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tips A few tips / info for December 2022 (and 2023 - Going forward)

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twiki

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- Been asked how my sales are going lately.

My sales have been growing a lot in November/ start of December after the September - October slump. Year turned out very good overall, its early December and I've already hit yearly target. Had several sales between $2.5K and $6K. Smallest ones have been at $1.7k.

Tip, don't underprice - especially now. Keep prices up as these are top months. It's your chance to recover if things went slow after this summer.

- In fact , I'd recommend you to always increase your prices gradually. Everything else is more expensive. Why should domains be any cheaper?

Besides, with growing domain cost and insane auction prices, and DC / SN going rogue over drops, the math doesn't check out if you decrease your prices.

- Reducing prices to xxx range (or so) does not work like in the past in my observation. In fact discount seems to have the opposite effect. I still have $1.7k names (my weaklings) but plan to up them all to $2k minimum, or more. I've mentioned this already on NP but it is worth saying it again.

There's a long story why this happened lately but I want to keep things short in this post and yes there will be hints below as of why.

- Lately there has been an increase in Paypal scam attempts over sales on NP. New accounts, zero feedback, promise to pay via Paypal Family & Friends, and then they come up with a looong story as PP changed policy or whatnot.

Ignore any such requests, no matter what they promise. You're just wasting time. They'll always come up with a ton of reasons why you should accept (another) sneaky form of payment.

Oh, they are all very polite and with plenty of explanations... (I'm done with any of these BTW).

- I'm getting good results lately with Afternic NS3/4 landers. But there are things to be aware of.

You need to keep prices high in case there is any negotiation. Say if BIN domain price is $2k, use a 3K...3.5K price with 2k floor and perhaps $1.5K min.

I'll be switching soon to NS3/4 fully if things go like this. Side note @AbdulBasit.com was always right about NS3/4. The only real condition is, have good names - ideally $2k... $2.5K value minimum. Then set the lander and just let it roll.

Edit: - In many cases can improve your sales by a lot just upping the price somewhat. Higher prices make a higher quality impression on the buyers. Making them cheapo makes them appear as such.

- Don't mix BIN with make offer. Choose one or the other. The mix is worse, it will reduce your conversions.

- It appears there is an increase in cancellations for installments. If you ask me, stay out of installments. Side note I'm not going to use any such going forward.

- I ran a long lander test for traffic over my 5500 .COM names . The results have been surprising.

99.9% are bots. Once they are weeded out, I barely got 10 interested clicks per day over the whole 5.5K range of names. And at least half of them are good names, sold for several K usually.

So true lander traffic is extremely low in quantity; unless there is a particular reason for a given domain, say direct type-ins etc. But out of those few clicks, comes buyers. Oh, and those traffic stats? Or whois calls stats such as Epik shows? Ignore them. You're wasting time. No correlation whatsoever between traffic quantity and sales.

- Sedo is on the rise lately, brought me good sales. If you're not on Sedo, consider listing there too.

- I sold some co's so there is movement there. No show though on xyz. Although I have better xyz left. I wonder if the flame is dying out on xyz (don't see much on others either, apart from DNGear which is its own category).

- COM id king will always be king. No it's not going anywhere and didn't had its heart eaten out by ngTLDs.

- If you change landers, don't hastily change them again. You need at least 4...6 months to let them run just to make sense of what's going on.

- Don't change prices often too. This kinda resets your sales (bad).

Also at Afternic you are put back at the listing queue in Godaddy Auctions (takes 45 days from listing to get to the top of search results). Better keep prices on for say 6 months. I used to make this mistake in the past.

- Decide if you're a BIN or make offer / lead domainer. Then stick to one or the other. Again I see mixing them as affecting your performance. For mid 4-fig and above, use lead or just make offer. For below $1.5k, BIN. In between these, I'd still use lead or make offer.

- If you followed my history, I used to have a ton of BIN sales because I've been mostly a discount domainer. While it worked, in hindsight it's a mistake. I should have kept prices up (3k or more) and put a lead lander and wait for the right buyer to come.

- I see quite a gap lately in NP sales section. The gap is between offer and demand. On one hand if I want to buy there's mostly bad names or highly overpriced ones for what is a domainer to domainer market. On the other hand, I can't barely sell $2.5 K+ value names with solid applications for $20. I'm renewing most now or selling in bulk to other domainers which have the cash. There's also a lot of decrease in numbers sold although I've had increased quality at clearance sales.

