information Domain Pricing: NameFind finds 499/999 Pricing Produces Significant Results

[James Iles]

Hi everyone,
In collaboration with NameFind, the GoDaddy-owned portfolio of domains, I've written an article about domain name pricing psychology based on a test that NameFind ran. This test included a substantial batch of domains with an equal control group.

In short, NameFind's experiment found that pricing domain names ($2,500-$10,000 BIN) to their nearest 499/999 price point (moving either up or down) resulted in significantly higher revenue while also increasing the average sales price and the number of sales.

Why is this notable? NameFind has a large enough portfolio to test and discover statistically significant results, providing results and insights that all domain investors can test and implement. It's the first time that NameFind has shared this information in a blog post, too.

I'm planning several blog posts with NameFind, with the next one being the results of NameFind's 111 pricing.

Read the 499/999 article here.

 

[GoKaizen]

Great info!

 

[magnificentdomains]

Wow - great info! But at first when I saw the headline I assumed it meant BIN $499 / $999. Thought okay well I guess it's officially bargain season.

 

[Bannen]

Lot of people swear by the '488' or '888' ending; and I notice BuyDomains daily sales reports show 'mostly' those endings also, a lot of $1088, 1888, 2088, 3888 type sales there. Will you be doing a comparison between 99/999 and 88/888 endings? On the one hand, this seems an insignificant difference in actual price... but on the other hand, might be interesting to know if it results in substantially higher STR for one or the other... that's where the data would be interesting.

I have not done any comparisons myself; however, looking at sales data every day for years, I seem to notice that the '99' and '88' endings outstrip the sales of other endings, eg: 499 and 488 type prices outstrip 498, 495, 490, 450, 475, 500 etc type prices. I could be wrong but that's what I seem to notice. Would be nice to see a solid comparison done, by someone/company with a huge portfolio/marketplace who can run a definitive comparison.



**Also, on a related note: I go in for kidney stone surgery in about 3 hours. Everyone please pray that I wake up afterward with all my 'boy parts' still attached. Yay God.

 

[TheDev]

I read the article and, interestingly enough, it fails to mention if the same 'charm effect' applies to domains outside of just .com. Thoughts on this? Would the same psychological effect happen with .co, .biz, .info, etc? Someone should test this!

 

[magnificentdomains]

Why is this notable? NameFind has a large enough portfolio to test and discover statistically significant results, providing results and insights that all domain investors can test and implement. It's the first time that NameFind has shared this information in a blog post, too.

I'm planning several blog posts with NameFind, with the next one being the results of NameFind's 111 pricing.

Read the 499/999 article here.

So, according to this data a domain priced at 9,888 should move to 8,999 or 9,499?

 

[James Iles]

I read the article and, interestingly enough, it fails to mention if the same 'charm effect' applies to domains outside of just .com. Thoughts on this? Would the same psychological effect happen with .co, .biz, .info, etc? Someone should test this!

I don't know what the breakdown of NameFind's portfolio is - it's likely to be predominantly .com, but this wasn't a .com exclusive test. Sorry if that wasn't made clear.

So, according to this data a domain priced at 9,888 should move to 8,999 or 9,499?

That's a decision for your portfolio - but in that instance, if you were following this pricing, it would move from 9,888 to 9,999 since it's the closest 499/999 price point (NameFind moved prices both up and down to get to the nearest 499/999)

 

[James Iles]

Lot of people swear by the '488' or '888' ending; and I notice BuyDomains daily sales reports show 'mostly' those endings also, a lot of $1088, 1888, 2088, 3888 type sales there. Will you be doing a comparison between 99/999 and 88/888 endings? On the one hand, this seems an insignificant difference in actual price... but on the other hand, might be interesting to know if it results in substantially higher STR for one or the other... that's where the data would be interesting.

I have not done any comparisons myself; however, looking at sales data every day for years, I seem to notice that the '99' and '88' endings outstrip the sales of other endings, eg: 499 and 488 type prices outstrip 498, 495, 490, 450, 475, 500 etc type prices. I could be wrong but that's what I seem to notice. Would be nice to see a solid comparison done, by someone/company with a huge portfolio/marketplace who can run a definitive comparison.



**Also, on a related note: I go in for kidney stone surgery in about 3 hours. Everyone please pray that I wake up afterward with all my 'boy parts' still attached. Yay God.

I'll feed the 888 test idea to the NameFind team. Good luck with your surgery

 

[magnificentdomains]

That's a decision for your portfolio - but in that instance, if you were following this pricing, it would move from 9,888 to 9,999 since it's the closest 499/999 price point (NameFind moved prices both up and down to get to the nearest 499/999)

Thanks but if I'm not mistaken it looks like the left digit should be one number smaller. So I'm assuming that would mean 8999 or 9499 in this instance.

(The “charm” pricing that makes people perceive anything as cheaper is when you reduce the left digit by one, and the price is left with “something ninety-nine.” Research shows that a one-cent difference between $2.60 and $2.59 isn’t the same as $3.00 and $2.99 difference. All because we see the price from left to right and perceive it as “high” or “low” before we even get to the ninety-nine part. Shortcut perception works very fast. Unconsciously fast. After we get to the ninety-nine part and process it, it’s often already too late to change our perception of the price.)

 

[ArielT]

Good article @James Iles

It would be great if Afternic could implement a filter to filter domains by price / price ranges to make easy the bulk update on prices

Dan has this feature

Thanks

 

[James Iles]

Good article @James Iles

It would be great if Afternic could implement a filter to filter domains by price / price ranges to make easy the bulk update on prices

Dan has this feature

Thanks

That's a great suggestion - thank you! Filtering is something I'd love to get implemented.