Dynadot

My journey with BrandBucket (and why I'm leaving them)

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BrandVenue

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I have joined BB in the beginning of 2016. Started with only a less than 15 names just to give it a try. Within a couple months I sold one domain (May 2016 to be exact). After that sale I took BrandBucket seriously and listed 250+ names over the years, mostly hand registered domains. That was the time when BB acceptance rate was only around 20%. So I had to submit 100 domains to get 20 of them approved. Unlike now that was the time when submitting unregistered domains wasn't allowed.

For almost a year I had no sale so I sold some of my hand registered domains to other BB sellers here at Namepros. Mostly because I was not getting my 2nd sale, renewals were coming due, I wasn't sure what my next move would be if I didn't have another sale.

My 2nd sale came exactly 1 year after my first sale. After my 2nd sale I have been regularly selling one domain every month or two on BB. With each of these sale I came to realize the importance of quality over quantity. Because on BrandBucket I was only selling the names I bought from auctions. But my portfolio was filled with so many hand registered names. I wasn't so lucky to sell a single hand registered domain there.

For this reason I had changed my strategy. With the profits of each sale I bought domains from auctions. I sold off nearly all my hand registered domains from my BB portfolio to other BB sellers, kept only a few which I really like and filled my portfolio with domains bought from auctions.

Currently I have 138 domains and 70%-80% of those are domains bought for XX, XXX and XXXX figures from auctions. I have stopped hand registering domains long time ago.

Total sold : 8 domains
Total Revenue: $26K (average $3.2K)
Total Net proceeds: $18.3K (average $2.2K)

My dashboard says 3.82% sell through rate, with being top 13% of sellers.

I consider myself pretty successful on BB. But despite that I have decided to leave BB. Why?

Over my journey I have watched BB inventory grow from 20K+ domains to 50K+ domains. But quality of the names did not grow with the same pace. Nowadays BB accepts every kind of domains which would have never been accepted in 2015/16.

At first it was good to repeat last letter of a domain like Domainn , then they started to accept repeated letters anywhere on the word like large_faabric.png and large_fabriic_0.png .

Even though at this point I thought they wouldn't approve repeating first letter of a domain, but after seeing large_llanza_0.png it's clear that in upcoming days we will see more of this kind first letter repeated domains.

I knew BB only publish pronounceable 4 letter domains but large_vmzi.png large_zrze.png ?

I thought removing one vowel like Tunnl (I've sold this one on BB) instead of Tunnel was good but removing 3 vowel? large_nwslttr.png

And the last one which I saw today is large_outsoursd.png

in the description it says - A clever spelling of "outsourced". The domain is Out/Soursd, S not C. if it was OutSourcd I'd understand why BB accepted it - they removed the last vowel of correct spelling OutSourced but why would they accept or publish a domain like Out/Soursd?

After seeing this name I have said myself enough is enough. I can't have my domains, most of which were bought from auctions for substantial amount of money compete with these kind of names. One thing is clear BB is ignoring quality issue, they now believe in quantity over quality which is against my point of view. So I've decided to leave BrandBucket.

When they were getting good number of sales they would highlight that in their newsletters, but they've stopped publishing any kind of sale related info which suggests their sale rate also dropping.

I did not have any intention to go against any other BB sellers (especially those whose domains I've mentioned here). I only blame BB for their decision to move to quantity over quality strategy. I am not saying these domains I've mentioned here won't sell, they might sell. But BB has proved that we may see more unpronounceable 4 letter domains (even CHIPS too) in future, we may see more first letter repeated domains in future, we may also see more domains like large_outsoursd.png in future.

All these suggests BB inventory will grow rapidly in the future and my small portfolio of domains will be like a small water drop of a ocean, chances of selling a name there through buyer using search option doesn't look bright anymore.

I've sent them 30 days notice to remove my names. It's been a good journey.
 
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The views expressed on this page by users and staff are their own, not those of NamePros.
Yes, brandables are subjective and I respect your opinion on the current letter dropping trends. You are not the first person, amateur or professional, to criticize trends in startup names. A lot of people are scratching their heads. :)

2018 TechCrunch - Startups are Still Making Weird Choices.

2014 Time - Seven Silly Tech Company Naming Trends

2013 The Atlantic -- The Pitfalls of the Clever.ly Named Startup


BTW if you know of any good keywords that are available to register without vowels, please send them to me via private message. I'd like to register them. I'm serious about this. I've looked and I can't find anything that's 7 letters or less (after the vowels have been removed). So I would really be interested if you come across any. Thanks!

PS they need to be CVCVC...... only one vowel between the consonants for them to work.

Thanks again for putting into words your experience and insights. Much appreciated!
 
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One thing I would like to add about is deteriorating logo quality.

A couple of my domain logos were so bad, I was looking at them in disbelief.

They looked liked made from random online word art generators that kids use in completing their school projects.

I always use $100 logos. Not sure if it is intentional on their part to push us on more costly logos.
 
