reviews My first backordering attempt, my mistake & the trustworthiness of Snap[NAMES]

[ThingsAreBetter]

I waited to catch one domain name since about 20-25 days.

My favourite whois site was whois-search-net until I realised that the owner of the site uses the service to know which domains are being followed up by people. So, this time, I used internic.net whois. Since whois records are not centralized and calls registrar's database everytime we try to retrieve whois info, I was so cautious about fetching whois records multiple times before it was into PENDING DELETE state, to prevent GoDaddy, it's previous registrar from trying to renew or backorder.

[All the following happened just about 11 hours ago.]

In the next step, I was too cautious. They had mentioned a time 10:45 AM (EST) on their website. But I added my domain name to the cart just a minute before 1 PM CST and tried to check out. The Snap[NAMES] system said "the domain cannot be added now." or something similar to that.

After about 30-35 minutes, I was still curious what would happen to the domain name and going through the whois records of this domain in the internic site.

To my surprise, it was registered. The chances of other people wanting to register was less than 0.1%. Nevertheless, I didn't mind paying $79 to get it with 100% guarantee. If the back ordering was successful, I'm sure I would have been the only person to bid on the domain name, unless Snap[NAMES] showcased it to the public.

Domain Name:
   Registrar: TRADEWINDS NAMES, LLC
   Sponsoring Registrar IANA ID: 2248
   Whois Server: whois.tradewindsnames-com
   Referral URL: tradewindsnames-com
   Name Server: NS1.SEDOPARKING-COM
   Name Server: NS2.SEDOPARKING-COM
   Status: ok icann-org/epp#ok
   Updated Date: 29-oct-2016
   Creation Date: 29-oct-2016
   Expiration Date: 29-oct-2017

Sinice the Name Server is set to sedo's, I'm sure its current owner wants to sell the domain name and doesn't own the company of that name.

If we open tradewindsnames-com, it will take us to Snap[NAMES] page, which then redirects us to Network Solutions website. After checking out who owns TradeWinds Names, I found out that it's owned by Register-com.

See - Snap[NAMES], Register, NetworkSolutions, TradeWinds Names - each one of these is "A web.com Company".

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I currently own the .net and .org versions of that domain name and .net would be sufficient for me to manage. I am very unlikely to pay them even a cent more than $79 if they sell it on sedo (I'm sure nobody else would bother either). I want to use it solely to name a parent company and not use it as a front-end of company. Therefore, I believe, .net will be sufficient for in my case.

I'm sure plenty of people here who play with domain names everyday already know about this. If you're new to this business, I hope you get the whole picture now. This is how Web.com's entire network is working.

Being aware of this would help.

 

[ThingsAreBetter]

I should have created this post in the review section. Please move it there.

 

[golan]

So, what's your point? That you don't know how to backorder domains? Or to blame in it just anybody?

 

[HKIBC]

Seems he'd paid SnapNames to dropcatch the domain, but no joy. It has been caught through a registrar that belongs to the same group of companies as SnapNames and listed for sale at Sedo.com. My sympathies, but nothing extraordinary here, really.

 

[Arca]

I currently own the .net and .org versions of that domain name and .net would be sufficient for me to manage. I am very unlikely to pay them even a cent more than $79 if they sell it on sedo (I'm sure nobody else would bother either).

Sedo's minimum commission fee is $60 and the sellers asking price on Sedo is certainly not going to be anywhere near $79.

What's the point of complaining about netsol/web/snap if the .NET is "sufficient" for you anway? Why did you track the .COM for 20-25 days if the .NET is sufficient for you to develop on?

Somebody else won the domain for $79 fair and square, and opening a thread stating that you missed the backorder deadline and that you will never pay more than $79 for the domain will not give you another chance at getting the name for $79 (the seller/new owner won't see your thread and then decide to sell the name to you at a loss). The only thing you can do is pay up for the .COM or go ahead and develop on your .NET.

 

[Jurgen Wolf]

Minimum offer at Sedo is $90 nowadays...

 

[Domainstore]

Minimum offer at Sedo is $90 nowadays...

Really ??

 

[cdboard]

a domain dropped, and a domain company regged it immediately.

sounds familiar.

Seems he'd paid SnapNames to dropcatch the domain, but no joy.

he did not backorder it at snapnames. he missed the deadline.

 

[Jurgen Wolf]

Really ??

Really.
And if other currency was set - then 90 EUR or 90 GBP...

 

[ThingsAreBetter]

a domain dropped, and a domain company regged it immediately.

sounds familiar.





he did not backorder it at snapnames. he missed the deadline.

Exactly. That's my mistake, which is a part of this learning experience.


For anyone who didn't take enough time to go through the first post or didn't understand the purpose of the post, I'd like to highlight here:

I'm sure plenty of people here who play with domain names everyday already know about this. If you're new to this business, I hope you get the whole picture now. This is how Web.com's entire network is working.

Being aware of this would help.

What's the point of complaining about netsol/web/snap if the .NET is "sufficient" for you anway?

Who is complaining? I've shared my experience with their network.

Why did you track the .COM for 20-25 days if the .NET is sufficient for you to develop on?

Just like you preferred .COM for your friend but was ready to move on to other extensions when it was taken by someone else as quoted below, I preferred .COM and now don't mind moving on to other extension since it's grabbed by someone else. In my case, .COM was almost about to drop when I decided the name. That's the only difference.