Side note it's not NP's fault at all, but rather a side effect of the market status.

- Decreasing prices also doesn't help you at all for the sole reason that it's not the prices that have changed, but the demand.
There is still solid demand for top domains, but not so much on the lower tiers.

Reason is, companies with money are still purchasing strong at good pricing. But individuals and SMBs have largely dropped the towel, most likely due to dwindling cash reserves.

- Therefore, if you're into XXX range sales, you might be most affected now. In such case I'd rather up the prices and wait for those who would pay at least 1.5k for a domain - any domain. A company with reasonable interest should afford that. It's one months' pay for a worker or whatnot (even less depending on where you live).

- Match currency with where your most clients come from. USD for US, EUR for europeans.

Also on Sedo, use EUR. Sedo seems to be preferred by Europeans as far as I can tell. I've also read numerous times that EU buyers often distrust GoDaddy. This is just hearsay but my own experience also seems to match it; anyway just do your due diligence.

- Final tip, domaining is for the patient domainer. My best sales come from domains I've renewed for 3 years or more, even if at times seemed not to have much point further. It does. Don't ditch your names too soon. I have super names recently which don't sell at all (yet) simply because it is too soon. Set a price, forget, enable auto-renew, and good luck.

Disclaimer: These tips won't apply to everyone else as each domainer is different, portfolios are different. So don't throw shoes at me if I appear as being teacherly to you here or whatnot. I'm not (being that). I don't have the entire truth but just one view over things.

I'm just sharing what I learned.

Good luck there.
 
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@twiki

I made a test and you are right after I changed the price my domain went down in the search list at GD Auctions. I wonder how end users end up at GD Auctions!

Also I have noticed that the time left (at domain auction details page) is sometime more than 45 it can be 70 days or more .
 
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@twiki

I made a test and you are right after I changed the price my domain went down in the search list at GD Auctions. I wonder how end users end up at GD Auctions!

Also I have noticed that the time left (at domain auction details page) is sometime more than 45 it can be 70 days or more .
For me it always has been 45 days - but who knows, you might be right. Have to verify that.
 
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For me it always has been 45 days - but who knows, you might be right. Have to verify that.
For me, the domains I have listed on GoDaddy have a 90 day cycle.
 
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For me, the domains I have listed on GoDaddy have a 90 day cycle.

Oh great. I have just destroyed my January sales. It's no longer 45 days.

It appears that all my domains now have an 80 day cycle or something, currently at day 78. So I just lost months of being in top results.

Takeway: Verify all via GD Auctions and don't bloody touch them.
 
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@twiki What do you mean by "verify"?
 
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@twiki What do you mean by "verify"?
Verify how many days you have left for your listing. And do not change price until it passes again to the bottom.

Edit: My GD Auctions BIN listing cycle has now changed from 45 to 90 days for reasons I don't know. Anyway will have to wait a month or more until will see good sales again as I changed my pricing mid-January, unknowingly of the listing duration change.

Just asked my Afternic rep where did that come from, awaiting a reply.
 
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This is most interesting topic I've seen on NP in quite some time. Thanks @twiki - this is a solid tip.

That said, I went to GoDaddy auctions and all my domains appear without an end time. I'm listed on Afternic with Buy It Now pricing, and all my names appear on GoDaddy auctions but there is no end time listed.

Is there anything in particular you all are doing to make your names have an end time?
 
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This is most interesting topic I've seen on NP in quite some time. Thanks @twiki - this is a solid tip

Thanks, happy to help.

This is not new though, I have posted about it before.

That said, I went to GoDaddy auctions and all my domains appear without an end time. I'm listed on Afternic with Buy It Now pricing, and all my names appear on GoDaddy auctions but there is no end time listed.

Is there anything in particular you all are doing to make your names have an end time?
No. Always had such ending time.

Maybe it does not appear to you for some reason but it still exists. It makes sense for GD to have one. Listing rotation.
 
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No. Always had such ending time.

Maybe it does not appear to you for some reason but it still exists. It makes sense for GD to have one. Listing rotation.

Thanks for getting back to me. My domains absolutely do not have an end time - screenshot below. This is just one name, but all of my names appear this way.

R0mKnVv.png


There's a lot of other domains in their search results that also don't have an end time. Would love to understand the differences.
 
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Thanks for getting back to me. My domains absolutely do not have an end time - screenshot below. This is just one name, but all of my names appear this way.

R0mKnVv.png


There's a lot of other domains in their search results that also don't have an end time. Would love to understand the differences.

