Is Sedo DONE?

[DanBingham]

Ok, so let's face it - Sedo has been around for a while, it's platform could do with a complete overhaul, and they've made it much more difficult in listing names.

Is now about time Sedo closed it's doors?
What do YOU think?

 

[Sutruk]

· Price cap was lifted for sellers listing domains for more than 50000.

· We updated our Search Algorithm, to display more direct matches to the keyword.

· We reduced the Payout time for transfers sales if buyer doesn’t confirm ownership.

Thank you for the updates!

 

[nivadriver]

Pwned!

 

[ThatNameGuy]

No. Lots of endusers feel confortable with them and in the end that's all that matters to me.

In all due respect 90% of "end users" have never heard of Sedo unless they're like me and own a SeaDo jet ski Same goes for Uniregistry, Flippa and Afternic and Undeveloped.

 

[ThatNameGuy]

Hi DefinitelyDomains

Thank you for your engaging post.

The answer to your question is no, Sedo is most certainly not done. In fact since new management took control over Sedo, not only has our domain sales increased but the percentage of successful transfers has increased and with it customer satisfaction has also improved. This can be reflected in our trust pilot scoring, which has increased to ‘Excellent’.

We have a domain ownership verification process to increase the integrity of our marketplace and as a process to fight against ‘seller not owner’ sales. If you are finding this process difficult then please explain in more detail where exactly you are having difficulty and I will do my best to assist you.

As you mentioned, Sedo has been around for a while and we intend to be around for a lot longer, we want to remain the number 1 marketplace for you to buy and sell your domains. You mention our platform could do with an overhaul, I can assure you that our Tech Team are innovating and working on improving our marketplace as I write this email. With the intention of creating a better user experience when managing your domains.

We are constantly listening to feedback from our customers, some of the best feedback of which has come from this very forum. Our customers have asked and we have delivered:

· Price cap was lifted for sellers listing domains for more than 50000.

· We implemented 13 new sales landers to increase the chances of selling for those of you who looking to prioritise the sale of domains over earning money with our parking program.

· We dropped the minimum commission fee of 60 USD/ Euro, meaning on lower sales a seller can earn twice as much profit.

· We lowered the minimum offer to 20 Euro from 90 Euro for our sellers who wanted to sell lower valued domains quickly attracting more buyers.

· We have provided engaging auctions for our customers including the latest IGaming and Gambling auctions which are free to apply for.

· We updated our Search Algorithm, to display more direct matches to the keyword.

· We reduced the Payout time for transfers sales if buyer doesn’t confirm ownership.

· We have improved our MLS service to increase the chances of a domain selling.

· Sedos marketplace and our Sales brokers are STILL achieving some of the highest sales in the industry.

These are just some of the improvements we made in the last few months which were suggestions from domainers like yourself. Plus we have made many other changes, we have been taking all our customers feedback to our business development team and are trying to implement customers wishes to improve the overall experience at Sedo.

Just watch out, we still aim to improve and be the best we can for you and 2020 is a new year coming soon!

We wish you every success in your domain affairs!

All the best Chris

Chris...in all due respect, I just responded to another member who said "endusers" know and respect the name Sedo? That's total BS in my honest opinion. I contend that unless Sedo adopts some sort of aggressive and progressive "outbound" marketing program they'll be history in the next 3-5 years.

 

[branding]

What world do you live in? I qualify as "older people" at 72 years old young, and I'd NEVER heard of Sedo until such time I joined NP 24 months ago. Sedo might have a following in Europe, but few if any "end users" here in the states have ever heard of them....a FACT! "Dan", formerly Undeveloped is yet another example...do you think any "end user" here in the states has ever heard of a company called "Undeveloped"? Would you trust a company that calls themselves "Undeveloped"?

I rest my case

Last time I checked I was still a resident of planet Earth although I must honestly admit there are days I feel like an alien.