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BTW if you know of any good keywords that are available to register without vowels, please send them to me via private message. I'd like to register them. I'm serious about this. I've looked and I can't find anything that's 7 letters or less (after the vowels have been removed). So I would really be interested if you come across any. Thanks!

PS they need to be CVCVC...... only one vowel between the consonants for them to work.

Thanks again for putting into words your experience and insights. Much appreciated!

Spent some time and found a few. Don't know if they are good keywords as 'good' in brandable is subjective.

bckrdr - backorder
bcklght - backlight
bcksd - backside
brrwng - borrowing
rctnglr - rectangular
trnsplnt - transplant
snsbl - sensible

similar to Mndfl
hndfl - handful
delghtfl - delightful

As per dynadot search they are all available. Sorry that I wrote here and didn't send via pm as I didn't want to move our public conversation to private.
 
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Some of those are compound words which wouldn't meet BB criteria (in my experience they don't accept mutations of compound words like backorderr, backordr etc) but others are interesting. Thanks!
 
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I kinda agree on the lack of quality. However, I have found higher number of crappy names on other brandable marketplace.

Where will you list your domains now?
 
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I kinda agree on the lack of quality. However, I have found higher number of crappy names on other brandable marketplace.

Where will you list your domains now?

My own landers. Why? The search is a rigged system on BB, and I keep all the money for myself ;)
 
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My own landers. Why? The search is a rigged system on BB, and I keep all the money for myself ;)

Well, I do have names that can sell on their own but I also have some great made up words that I believe will be hard to sell outside of a brandable marketplace.
 
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There are at least 3 other brandable marketplaces. Namerific, BrandRoot, Brandpa. But I cannot tell you if they are better or worse morally corrupt than BrandBucket. But BB would not be easy to beat, in those stakes. Perhaps these others, just fly under the radar :)

It would be nice to see a comparative review of all four.
 
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@stub i am hoping someone can run a non-biased review of the top 3(bb,bp,br) basically namerific is dead so need.

Where is grill?:xf.grin:

Drops mic..B-)
 
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@stub i am hoping someone can run a non-biased review of the top 3(bb,bp,br) basically namerific is dead so need.

Where is grill?:xf.grin:

Drops mic..B-)

I'm kinda curious why you say Namerific is dead? But not BR?
 
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@stub i have friends on Br selling names..while namerific seems like a graveyard:xf.eek:. Right now we are talking about serious people and namerific isnt on that list . BB, BP, BR

So thats how i see it.
:xf.grin:
 
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Just take a look at alexa ranking. Numbers don’t lie. Bb BR are close BP is growing
 
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Am thinking of listing my domains on brandbucket.
 
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Alexa Ranking doesn't mean very much. Unfortunately. It's skewed to those people who have Alexa in the browser. Which I would suggest, is highly limited.
 
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New experience, flippa is just a waste of time, if you don't have money for upgrades.
 
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bb is the leader in selling brandables domain name.
 
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bb is the leader in selling brandables domain name.

It sounds like your mind is already made up :) For the same reason people flock to GoDaddy for Registrations and Hosting.
 
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It sounds like your mind is already made up :) For the same reason people flock to GoDaddy for Registrations and Hosting.
For new purchase I always use godaddy, but for hosting I use bluehost.
 
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/ edit!
 
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@stub i have friends on Br selling names..while namerific seems like a graveyard:xf.eek:. Right now we are talking about serious people and namerific isnt on that list . BB, BP, BR

So thats how i see it.
:xf.grin:
How is Namerific a "graveyard?" They keep accepting new names and are pretty fast at filtering the good from the bad. Just visit the site to see each one they add each day. They also show which ones they've recently sold. If there's one that I personally find to be a graveyard, it's Brandroot. Brandroot does not even let you create an account right now. I read in another thread that they have a waiting list of several months before sellers get notified of their account status. Like, lol. As if they're the only game in town. If they're "too busy" to accept your domains, try their competitors. Namerific will let you know whether or not they accept your domains. Aside from brandBucket and Namerific, Brandpa is also active in accepting sellers and their domains. Here's my thorough review of the Big 3: nametaster.com (check the blog). yes, my site is still a draft until I get something better...
 
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How is Namerific a "graveyard?" They keep accepting new names and are pretty fast at filtering the good from the bad. Just visit the site to see each one they add each day. They also show which ones they've recently sold. If there's one that I personally find to be a graveyard, it's Brandroot. Brandroot does not even let you create an account right now. I read in another thread that they have a waiting list of several months before sellers get notified of their account status. Like, lol. As if they're the only game in town. If they're "too busy" to accept your domains, try their competitors. Namerific will let you know whether or not they accept your domains. Aside from brandBucket and Namerific, Brandpa is also active in accepting sellers and their domains. Here's my thorough review of the Big 3: nametaster.com (check the blog). yes, my site is still a draft until I get something better...

@farouk20 I'll copy you in since you were also part of that thread and I feel like @Namerific deserves a more positive review.
 
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