Bad Experience with Bodis

[Zeeble Domains]

I am not very active in domain forums, but I thought it important to write about my recent experience with Bodis, as it may be relevant to other domain investors (and particularly ones that have the same kind of domains we do) when considering Bodis for parking.

My company has been investing in domains since 2014, mostly new gTLDs. We own a large portfolio of them, mostly the kind where the left-of-the-dot keyword and the right-of-the-dot extension together form meaningful keywords (examples: military.equipment, nurse.shoes, snow.shoes, etc.).

We have been using Bodis since 2017, directing hundreds of our domains there. About two weeks ago, I noticed that I could no longer log in to our Bodis account. I opened a support chat and spoke with Troy, who told me that Bodis decided to close our account because one of our domains received a one-day spike in traffic, which Bodis interpreted as us “actively promoting and/or driving referral traffic to our ads”.

Anyone who has invested in our kind of new gTLD left+right “keyword” domains probably knows that some of them occasionally receive temporary spikes in traffic, which are in most cases caused by a combination of the proximity of the dot to the space bar in smartphones, together with most social networks converting these types of mistakes to links. So, for example, if a Twitter user with many followers makes this kind of mistake, the corresponding domain will probably receive a big temporary boost in visits. Here is a random example from Twitter I found by doing a quick search:

https://twitter.com/x/status/1261927532963618816

(in this example, if this particular user had a lot of followers, the corresponding domain would have most likely received a 1-2 day boost in traffic).

I explained to Troy that some of our domains are prone to this kind of spikes, and he agreed to escalate the issue for reconsideration. In the meantime, I tried to search Twitter and other social networks to see if I could find the source of this particular spike, but I was not successful.

Two weeks later, Troy replied that after review, their decision stands. They would not even consider reactivating the account without the domain that had the spike.

Here is what I think Bodis did wrong:

1. Assuming that we were actively promoting and driving traffic to their ads (which we would never do), and then canceling the account without even speaking to us first.
2. Not even notifying us that the account was canceled. For who knows how long, hundreds of our domains resolved to a Bodis error page. We may have missed potential leads.

On a positive note, Troy was cordial, helped me escalate the case, and later provided a historical traffic/earnings report for the domains we had pointed to Bodis. I do appreciate his efforts and positive attitude.

 

[jk23]

I'll share my experience with Bodis... I've been a customer of bodis for 5+ years. Up until a couple of years ago, I never paid much attention to domain parking and never put much thought or effort into it. Then, a couple of years ago, I read the post on NP, "Why Domain Parking Works For Me". So, after reading that, I was pretty inspired and I decided to give domain parking a real shot. At the time, I was making next to nothing.

After a lot of time, money, and trial and error I started to figure out what domains to buy that would be profitable for parking. I would still make mistakes, and buy domains that would not earn anything. But after some time, I was making a pretty decent profit. In May of last year my revenue was just under $9500.

In early June I reached out to Bodis customer service to inquire why my cpc/rpm had suddenly started to plummet. This did not seem like the typical summer slow down. Troy, from Bodis replied, "we've detected that a substantial percentage of your overall ad clicks were in fact coming from the same Apple Mac devices, that have been using a Cloudflare proxies to falsely inflate your click volume" and "a very substantial amount of false ad clicking was being undertaken through use of the iCloud Private Relay network for the purpose of obfuscation."

He also informed me that they would be closing my account and they would not be paying me what I was owed for the prior month, which as I mentioned, was just under $9500.

Needless to say, I was pretty surprised and disappointed. Not only did I not do what I was being accused of, I also had no idea how to do any of what they were accusing me of. I'm not an overly technical person and I'm not familiar with cloudflare proxies or the icloud private relay network.

I was as careful as I could be with the domains I was buying. They were not what I considered to be risky. I never had any issue in the two plus years I had been actively buying domains for parking. Yes, I could have mistakenly purchased a domain with bad links or whatever. Why would I had never done it before? Why would I risk it? There was not a domain that stood out that was getting unreasonable clicks or revenue. I also found it interesting that Bodis made this discovery, at the very end of the month, when they owed me the absolute most money possible.