@Jurgen Wolf couldn't have put it any better. It's about credibility.

And you're right, it depends on where you or your buyers are from. Thruth is, the US makes only for a small % of sales compared to the total market. Why limit yourself to the US?

I think undeveloped/Dan did a stellar job at gaining market share. They obviously run the better platform but it's not easy to outperform the establishment.

It's not weird you never came across Sedo actually. It's like GoDaddy. Having your domains there may be an advantage if your targeting US buyers, most people from my country never heard of them.

 

[Jurgen Wolf]

Please do shift the argument to VAT or tax, it's really simple, open one of your invoices and divide the total sale amount with sedo commission multiplying with % and see how strict the commission is.

And again, and the last...
As NON-EU seller - I'm not obliged to pay any other fees, only those which are stated in their pricelist.
They deduct 3/10/15/20% from me.
Escrow/parked BIN/MakeOffer/MLS accordingly.
Never had anything else.

 

[NickB]

Hi, I submitted a name for the igaming auction a week ago but not had a reply yet. In the meantime it's showing as not for sale. Does no reply indicate it has been accepted ?

No - they will email you if accepted or rejected

 

[NickB]

I have moved over all my .org names and all my Defi names to Sedo.

I agree that if your name has value it does not matter where it is listed BUT when it comes to higher value sales I am beginning to think (and have been for a while now) that Sedo & Uniregistry might be the best place to be seen

This does not mean all my names have high value by the way

 

[Jurgen Wolf]

why do I need to struggle with the same interface for nearly 20 years?

Ask for access to Sedo API - and then you may use your own interface or just command line.

 

[Laguna]

No - they will email you if accepted or rejected

It's been a week already and showing as not for sale. It shouldn't take that long to either say yes or no in my opinion

 

[Jurgen Wolf]

It's been a week already and showing as not for sale. It shouldn't take that long to either say yes or no in my opinion

Launch their LiveChat...

 

[branding]

thanks didn't know that option

but I have no intention to program myself
or pay a programmer
for a task
that sedo should have taken
ages ago

But it'll save you so much time in the long run! Think of all that extra time you would have on your hands to roast Epik

 

[ThatNameGuy]

Last time I checked I was still a resident of planet Earth although I must honestly admit there are days I feel like an alien.

@Jurgen Wolf couldn't have put it any better. It's about credibility.

And you're right, it depends on where you or your buyers are from. Thruth is, the US makes only for a small % of sales compared to the total market. Why limit yourself to the US?

I think undeveloped/Dan did a stellar job at gaining market share. They obviously run the better platform but it's not easy to outperform the establishment.

It's not weird you never came across Sedo actually. It's like GoDaddy. Having your domains there may be an advantage if your targeting US buyers, most people from my country never heard of them.

You said, "Truth is, the US makes only for a small % of sales compared to the total market. Why limit yourself to the US?" Herein lies a HUGE disconnect? Do you know this to be a fact...or are you just guessing? Please sir...point me to statistics that bare this out?

Interesting, I happen to notice this thread was started by a member from the UK, and the majority of responders seem to be European. No wonder when I build a portfolio of couple hundred real estate and homes domains, and I'm mostly targeting US "end users", the rest of the domainers in the world don't understand? It's like I'm saying tomatoes and you're hearing potatoes

Maybe we should have a USNamePros, a EUNamePros, and an AsianNamePros. We're all educated differently, our economic systems are different and lord knows, our political systems are miles apart.....any suggestions?

 

[ThatNameGuy]

I must admit I don't know for a fact nor do I have any data at hand to support my claim. @Bob Hawkes ? You're the data guy

Seriously though. I'm sure I could collect the data if I put my mind to it. It's a fine example of how a lot of people from the USA think that the world ends beyond the US. Best example is the underrepresented Chinese market. It's huge.

But sure, there is a global market for a lot of names but targeting specific regions can be a smart play. And no, we don't need a Geo specific namepros. We have subcategories for that

To get back to your real estate example, no. A lot of the world (read most) will not understand those names, better even, have no use for them.