The clothesly.com domain is taken and developed by a Chinese factory (website outdated not updated in 10 years, but the name is still being renewed). I have emailed and called them, but not been able to get any response, so this domain is not an option.

See, you can be bothered about getting a .COM domain when you are ready to manage with other extension in the case of non-availability of .COM, but you are questioning someone else's interest in .COM when he could manage with .NET extension.

 

[Arca]

Just like you preferred .COM for your friend but was ready to move on to other extensions when it was taken by someone else as quoted below, I preferred .COM and now don't mind moving on to other extension since it's grabbed by someone else. In my case, .COM was almost about to drop when I decided the name. That's the only difference.

See, you can be bothered about getting a .COM domain when you are ready to manage with other extension in the case of non-availability of .COM, but you are questioning someone else's interest in .COM when he could manage with .NET extension.

You really went through hundreds of my past posts to find that quote?

Also, you are quoting it out of context. I was asking for a friend what people though about going with a .LY domain instead of .COM, for her ecommerce project.

In my opinion, anyone who wants to be take seriously need the .COM of their company name. So I convinced my friend to go with an entirely different name instead, and the matching .COM was acquired for $XXXX. We preferred the .COM and we did not move on to another extension, but another domain name, just so we could get the exact match .COM.

 

[Arca]

Besides, since your name is a brandable, the .COM is even more important. A tech company operating on the .net will hardly be seen as an 'authoritative tech' company, thus the extension contradicts the meaning of the name itself.

 

[ThingsAreBetter]

the .net will hardly be seen as an 'authoritative tech' company

A shill around here backing Snap[NAMES] with access to so much of insider information on their customer.

I haven't shared my domain name anywhere in this forum (and I haven't shared this experience with Snap[NAMES] anywhere else either); not even the shared category of the domain name here. Now you're almost specifically pointing to the exact domain name I wanted [once upon a time] - authoritech.com - and specifically pointing to the tech category.

Someone please tell me this is coincidence. Someone please tell me that "the data that 'domain name I wanted to backorder on Snap[NAMES] was authoritech.com' is public (or at least accessible to a stranger on a forum, who doesn't even know my e-mail address or anything that can identify me) [before I shared it here now]".

 

[Arca]

Actually I just know due to a wild coincidence. I was doing some research about my recently dropcaught names, to see which end-users are out there for them. I usually check the WHOIS for the name in other extensions, if it is regged in other extensions, and I noticed that for authoritech . com, which was caught on Oct 29, the .net and .org had been regged about a month ago (which you shared above) and the registrar was the same as the one above (which you also shared above), so I simply put together all these details and started wondering whether it was actually me who caught the name you didn't backorder. I made the post above hinting at the domain, and as it turns out, it's the same name.

Tech names sell really well, and I thought authority + tech = AuthoriTech made for a nice tech brand. So I backordered the domain after discovering it while looking through lists of pending delete names at expireddomains.net. It was registered since 2002 or 2003, and registered continuously until 2016, and has never been available for sale previously. Until its drop, it was owned by a tech company called AuthoriTech, which held a TM for this name that expired in 2010 (and currently there are no live TMs for the mark). Your estimation that "the chances of other people wanting to register was less than 0.1%" is pretty inaccurate, as domains ending with the keyword "tech" are extremely popular, and namebio.com has 730 recorded sales of domain names ending with the word tech, and 2,012 total domain sales containing the keyword tech somewhere in the name, making it one of the top 10 most popular industry keywords in terms of aftermarket sales. I have sold several domains containing the "tech" keyword myself, and nowadays I backorder/bid for every decent tech name I come across, as I know that these sell.

 

[Arca]

Besides, it's absolutely impossible that anyone could have known about your interest in this domain - As you stated yourself, you were so careful to now indicate your interested in the domain that you didn't even backorder the domain until after it was too late.

You have been implying that there has been some dirty play or collusion here in almost every post you have made, trying to blame others for the fact that you don't know how to backorder a domain, even writing a negatively slanted "review" for a company you didn't even use to try to backorder the domain.

 

[dordomai]

A shill around here backing Snap[NAMES] with access to so much of insider information on their customer.

I haven't shared my domain name anywhere in this forum (and I haven't shared this experience with Snap[NAMES] anywhere else either); not even the shared category of the domain name here. Now you're almost specifically pointing to the exact domain name I wanted [once upon a time] - authoritech.com - and specifically pointing to the tech category.

Someone please tell me this is coincidence. Someone please tell me that "the data that 'domain name I wanted to backorder on Snap[NAMES] was authoritech.com' is public (or at least accessible to a stranger on a forum, who doesn't even know my e-mail address or anything that can identify me) [before I shared it here now]".

nowadays we have many software programs monitoring drops and grabbing anything that has a remote chance of having value. Domains that make sense rarely get missed. You should never hope that you are the only one wanting a domain.

Snapnames has maybe a 30% chance of winning a backorder against other services like Dropcatch.

The drop game is VERY competitive. A domain that has attracts the attention of more than one party usually ends up being backordered and caught by either Namejet, Snapnames or Dropcatch.

Domainers usually backorder with more than 1 service, usually all of the major services.

I don't see anything unsual with this story. If domain is dropping that you badly want, chances are you are not the only one. So if you want a chance to grab it you need to backorder the domain with the leading dropcatchers.