GoDaddy bought Mike Berkens domain portfolio MostWantedDomains.com

[NameClerk]

Godaddy purchases 70,000 domain name portfolio from Mike Berkins (Worldwide Media).

I'd love to know the details of this deal. Mike is known for holding out for top dollar. I'm also curious what Godaddy's plan is for all these domains. They acquired another 200,000 earlier this year from Marchex.

http://www.bizjournals.com/phoenix/...addy-bolsters-domain-name-portfolio-with.html

http://domainnamewire.com/2015/12/0...erkens-worldwide-media-domain-name-portfolio/

 

[Joseph Green]

Update from Michael Berkens on the sale:

Let me start by saying this transaction was prompted for personal life reasons, not based on any sudden shift in my belief, or feeling about the domain industry or the value of domain names.

Read more: My Sale to Godaddy

 

[NameClerk]

I'm happy for Mike on the well-deserved pay day.

I'm still left wondering what the ramifications of Godaddy becoming a major portfolio holder are? They're running two of the larger domain marketplaces in existence and now have over 250,000 of their own names to sell. One would believe they'll slant things in their favor, no?

 

[hugegrowth]

Makes sense for Godaddy, they already distribute domains in all sorts of ways, and have some of the best buying/selling domain stats of anyone. They should know what they're doing.

Makes sense for Berkens, a no-hassle exit strategy at the right time for him.

Would love to know the details of the transaction but we probably never will.

 

[Jacks86]

I also think since they are a registrar, cost per domain for renewals must be really low too. So even if GD acquired 1 million domains, might be less than a dollar to keep each one per year?

 

[Kate]

Indeed, GD is a Tier 1 domainer...

 

[Argentum]

Finally he tired to reply on Chinese spam offers

 

[Joseph Green]

I'm still left wondering what the ramifications of Godaddy becoming a major portfolio holder are? They're running two of the larger domain marketplaces in existence and now have over 250,000 of their own names to sell. One would believe they'll slant things in their favor, no?

On the other hand, if they're buying up portfolios and/or domains, that provides a good opportunity for domainers, and it may even create more liquidity for domains that were once illiquid.

 

[NameClerk]

I also think since they are a registrar, cost per domain for renewals must be really low too. So even if GD acquired 1 million domains, might be less than a dollar to keep each one per year?

I'm pretty sure the registrar's cost per year on a .com is closer to $8 than $1.

 

[Argentum]

I'm pretty sure the registrar's cost per year on a .com is closer to $8 than $1.

Verisign price for .com is $7.85 + $0.18 ICANN fee.

 

[Jacks86]

I'm pretty sure the registrar's cost per year on a .com is closer to $8 than $1.

For themselves $8 each?. I find that hard to believe that GoDaddy would charge itself the same price as the customers, but I could be wrong.

 

[NameClerk]

For themselves $8 each?. I find that hard to believe that GoDaddy would charge itself the same price as the customers, but I could be wrong.

VeriSign charges that price to Godaddy for all .com domains. Doesn't matter if GD owns them, or GD's customers own them.

My primary concern is how prominent the promotion of these domains become at GD and Afternic. The rest of us could be looking at diminished visibility on these marketplaces if it becomes more profitable for GD to sell their inventory than take a small percentage for selling ours. Premium listings could be taken out of the search path and replaced with recommendations from GD inventory.... things of that nature. It also brings up possible conflicts with their expiring domain inventory. I'm sure they'll continue to run the highly contested auctions but they might opt to keep large amounts of names for their own inventory instead of letting them go to Closeout status.

It's very interesting but I don't see it as a positive based on where things could go.

 

[Jacks86]

VeriSign charges that price to Godaddy for all .com domains. Doesn't matter if GD owns them, or GD's customers own them.

Oh right verisign owns .com, ok now that makes sense.

 

[cdboard]

might be interesting to see what sort of landing pages G sets up for their for-sale portfolio.

 

[NameClerk]

As Kate so eloquently put it...

Indeed, GD is a Tier 1 domainer...

And when that happens they become a competitor very similar to what Huge Domains has become.

 

[80-20]

but they might opt to keep large amounts of names for their own inventory instead of letting them go to Closeout status.

This is the biggest worry - harvesting domains en mass and reselling them for peanuts as Huge Domains do...

 

[DnEbook]

Ppc aint what it used to be .... abort abort about

 

[DnEbook]

Is there any direct link to the Marchex Names ?

 

[NameClerk]

Is there any direct link to the Marchex Names ?

An article from earlier this year points to this source.

http://namefind.com

 

[DnEbook]

An article from earlier this year points to this source.

http://namefind.com

Are you saying these are only Marchex names?

 

[DnEbook]

Doesn't seem right? No real numerics to speak of?
~
Didn't Marchex sell 1000s of numerics, i can't really find any on this site

 

[NameClerk]

Are you saying these are only Marchex names?

No. I'm just pointing out an old article that answers the question you asked.

 

[DnEbook]

There must a be a full sales list somewhere, thanks but that is not it, cheers

 

[Keith]

The crazy part about the Berkens sale is that about 69,000 of the domains are lackluster. Check the Whois. They wouldn't fetch $100 here at NP.

That said, I'd run with Godaddy's cash too if it was flashed my way!

Marchex had several uber domains. Hopefully that same quality was represented with this sale.

 

[RU]

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