It's like you're trying to sell your stuff over here through Amazon. Not gonna pan out. I'm not saying what you're doing is wrong, just that there's a vast market beyond what a lot of domainers are focusing on.

For a 72 year old, I'm actually a renaissance sort of guy. Why else would I have reached out to meet the likes of Marek, lolWarrior from Prague, or Bob Hawkes from Canada? I can learn from anyone with the exception of some of the arrogants I've met here

 

[Bob Hawkes]

· We dropped the minimum commission fee of 60 USD/ Euro, meaning on lower sales a seller can earn twice as much profit.

Thank you very much for the detailed reply on many different aspects of your operations @Sedo. If I recall correctly when the minimum commissions were dropped, it was (I think, possibly I am wrong) for a trial period. Is the plan to continue with no minimum commissions?
Thanks,
Bob

 

[Sedo]

Hi, I submitted a name for the igaming auction a week ago but not had a reply yet. In the meantime it's showing as not for sale. Does no reply indicate it has been accepted ?

Hi,

Thanks for your message, can you provide me with the name of the domain so I can look into it for you. Alternatively email [email protected] and one of our team will look into it and get back to you privately via email with whats going on.

Cheers
Chris

 

[Sedo]

I think, Categorization should be removed completely from Sedo panel...
It has no any effect/gain when this directory contains millions of domains.

Hi Jurgen,

Thanks for your suggestion, I have forwarded it one to our developments team.

All the best.

Chris

 

[Sedo]

Same here.

Hi Josytal,

Thanks for your message, can you provide me with the name of the domain so I can look into it for you. Alternatively email [email protected] and one of our team will look into it and get back to you privately via email with whats going on.

Thanks
Chris

 

[Jurgen Wolf]

I use V3 Blank lander.
And I don't see any sense in Sedo monetization, it is traditionally the worst among competitors.

 

[Soofi]

-edit

 

[Soofi]

You just proved my point. RUDE

going to ignore you, because I wasn’t really talking to you anyhow!!

 

[Jurgen Wolf]

@Sedo
You are holding a igaming auction at the end of November and I entered iGamingTokens but as usual it was rejected. I think iGamingTokens for an igaming auction is spot on. Can you please explain to me and others what basis this was rejected.
Gary

https://www.namepros.com/threads/sedo-igaming-auction.1163137/

 

[Jurgen Wolf]

Switch to Parking Optimization view in Sedo panel...
Then click "Edit" icon beside Layout column title, set in a bulk and save at the bottom.

 

[ThatNameGuy]

I must admit I don't know for a fact nor do I have any data at hand to support my claim. @Bob Hawkes ? You're the data guy

Seriously though. I'm sure I could collect the data if I put my mind to it. It's a fine example of how a lot of people from the USA think that the world ends beyond the US. Best example is the underrepresented Chinese market. It's huge.

But sure, there is a global market for a lot of names but targeting specific regions can be a smart play. And no, we don't need a Geo specific namepros. We have subcategories for that

To get back to your real estate example, no. A lot of the world (read most) will not understand those names, better even, have no use for them.

It's like you're trying to sell your stuff over here through Amazon. Not gonna pan out. I'm not saying what you're doing is wrong, just that there's a vast market beyond what a lot of domainers are focusing on.

