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opinion Namescon Europe AMA in two weeks with GoDaddy / Afternic

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Joe Styler

Aftermarket Product ManagerTop Member
GoDaddy Staff
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For Namescon Europe this year on June 20th in Portugal, my boss the very important @Paul Nicks and @Alan Shiflett from Afternic and I will be doing a panel discussion in lieu of a keynote. If anyone is interested in asking questions from the Aftermarket please start thinking of them now.

We wanted to have a session that is focused on helping people be successful by answering anything we can on GoDaddy or Afternic. So please get your questions ready. With the three of us we have a pretty deep knowledge of anything from the technical to purchases and sales best practices side of the business.

The goal here is to help you with your domain business. If you are not going to be there you can post some questions below and if we have time in the panel we may pick some of these to answer. So please feel free to post them below.
 
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The views expressed on this page by users and staff are their own, not those of NamePros.
Afternic Premium Network and fast-transfer have been working well for me over many years. Then two months ago Name.com emailed me that an opted-in name was transferring, and my Afternic account showed nothing. I contacted Afternic the same day and was told the domain "expired on xxxx [41 days before], went through an expired domain auction, and was awarded to a GoDaddy customer, who now owns it." But the name HAD been properly renewed. Maybe this was a Name.com breakdown in reporting renewal? Did the opt-in function at Afternic somehow bite me? Relevant Helpdesks still say this is being reviewed; I still don't have my name back or compensation. But biggest fear: How easily might this happen again? If this were truly a mission-critical name, horror of stress-filled months. Suddenly Afternic opt-in seems dangerous.
 
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When will Afternic and Godaddy be fully integrated so that listing a Godaddy domain on Afternic does not require an extra email from Godaddy to confirm participation in the Afternic Premium Network?
 
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Afternic Premium Network and fast-transfer have been working well for me over many years. Then two months ago Name.com emailed me that an opted-in name was transferring, and my Afternic account showed nothing. I contacted Afternic the same day and was told the domain "expired on xxxx [41 days before], went through an expired domain auction, and was awarded to a GoDaddy customer, who now owns it." But the name HAD been properly renewed. Maybe this was a Name.com breakdown in reporting renewal? Did the opt-in function at Afternic somehow bite me? Relevant Helpdesks still say this is being reviewed; I still don't have my name back or compensation. But biggest fear: How easily might this happen again? If this were truly a mission-critical name, horror of stress-filled months. Suddenly Afternic opt-in seems dangerous.
I am sorry to hear this happened. I am not sure what happened as the domain was registered with another company. Speaking on the Afternic side of things we couldn't sell your domain as a fast transfer domain. At a certain point after a domain expires the WHOIS updates and we remove your name from Afternic sales as a fast transfer.
To me it sounds like the domain expired and was sold after it was not renewed. Again this would not be something we would know. You would have to contact your registrar about the domain's renewal status at the time it left your account.
 
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I am sorry to hear this happened. I am not sure what happened as the domain was registered with another company. Speaking on the Afternic side of things we couldn't sell your domain as a fast transfer domain. At a certain point after a domain expires the WHOIS updates and we remove your name from Afternic sales as a fast transfer.
To me it sounds like the domain expired and was sold after it was not renewed. Again this would not be something we would know. You would have to contact your registrar about the domain's renewal status at the time it left your account.

Thanks Joe! The registrar (Name.com) still apparently believes Afternic sold the domain via Fast Transfer. This case is relevant to others because I renewed the name and received receipt before time of expiry. The domain was in my Name.com account, locked, showing 10+ months to expiry. They say "the domain was sold successfully, an API call was made to pull and transfer the domain."
(Their helpdesk also told me: ) "Here's a brief timeline of the events:
Ab?c.com was unlocked on 2019-04-07 07:16:28 (MDT = Mountain Daylight Time)
Ab?c.com was approved out for transfer on 2019-04-07 07:18:28"
(I was not involved in either of these steps. I'd no reason to imagine anything was awry with the domain. A GoDaddy customer has it now). You say: "At a certain point after a domain expires the WHOIS updates and we remove your name from Afternic sales as a fast transfer." But I insist: it was not expired, and Name.com agrees. And if the domain had expired, why an API call to unlock and transfer? ...it seems Afternic Fast Transfer was an accomplice when my domain "went through an expired domain auction, and was awarded to a GoDaddy customer, who now owns it." Rather than somewhat a power user -- in reality thus far I'm expending much time & effort to recover my property or get compensation. But because nobody admits responsibility, I'm deeply terrified more names could be swiped from my control. After 10+ years of good business relations, I'm newly uncertain about my registrar and Afternic, and utterly powerless.
 
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[Comms from Name.com Support, Apr 10 2019] I hope you are having a wonderful day so far. ... it seems that on 04/04/2018, the domain was opted into the Afternic Premium Promotion Signup, and opted into the Sedo Opt-in service on 12/19/2018. A?bc.com was purchased by a buyer through Afternic last week, then removed from your Name.com account to be transferred to the gaining party. I have also spoken with our Compliance Team this morning to further verify and they have informed me that the domain was appropriately purchased to the gaining registrar."

I repeated assurances I'd not received sales communications nor funds, and forwarded my Afternic replies, along with the Afternic story of expiry.

(Name.com Support; Apr 10, 2:05 PM MDT) "Hello, Thank you for this information. I have confirmed that the domain was successfully renewed on 02/24/2019 and rightfully remained in your account until this month. I apologize for the confusion that may have been caused regarding this. I have emailed one of our contacts at Afternic to request more information regarding the sale of the domain. Once I have received a response, I will email you straight away."

Please Note this was two months ago... with my continuing reminders and [reported] escalating efforts by Name.com yet to clarify what happened. Again, this single case is unfortunate, but empty assurances [think Egyptian swimmers, in de Nile] create the prospect this can easily happen, catastrophically, to anyone.

Look positively at this case: it identifies a technical gap, and also the customer need that you at Afternic expend more effort communicating with Fast Track Premium Promotion registrar partners.
 
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I guess I am not understanding what happened here. If you send me the domain via a private message I can look into it. From what you are describing, the way I am understanding it, you may have sold a domain 41 days post expiration via fast transfer on Afternic. We cannot fast transfer a domain that late in the expiration cycle, so we did not sell it if this is correct. That would account for the lack of sales email. From my point of view if name.com had told us the domain was expired it would be highly unlikely that you sold this domain via our platform. But again it is hard to say what happened without knowing the domain.
 
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For Namescon Europe this year on June 20th in Portugal, my boss the very important @Paul Nicks and @Alan Shiflett from Afternic and I will be doing a panel discussion in lieu of a keynote. If anyone is interested in asking questions from the Aftermarket please start thinking of them now.

We wanted to have a session that is focused on helping people be successful by answering anything we can on GoDaddy or Afternic. So please get your questions ready. With the three of us we have a pretty deep knowledge of anything from the technical to purchases and sales best practices side of the business.

The goal here is to help you with your domain business. If you are not going to be there you can post some questions below and if we have time in the panel we may pick some of these to answer. So please feel free to post them below.

here are some that can help the sales process at Godaddy

1. why don't you show the Valuation for 7 days auctions and any type of auction that run on Godaddy?
This will help the sale to get more traction, the same way it help those expiring auctions getting more bids
 
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We are looking into doing that.
 
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Here is the video of the AMA from names con. I know the video quality is bad, I didn't take it. But the audio is good. :)
 
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