel it will help, they have on me a black eye, this is when you talk too much, it is better to stay low and lick the boots of big corporations in this way you will benefit and they will help, else they will keep you at the bottom if you talk against them.
All of us have a digital profile somewhere there at the big data collectors, that digital profile has everything about you, what you wrote online, what movies you watched, how you pee etc.

If I will keep my domains at their daughters like Dan, Afternic and others which they bought out, it means that I not believe in the power of my domains.
 
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All of us have a digital profile somewhere there at the big data collectors

I don't understand what this has to do with the subject.

If I will keep my domains at their daughters like Dan, Afternic and others which they bought out, it means that I not believe in the power of my domains.

Self-confidence and stability are definitely important.

However, I still did not get an answer to my question; If a potential customer who wants to buy a domain name cannot reach your portfolio by searching on a registrar that has joined the Afternic distribution network, how do you plan to sell to that person?
 
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Can anyone recommend some good alternatives to DAN that don't have such high commission fees? DAN user interface is still nice, but Godaddy really screwed the pooch with increase on commission fees from 9% to 15% and 25% for not using their nameservers. I guess that's no surprise. Too bad DAN sold out for an exit paycheck. Bummer.

I guess Efty is in a prime spot to add DAN users like me who are looking to jump ship.

Any ideas or recommendations? Thanks!


No, really GoDaddy removed all incentive to list your names anywhere but Dan/Afternic.

If you have $20,000 in sales per year, about $10k is coming through your lander, and $10k via Afternic. So you are paying an overall commission of $3,000 ($20k * 15%).

If you decide to set up your own lander and pay no commission (just escrow fees) on $10k coming through your lander and $10k via Afternic, you are going to pay commissions of $2,500 ($10k * 25%). If you add in escrow fees and other costs you're likely going to be over the $3,000 anyway.

So for me as a creator of biix.com (where there was 2% commission and lease options), there's really no purpose for me to promote that solution to others or even use it myself. The selling points of biix was a low 2% commission, lease options, and the trust of escrow.com as opposed to Dan.com, which no one had any brand recognition with until they were bought by GoDaddy. If you can potentially get the same or higher sales by just using Afternic/Dan, then you should just be using Afternic/Dan because the savings are so nominal now by having your own lander somewhere.

Positives to solely using Afternic/Dan:

1. Afternic is a must if you are selling domains and opting for their Premium Network with instant purchase. If you aren't using it, then you are getting up to 50% less sales than you would otherwise. Some people don't like the instant purchase option, but if you look at how much more those domains are promoted, you should be opting for this feature. Their ability to make you sales without your traffic is so significant that years ago when their commission was 30%, I was happy to pay it because they made such a positive impact on my sales.

2. Leases need to be an option or you'll be losing sales. I've had a buyer recently who in no way could make a $10k purchase work, but they had a great business that they were trying to grow. After offering a lease option (for over $400 per month), it was an easy decision for him. With the ability to use the lease option at Dan, it makes the sale of your larger domains much more viable while still receiving the 15% commission rate.

3. Trust needs to be at the forefront of your plan because you don't want the trust issue to cross the mind of your buyer. I've seen people have their highest sale on one platform, then setup their own lander that had no shot at selling a high-value domain. Don't do this. Know that everything matters in your sales process.

Negatives:

Transparency
- you really don't have a lot of insight as to what deals are in discussion unless you communicate with your Afternic Account Manager. But it sounds like they have a dashboard coming that will address this as well.
 
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No, really GoDaddy removed all incentive to list your names anywhere but Dan/Afternic.

If you have $20,000 in sales per year, about $10k is coming through your lander, and $10k via Afternic. So you are paying an overall commission of $3,000 ($20k * 15%).

If you decide to set up your own lander and pay no commission (just escrow fees) on $10k coming through your lander and $10k via Afternic, you are going to pay commissions of $2,500 ($10k * 25%). If you add in escrow fees and other costs you're likely going to be over the $3,000 anyway.

So for me as a creator of biix.com (where there was 2% commission and lease options), there's really no purpose for me to promote that solution to others or even use it myself. The selling points of biix was a low 2% commission, lease options, and the trust of escrow.com as opposed to Dan.com, which no one had any brand recognition with until they were bought by GoDaddy. If you can potentially get the same or higher sales by just using Afternic/Dan, then you should just be using Afternic/Dan because the savings are so nominal now by having your own lander somewhere.

Positives to solely using Afternic/Dan:

1. Afternic is a must if you are selling domains and opting for their Premium Network with instant purchase. If you aren't using it, then you are getting up to 50% less sales than you would otherwise. Some people don't like the instant purchase option, but if you look at how much more those domains are promoted, you should be opting for this feature. Their ability to make you sales without your traffic is so significant that years ago when their commission was 30%, I was happy to pay it because they made such a positive impact on my sales.

2. Leases need to be an option or you'll be losing sales. I've had a buyer recently who in no way could make a $10k purchase work, but they had a great business that they were trying to grow. After offering a lease option (for over $400 per month), it was an easy decision for him. With the ability to use the lease option at Dan, it makes the sale of your larger domains much more viable while still receiving the 15% commission rate.

3. Trust needs to be at the forefront of your plan because you don't want the trust issue to cross the mind of your buyer. I've seen people have their highest sale on one platform, then setup their own lander that had no shot at selling a high-value domain. Don't do this. Know that everything matters in your sales process.

Negatives:

Transparency
- you really don't have a lot of insight as to what deals are in discussion unless you communicate with your Afternic Account Manager. But it sounds like they have a dashboard coming that will address this as well.
What are your thoughts on using Afternic's Premium (Fast Transfer) Network vs using Afternic's regular (non Fast Transfer) network? How much difference do you think it makes to the bottom line?
 
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What are your thoughts on using Afternic's Premium (Fast Transfer) Network vs using Afternic's regular (non Fast Transfer) network? How much difference do you think it makes to the bottom line?

I'd say it is extremely significant. The process has changed throughout the years so it's always important to test what your customer sees, but anytime I've checked the alternate process, it's not one I would choose.

If you have some Ultra Premium domains that you don't want to list as fast-transfer, just don't price those domains or disable the fast-transfer option for those domains. But for the majority of my domains, I would include this option. If you are at a registrar like Epik who no longer supports this, I would move your domains as quick as you can. I pushed Rob to enable this for Epik many years ago, and basically said if it wasn't enabled I was leaving because of the sales decline I experienced firsthand. He was able to get it up within 1-2 months after our conversation, which I appreciated, but since fast-transfer is no longer allowed with Epik due to a policy change by Afternic, I've been moving my domains as fast as I can out of there.

Once setup the non-fast transfer pages will look like this at GoDaddy. Instead of "Buy Now" you get a "Get It" button. That takes you to GoDaddy auctions where the customer is also presented with an offer minimum ($28,925) unrelated to anything I've setup. You don't want them to see an offer box, and this offer box containing a price under my asking price probably just killed all chances of me getting the full value for this domain.



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Once setup the fast transfer pages will look like this at GoDaddy. It has a "Buy Now" button that takes you directly to the shopping cart. There are no offer boxes displayed and no offer amount that is lower than your asking price.


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For external sites, it just gets worse. For Register.com for instance, where you'll probably be getting a decent amount of premium buyers purchasing (due to being price insensitive purchasers), it doesn't even show your domain for sale if you don't opt into the fast-transfer option. I think this was different in the past, but the few that I've checked now don't even show your domain for sale.


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So strange. Why would GoDaddy do it this way?

I'm still torn on the Fast Transfer thing but I really appreciate your info. Very helpful. Thank you! 👍
 
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