* Click on the domain then click "Domain details page" on the right:

11.jpg



* You will go to this page:

22.jpg


This is my domain it has 49 days left. When it reaches 1 day it resets to 90 days (I think).
 
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Oh great. I have just destroyed my January sales. It's no longer 45 days.

It appears that all my domains now have an 80 day cycle or something, currently at day 78. So I just lost months of being in top results.

Takeway: Verify all via GD Auctions and don't bloody touch them.
Mine have always been 90 days. At least since 2016. I used to think that I had to delete them and relist them when they got to 0 days, but finally realized that they just went back to 90 days once they rolled through 0.
 
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@twiki, thanks for the informative post once again. I wanted to ask you what was the reason you left the brandable marketplaces. You may have detailed this somewhere and I possibly missed it before. I know for you Afternic landers work the best, and I guess now you are even better off with the 15% commission. Anything else you would mention that made you removing names?
 
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@twiki, thanks for the informative post once again. I wanted to ask you what was the reason you left the brandable marketplaces. You may have detailed this somewhere and I possibly missed it before. I know for you Afternic landers work the best, and I guess now you are even better off with the 15% commission. Anything else you would mention that made you removing names?

I'd rather not do that in-depth. It's my personal view over SH so it's not a general thing to be aware of.

Quick overview, there are many issues for me, one being, they control the price. That doesn't appeal to me. And I did not have great sales with them.

But there are others as well.
 
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I'd rather not do that in-depth. It's my personal view over SH so it's not a general thing to be aware of.

Quick overview, there are many issues for me, one being, they control the price. That doesn't appeal to me. And I did not have great sales with them.

But there are others as well.
Hey, Twiki, I don't like SH either by the way. Seems too random and probably there is some sort of algorithm bias towards specific portfolios since the customers actively looking to buy.

How's it it going with your sales in 2023? Do you still have 5000 names, cos I see you are selling/ dropping loads of names (that I would not revew either)..
 
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Hey, Twiki, I don't like SH either by the way. Seems too random and probably there is some sort of algorithm bias towards specific portfolios since the customers actively looking to buy.

How's it it going with your sales in 2023? Do you still have 5000 names, cos I see you are selling/ dropping loads of names (that I would not revew either)..

I have renewed some of the names. (few that are better)

But the fact that you would not renew them is not relevant, to be honest (sorry to be frank).

It has become clear to me that only a couple of domainers here have a similar eye. We're different and I'm in a special stack, pretty lonely one. Have you encountered many full drop regs domainer around?

Anyway some of the guys I sold such names to are doing quite well; I estimated they make more money than me.

But I agree many of those are indeed too far of a stretch. That's why I am dropping them of course. But they used to sell well though until mid 2022 as everyone could see. Not anymore - since then. Things have sharply changed right in the middle of 2022. Side note I'm also not posting anything anymore for sale on NP. $7..$9 per domain? not worth my time.

January has been weak, I've probably broken even or so. But September and October were worse; I made losses then. After that, I recovered in November in December so the year was overall decent.

February started with one sale, I'm confident so far.

There are fluctuations and other factors influencing sales, such as the issues I had with the 90-day listing cycle of GD auctions which basically has reset my January sales.

I'm alright, making a better portfolio but that will take 1-2 years.

I'm still at 5k names but I estimate next year around this time I will be around 2k names left.
 
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@twiki

I checked some domains that I repriced few days ago, non of them got reset to 90 days, they are between 19D to 57D.

Maybe they removed the reset effect?
 
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@twiki

I checked some domains that I repriced few days ago, non of them got reset to 90 days, they are between 19D to 57D.

Maybe they removed the reset effect?
@twiki

I checked some domains that I repriced few days ago, non of them got reset to 90 days, they are between 19D to 57D.

Maybe they removed the reset effect?
Maybe. I really don't know.

Indeed it hasn't happened lately which is baffling.

Perhaps all it takes is a bad upload or something if reconcile option is used... And / or Afternic occasional weekend unannounced maintenance... Have no idea.

But it used to reset like clockwork if you changed prices.
 
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I'm alright, making a better portfolio but that will take 1-2 years.

I'm still at 5k names but I estimate next year around this time I will be around 2k names left.

I have renewed some of the names. (few that are better)

But the fact that you would not renew them is not relevant, to be honest (sorry to be frank).

It has become clear to me that only a couple of domainers here have a similar eye. We're different and I'm in a special stack, pretty lonely one. Have you encountered many full drop regs domainer around?