In all due respect, you are so far off base with regards to the percentage of English speaking domains, you have to be living in a different world, or maybe the Netherlands I've done a quick study on Namebio of domain names sold and the percentage mirrors the percentage you see here with regards to the top 25 Brands in the world;

https://www.netbase.com/blog/global-love-list-2018-the-importance-of-brand-love-in-social-analytics/

It appears that instead of a "small percentage" of domain sales are from the US like you said, it's about 70% and the rest of the world 30%. This is yet another reason why I'm not buying into the idea that "outbound" sales won't work. It may not work for you in the Netherlands, but I'm more positive now than ever it can work here in the US. Rob Monster of Epik, are you listening? EpikTrust.com is available to start a commission/contingency brokerage, and I know the perfect guy to make it happen

 

[branding]

In all due respect, you are so far off base with regards to the percentage of English speaking domains, you have to be living in a different world, or maybe the Netherlands I've done a quick study on Namebio of domain names sold and the percentage mirrors the percentage you see here with regards to the top 25 Brands in the world;

https://www.netbase.com/blog/global-love-list-2018-the-importance-of-brand-love-in-social-analytics/

It appears that instead of a "small percentage" of domain sales are from the US like you said, it's about 70% and the rest of the world 30%. This is yet another reason why I'm not buying into the idea that "outbound" sales won't work. It may not work for you in the Netherlands, but I'm more positive now than ever it can work here in the US. Rob Monster of Epik, are you listening? EpikTrust.com is available to start a commission/contingency brokerage, and I know the perfect guy to make it happen

Ready to get educated?

I know you tend to skip a lot, but for real, its informative.

First of all, It's not about 'english speaking domains'. That has nothing to do with the geographical location of the owner. Over here we speak/read/write English all day long. Most people in europe (some countries excluded, depending on generation also) are quite fluent in English or a multitude of languages.

We have to be. The core aspect that makes the EU work is international trade. This goes especially for a small country like The Netherlands (on a sidenote, did you ever notice you'll find Dutch names all over the world? We've always been trading. It's in our blood. Did you know we used to own New York? If we wouldn't have gotten our ass handed to us by the British it would still be named New Amsterdam ).

Knowing that, a lot of domains that would be concidered valuable to the national market are english keyword domains, hence a lot of domains registered by EU owners are english keyword domains. My best bet is that the same goes for a lot of other countries.

I'm not sure how you pull that data from Namebio. They have no data on buyers locations so how would you measure that? I like the article you quote in your post (we share the love for branding) but it doesn't support your opinion in any way. It's about the most loved brands. That says nothing about quantity. For all I know the 100 most loved brands are mostly US companies whereas millions of others are from China. I didn't see the full report but I wouldn't be surprised if the list of evaluated brands is biased towards the western world given the source.

So basically you come to the conclusion that 70% of sales are US based derives from the fact that (I don't know how) you pulled data from NB that would support 70% of sales are english keywords. That's comparing apples and oranges.

Let's also take into account that a lot of large venues do not report any sales. I know for a fact that there are some very active EU markets with a lot of trade and sales going on that don't report ever. I can't know for sure about areas I'm not familiar with or don't operate in but I can only assume the Asian market is huge. That being said, a lot of trade in the US goes unreported just the same.

Anybody with more insight about those markets feel free to chime in.

So now, let's apply some logic to my reasoning as we obviously lack enough data to know for sure (again, I'm sure the data can be compiled and extrapolated upon but that would require some further research and sharing of more data by some venues).

Only 26% of domains registered are owned by US registrants. Now let's factor in that hundreds of thousands, if not millions, are under privacy which obviously most of the time would show up as a US entity. On 34% of domain registrations the geographical location of the owner is unknown. Maye that includes the domains under privacy, it's a bit unclear to me. But you know, Since we do know that 26% is owned by US registrants, lets also assume that roughly 1/4th of that percentage accounts for US owners. So lets say about 35% of all domains are owned by Americans...

It would not make sense that 35% of all domains would account for 70% of sales on global scale. What we do not know is who the targeted endusers are, EU registrants could just as well be targeting US endusers and the other way around. Let's say that evens out the numbers on both sides. I can only logically assume that the US market only represents roughly 1/3rd of the industry.

I know there are be some flaws in this resoning but you know... without cold hard data... gotta skip some if/then/else thoughts.

Point being: If you focus only on US endusers you're leaving money on the table.