I don't like posting this type of stuff. But, I think it's wrong how Bodis handled it and I think others should know the risk with who they are dealing with.

 

[Bertrell]

I'll share my experience with Bodis... I've been a customer of bodis for 5+ years. Up until a couple of years ago, I never paid much attention to domain parking and never put much thought or effort into it. Then, a couple of years ago, I read the post on NP, "Why Domain Parking Works For Me". So, after reading that, I was pretty inspired and I decided to give domain parking a real shot. At the time, I was making next to nothing.

After a lot of time, money, and trial and error I started to figure out what domains to buy that would be profitable for parking. I would still make mistakes, and buy domains that would not earn anything. But after some time, I was making a pretty decent profit. In May of last year my revenue was just under $9500.

In early June I reached out to Bodis customer service to inquire why my cpc/rpm had suddenly started to plummet. This did not seem like the typical summer slow down. Troy, from Bodis replied, "we've detected that a substantial percentage of your overall ad clicks were in fact coming from the same Apple Mac devices, that have been using a Cloudflare proxies to falsely inflate your click volume" and "a very substantial amount of false ad clicking was being undertaken through use of the iCloud Private Relay network for the purpose of obfuscation."

He also informed me that they would be closing my account and they would not be paying me what I was owed for the prior month, which as I mentioned, was just under $9500.

Needless to say, I was pretty surprised and disappointed. Not only did I not do what I was being accused of, I also had no idea how to do any of what they were accusing me of. I'm not an overly technical person and I'm not familiar with cloudflare proxies or the icloud private relay network.

I was as careful as I could be with the domains I was buying. They were not what I considered to be risky. I never had any issue in the two plus years I had been actively buying domains for parking. Yes, I could have mistakenly purchased a domain with bad links or whatever. Why would I had never done it before? Why would I risk it? There was not a domain that stood out that was getting unreasonable clicks or revenue. I also found it interesting that Bodis made this discovery, at the very end of the month, when they owed me the absolute most money possible.

I don't like posting this type of stuff. But, I think it's wrong how Bodis handled it and I think others should know the risk with who they are dealing with.

I'll simply say this: I believe you, and thanks for sharing your experience. Sorry you didn't get your payout. The timing of your account being closed--as well as the explanation given from the company--were indeed Interesting AF.

 

[LoveCatchyDomains]

In early June I reached out to Bodis customer service to inquire why my cpc/rpm had suddenly started to plummet. This did not seem like the typical summer slow down. Troy, from Bodis replied, "we've detected that a substantial percentage of your overall ad clicks were in fact coming from the same Apple Mac devices, that have been using a Cloudflare proxies to falsely inflate your click volume" and "a very substantial amount of false ad clicking was being undertaken through use of the iCloud Private Relay network for the purpose of obfuscation."

Sorry to hear about your frustrating situation. Did you ask Bodis if this was happening even before you purchased the domain for parking? If so, could you demand that the domain seller refund you for the sale.

Alterntively, if the dubious activity started solely after your domain purchase and parking with Bodis , would it merit more investigation on your part? Could someone else have tried to undermine your parking revenue business? Concerns have been raised on NP in the past, about the potential sabotage of profitable parking domains by others.

Bodis is very strict in their policies. One would hope in the future that they could alert a domain owner promptly about any unusual activity. That could prompt action before significant potential parking revenue is lost and one is banned from their platform---even if the prohibited activity was not your fault.

Finally, did you consider reaching out to Cloudflare directly, to further investigate? If you wish to continue in the domain parking arena, would it make sense to have them help clear your name? While Bodis still might not be an option, perhaps other parking services would be more receptive if Cloudflare provides a forensic analysis that plausiby clears your name? Or perhaps there are other computer security companies that, for a fee, would provide such servces?

 

[Bertrell]

if Cloudflare provides a forensic analysis that plausiby clears your name? Or perhaps there are other computer security companies that, for a fee, would provide such servces?

RE: Cloudflare -- that probably wouldn't happen unless you're on one of their top tier subscriptions. And even if they or a third party did, that's no guarantee to change anyone's mind or of getting an account restored if proven and submitted.

The majority of my domains are on Cloudflare registrar, so I'm at least somewhat familiar with how they operate.