Anyway some of the guys I sold such names to are doing quite well; I estimated they make more money than me.

But I agree many of those are indeed too far of a stretch. That's why I am dropping them of course. But they used to sell well though until mid 2022 as everyone could see. Not anymore - since then. Things have sharply changed right in the middle of 2022. Side note I'm also not posting anything anymore for sale on NP. $7..$9 per domain? not worth my time.

January has been weak, I've probably broken even or so. But September and October were worse; I made losses then. After that, I recovered in November in December so the year was overall decent.

February started with one sale, I'm confident so far.

There are fluctuations and other factors influencing sales, such as the issues I had with the 90-day listing cycle of GD auctions which basically has reset my January sales.

I'm alright, making a better portfolio but that will take 1-2 years.

I'm still at 5k names but I estimate next year around this time I will be around 2k names left.

2K seems reasonable in terms of quality and renewal cost. 5K is about 4000 dollars for renewals on average per month and you need 7000 dollars sales per month to cover tax and have some profit, which doesn't sound realistic nowadays. You actually need around 10000 dollars sales each month, but anyway.
 
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2K seems reasonable in terms of quality and renewal cost. 5K is about 4000 dollars for renewals on average per month and you need 7000 dollars sales per month to cover tax and have some profit, which doesn't sound realistic nowadays. You actually need around 10000 dollars sales each month, but anyway.
That's not the issue - rolling budget.

The issue is: 1) management effort, and 2) margin.

Since sales ratio has decreased in 2022, I focus on increasing the margin. Which means better names, but more expensive overall.
 
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Perhaps all it takes is a bad upload or something if reconcile option is used... And / or Afternic occasional weekend unannounced maintenance... Have no idea.

There is a posbility that when using reconcile option Afternic remove all domains and add them again from the excel file, and thus they become newly listed with 90 days left!
 
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There is a posbility that when using reconcile option Afternic remove all domains and add them again from the excel file, and thus they become newly listed with 90 days left!

It used to do that consistently; but only if you changed pricing.

But now it doesn't cause this anymore, which is some relief. As I accidentally checked it twice already (old habits die hard...) and yet, no changes in the listing cycle.

Indeed if you upload a broken file, all listings will be removed; then at the next upload they will be uploaded with 90 days term. So my monies are on some error occurring on upload that caused this for me lately and ruined my January sales.

This doesn't mean though it might not happen occasionally, just that I've yet to determine what exactly caused (or still causes?) it.

Anyway, I'm not going to use reconcile anymore. Will send my rep a weekly list of domains to take down and he'll be happy to remove them.
 
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2023 seems to match my expectations so far. (with good and bad as well)

Domain sales are going by in a more or less steady way, without any sign of significant disturbance or significant recovery (might vary depending on your portfolio).

The stock market is on a bullish feeling but without major reasons to. Guess they are eager for some profits, I hope they are right on that (as that will mean some sales for us as well despite not directly related).

So far Tech hasn't dropped further in 2023, which we hope means recovery . Probably the contrary, there's some recovery now, S&P 500 has grown almost 8% and NASDAQ has grown 15%. Good signs but there are still a lot of underlying issues looming. Domain sales haven't yet caught up with that growth as far as I can tell.

Binance has just stopped withdrawals in USD, which doesn't have a big market share BUT it a is concerning sign, as no explanation has been offered. Might mean further turmoil in crypto. I'd bet on another decline of bitcoin and therefore low sales of such domains for a bit. Edit: Personal opinion, I wouldn't trust them with my sats even if I had just one to put there.

The FED and also ECB, BOE are poised to further increase rates and therefore loans will get more expensive and fewer, people are to lose jobs despite current peak (actually it seems people having jobs is a bad thing for these institutions! ) so anyway this increase goes further. To stop inflation they have created by printing money, people (including us) have to suffer. Including the payments on my own loans - doubled now.

Anyway. Uncontrolled inflation would be likely much worse so... it is what it is.

Personal note: I've had a (sort-of) break even January but I also messed up my listings at Afternic by accident and also did some general pricing readjustment, so it was expected.

January isn't much of a trend though (I mean anually). Expecting better results in the second half of the month, as springtime approaching might kick people into some buying action. Side note if you haven't had sales in 2023, don't worry. There are wild fluctuations from month to month and even quarter to quarter.

Like they said in the movie, what do we have here. 3.6 Roentgen, not great, but also not terrible.

That's 2022 so far if you ask me.
 
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