BrandBucket Experience

[xtremex]

hello

I am new to BrandBucket. Before getting my hands on this

I wish to experience about brandbucket from my fellow members


Thanks

 

[Shimmy]

little over 100

 

[campout]

@Shimmy wanna share your portfolio?

To go 8 months with no sales on a 100 name portfolio is a little rough.

 

[London555]

little over 100

With 100 names and no sales you'd need probably two or three sales in the coming year just to break even re fees ect never mind any rejects you paid for-that's if you choose to renew. I wonder if you don't renew if BB will go out and buy those names once the expire and keep them listed? Also-Michael Krell never answered my question ive asked three times as to what the sales "ratio" is now for names listed as to what it was when BB had only 1500 or so names not 20,000. Is it 6% of the total names listed-was it 6% back then etc. It's not that hard a question and now with 20,000 names sellers deserve an answer. Also as I've stated before if the sales ratio to listed names has stayed the same as inventory rises there's really no issue.

 

[cocaseco]

@Domainaffix
Nice Portfolio, and I've got to give you props on the awesome business description as well. It was very positive and inspiring.

I always wondered who actually read those things. You never know what you will see in them, you might even have to report the contents right?

 

[cocaseco]

Has anyone been in touch with or heard from Julia this week? Very uncharacteristically I had asked for some names to be transferred on Monday and I never heard back. I sent the request a second time yesterday and still no response. Sidekick says the emails haven't been opened and that's very unusual. I just now sent another, new, request in. I though maybe she was on holiday? @michaeljkrell

 

[xaticbeats]

i recently gathered up information that get have slightly exceeded $1 million in sales in the past 2 years (from somebody in their listings & sales department). that being said, lets do some analysis.
well.. they have 19500 names listed. i did some semi-inaccurate math (leaving a lot of variables out and a significant amount of room for miscalculations and margin for error) and added the price of 30 of the first domains i saw and divided it by 30 to get some sort of estimate of the average value of the domain listed on brand bucket (yeah, its not too accurate but like i said, I'm not spending to much time to reduce the margin for error of my calculations, sorry brothers.) and ended up with the average domain value being 2903. that being said, if we assume, lets say, they net 1.1 million in sales the last 2 years, and the average valued listing sits at 2903, that equals 723.38 domain sales in the past 2 years (out of 19500). I'm sure the listing amount changed over time and theres possible growth and other variables into consideration, but 723.38 domain sales out of 19500 listed means .. well ... 3.7% of listed domains sold. or if you had 27 domains/listings up over the past 2 years, you would've sold 1 by now. I'm not really sure what to think. like i said,theres a lot of rooms for miscalculations, error, and variables i skipped (I'm sure theres a lot of garbage domains, overpriced domains, people overcasting, and others). but maybe this could give you some sort of insight in an analytical perspective.

sounds like i got a platfor.. err.. nevermind. cya.

 

[Dominic Belley]

Stop calculating. All these numbers could not be more wrong.

 

[ApeXX]

Stop calculating. All these numbers could not be more wrong.

While there's certainly room for improvement in the calculation, I don't think his conclusion is too far off base. I've said for awhile now my internal math leads me to estimate a 2-3% sell through rate, which is a little more conservative than his estimate. I can guarantee the sell rate we'd previously used as a baseline (5%) is no longer a reality.

 

[campout]

Without even getting into the legitimacy of the assumptions, it would be wrong to divide # of domains sold over the past 2 years by number of domains listed today.

 

[starizec]

Average domain value of 2903 is too big. You probably didn't sorted by date, you select first 30 domains wich are sorted by staff pick.

 

[Jeffrey Emerick]

Are these #'s correct? (based on a 100 domain BB portfolio)

First year:
100 hand regged domains= $1,000 cost
100 BB listing fees = $1,000 cost
Total cost to list 100 domains = $2,000 (not including rejected domains by BB)

2% sales per year = $2,000 (based on $1,000 average net per sale)
Break even the first year.... Then...

Second Year:
100 domain renewals= $1,000

2% sales per year = $2,000 (based on $1,000 average net per sale)
Finally profit $1,000 the 2nd year because of no listing fees.

Based on my calculations, it would take 2 years to make a profit of $1,000?



**Please Note: This only counts hand regged domains, NOT drops/back orders or BB rejected domains.

 

[ApeXX]

Are these #'s correct? (based on a 100 domain BB portfolio)

First year:
100 hand regged domains= $1,000 cost
100 BB listing fees = $1,000 cost
Total cost to list 100 domains = $2,000 (not including rejected domains by BB)

2% sales per year = $2,000 (based on $1,000 average net per sale)
Break even the first year.... Then...

Second Year:
100 domain renewals= $1,000

2% sales per year = $2,000 (based on $1,000 average net per sale)
Finally profit $1,000 the 2nd year because of no listing fees.

Based on my calculations, it would take 2 years to make a profit of $1,000?



**Please Note: This only counts hand regged domains, NOT drops/back orders or BB rejected domains.

Your numbers are fairly accurate, but not including rejects leaves out a pretty big part of the equation. I'd say generally the absolute best submitters probably average 60-70% acceptance rate, and I know many of us are doing much worse.

