Thank you for you comments and your opinion.
With all due respect, Sedo is a business, and the same as any other business the intention is to generate revenue for providing a service. We operate similar to other businesses where we offer optional promotional services, increasing the visibility and the chances of the listing selling. All sellers can list domains on our standard marketplace for free and they can stay there for as long as they take to sell. Only if a domain sells would we charge a commission on the standard marketplace.
We don't charge customers for every service, we offer free services to our customers including marketplace auctions, should a seller wish to auction a domain for free, this can be initiated after receiving an offer from a buyer. We have recently completely dropped the 60 USD/EURO minimum commission fee via a promotion meaning sellers can earn twice as much commission with lower valued sales as previously and as I previously stated we offer free listings on our standard marketplace. Currently we are also offering free applications to our Great Domains auction and from time to time we run special auction events which are also free to apply for. Our sales team charge a fee for the buyer side brokerage service, this is because despite their efforts to purchase a domain, negotiations can fall through or may not be reached which could be due to the buyer or the seller, and not due to the brokers work. As you can appreciate, if you are hiring a specialist broker to buy any product for you, then for the time, research and expertise of that broker a payment is required. If using our brokerage service to sell a domain, then there is no contracting fee for this service, so if the domain can not be sold by the broker, then no commission fee is charged.
With regards to your comments about forcing customers to buy appraisals, we do not force any customers to purchase an appraisal, but lets be honest, there has to be some kind of limit to how much sellers can list their domains for on our platform, to keep a certain level of credibility. This is why we have the 50000 limit, a company decision to improve the integrity of the marketplace. If a seller has a domain that they believe is valued at more than 50000 then they can still list the domain as Make Offer with a minimum offer of 50000 and counter-offer with an amount of over 50000, should they receive an offer on the domain. There is no cost for this.
Concerning your last comment about 'crappy domains' and Homepage showcases, I can assure you that domains you may consider to be worthless are in fact worth something to someone else, while they may not sell for excessive high amounts, from time to time, they do sell and more often or not, lots of these sales are generated from our Homepage showcases: which proves that this method is effective in selling domains. More often than not, one time users of Sedo who may not know exactly what they are looking for will first review domains which are listed on the Homepage for inspiration and ideas, and may even end up purchasing a domain there, building their new company brand around the domain they buy.
I hope you can change your mind about Sedo, and I hope this comment will show that we do indeed offer free services. I wish you every success with your domaining. If you want to speak with me about any of the above services then feel free to contact me Chris directly on 0049 221 340 30 230 or email
[email protected] and I will be happy to go through the options with you.