discuss Afternic results in steady downtrend - now flatlining for months

[Dot Com Realty]

Hey all. Been domaining for 17 years, and Afternic has been a solid platform all this time. Well, except for the last year. I had 17 sales in 2017, and 22 in 2018, but only 12 last year. And nothing whatsoever in the last four months. This is far beyond the standard deviation from normal. I have been re-investing 150% of profits into higher quality and more names - happy to run negative cash flow to build a solid portfolio. I expected about 30 to 40 sales last year - this would have been normal based on my experience. Most of my names are priced right at the Godaddy appraised price - which has always been the sweet spot. My premiums are more and I have no interest in selling them, and I don't factor in my premiums into my bread and butter sales.

Brandbucket has died. In my experience with them in the last 4 years, they do about .05% sell-through rate at best.
Brandpa - only been with them for a year and have 60 names - priced up to $75k max. Zero percent sell through rate.
Squadhelp - Extremely happy with them. Three sales - mid to high four figures with a 10% sell through rate.
Efty - great guys running this, but just get lots of spam. Hard to get traffic stats with the goog anal system
Dan.com - Seems a clean platform - moved 150 names over recently. Like the traffic stats.

Would welcome any comments, suggestions, experiences and stats to share.

 

[poweredbyme]

Just an update. So I moved about 600 names over to N3 landers at afternic a few weeks ago. STILL nothing but crickets. It is now six months with no sales here. And again, I have not changed my system or pricing and have had tons of sales over the last 12 years. Clearly their changes is the cause. Only difference is that I have more and higher quality names, and my pricing is low.

Now with these landers, afternic keeps you in the dark with traffic. They have the data but refuse to share it. Why would that be I wonder. So, now going to ditch them.

Unireg? Dan? I need to have traffic stats at least. Any suggestions?

You have to host your domains if you want full stats. If you love their design you may try hosting their landing page embedded under frame if framing is not prevented by http header response. So you could watch your server stats and could likely add anything you want including statcounter-analytics codes. I haven't tried it. I think marketplaces would not be happy if you successfully took some control over your own domains. They would likely want to punish you for this. I would not bother with their landing pages for aesthetic-cosmetic concerns. I don't think good design is important. Frankly, I also don't get the importance of stats. I would want to host my own landing page just to have full control over my own domains. Full control would help more than stats especially in selling high quality domains.

 

[garptrader]

Domain sales can be sporadic - months can pass with no sales whatsoever and then a couple of sales can occur in a short timeframe. No doubt people are spending more time indoors than normal and many businesses have been adversely affected by the corona pandemic. I look forward to being able to go back to the gym or watch a football game at a local sports bar or go to a movie with my wife. But in the last few days I have had three sales - one low $xxx, one high $xxx (the $xxx sales are though Afternic) and another much higher going through Escrow currently. We'll see what happens in the coming weeks.

 

[Dot Com Realty]

Yeah, thanks. I would just like to see how many people land there. And I think the aftermarket platforms have ugly landing pages, but if they can field the lowballers it is fine with me. Also, a theory which I believe, is that some people like to be able to talk to a human and have their hand held going through the process.

I am negotiating one now through Afternic. Probably settle in at $800. Got the name on Ebay for $60 a few months ago, so will just take it.

I think I will try another platform, maybe Uni or Dan. I will probably pull my top tier and tier 2 and create landers, and then throw the bulk to the best aftermarket.