While you may sell the occasional brandable reject on your own, in most cases you're eating those costs. And with only a 45% acceptance rate (in my case at least), that's a lot of cost to eat.

It's one of the reasons I've been a very vocal critic of the listing fee. I think that the brandable marketplace has changed dramatically since that business model was dreamt up and it is no longer viable with the intense reseller competition for strong brandable domains.

 

[Brandworthy]

To go 8 months with no sales on a 100 name portfolio is a little rough.

Up till a couple of months ago I knew of 2 portfolios with combined ~600 BB names that had zero sales after about 8 months. One seller finally got a couple of sales, the other none and sold out his 300+ names and quit brandables.

The dynamics of this niche are changing, both for sellers and marketplaces, and right now it's not clear how things will settle. My guess is things are going to fundamentally change in next 6 months.

 

[trelgor]

The dynamics of this niche are changing, both for sellers and marketplaces, and right now it's not clear how things will settle. My guess is things are going to fundamentally change in next 6 months.

What are the scenarios you see?

 

[NameFit]

I think that the brandable marketplace has changed dramatically since that business model was dreamt up and it is no longer viable with the intense reseller competition for strong brandable domains

The dynamics of this niche are changing, both for sellers and marketplaces, and right now it's not clear how things will settle. My guess is things are going to fundamentally change in next 6 months.

2% turnover rate at an average of $2000/sale is a number that a domain seller any size portfolio would be happy with. The issue with brandables is that chances of end user buyer reaching out of their own are less - so there is limited exposure other than listing sites. That is just the nature of brandables. I still see lot of additions to BB and lot of them registered within past few months, actually weeks and many within days - that really dilutes the market in a way. If people think that they can just hand register the names today and hope to sell them at $1000 profit within few months - it is more of a wishful thinking in my opinion.

Sellers are creating competition among themselves without creating additional channels of sales. The dynamics for brandables marketplace will probably shift towards bigger portfolios because the occasional sales will let them stay, especially taking into consideration the investment they have done, while smaller portfolios with limited budget and resilience will probably opt out.

I think the bigger question is, have the norms and trends of domain industry changed? Is age no longer a relevant factor (when I say age, I do not mean 'per-se' but on the lines of quality)? Is there more of a trend towards these 'brandables'? Is brandability becoming a big factor now? When it was not? And people do not realize that is not the name that is brandable, but the underlying technology that is brandable. Good to have a marketable name at best - that is the scope of a domain name.

 

[ApeXX]

2% turnover rate at an average of $2000/sale is a number that a domain seller any size portfolio would be happy with.

I disagree with this assumption. If you are backordering or registering domains, having only half of them actually accepted by BB, paying $10 ea for those that are listed, and then selling only 2% of those listed names a year at $2k with 30% of the sale lost to commission, then chances are you are not a happy domainer. The math doesn't work.

 

[cocaseco]

Nobody seems to have looked at the other calculations you can do with that sales number, and fewer assumptions. $1.1M in sales is $770K in gross sales after COGS, or $385K/year, or $32K/month. Assuming they are an S corp or LLC with no corporate tax obligation, that is a pretty thin number for a company with physical expenses such as rent and IT etc. They seem to have a budget for marketing in high CPC segments so that has to come from the gross as well. Then there are salaries, presumably at least a couple people making over $100K and the rest of the staff payroll and your done. They do business in California, one of the most onerous places in the world in terms of costs to an employer. In other words, they would seem to barely be profitable, if at all. Now what likely turns the corner for them is the listing fees, and hence the decsion to drop voting points makes perfect sense. If they don't have long term success, neither do we (domainers).

 

[equity78]

Nobody seems to have looked at the other calculations you can do with that sales number, and fewer assumptions. $1.1M in sales is $770K in gross sales after COGS, or $385K/year, or $32K/month. Assuming they are an S corp or LLC with no corporate tax obligation, that is a pretty thin number for a company with physical expenses such as rent and IT etc. They seem to have a budget for marketing in high CPC segments so that has to come from the gross as well. Then there are salaries, presumably at least a couple people making over $100K and the rest of the staff payroll and your done. They do business in California, one of the most onerous places in the world in terms of costs to an employer. In other words, they would seem to barely be profitable, if at all. Now what likely turns the corner for them is the listing fees, and hence the decsion to drop voting points makes perfect sense. If they don't have long term success, neither do we (domainers).

The other breakdown that matters is are the sales coming from Boxador where they keep 100% or from sellers ? I would imagine most of the sales up til this year were coming from Boxador.

I doubt anyone is making $100,000 salary working at BrandBucket.

 

[NameFit]

I disagree with this assumption. If you are backordering or registering domains, having only half of them actually accepted by BB, paying $10 ea for those that are listed, and then selling only 2% of those listed names a year at $2k with 30% of the sale lost to commission, then chances are you are not a happy domainer. The math doesn't work.

Should have been clear, 'ideal situation' for any domainer managing his names himself (2% at $2000 a pop). Anything less than that is not ideal.

 

[Brandworthy]

And that ties into one of the possible outcomes I see - that more small boutique marketplaces start to crop up as larger portfolio owners switch to a self-sale model.