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Sedo - Most useless platform?

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I believe Sedo is the most useless platform of all.

Some of you may disagree and feel free to share your experience below, but from my experience, Sedo has been utterly useless. It has long relied on its well-established brand and the luxury of being one of the first players in the game. Since then, it has done nothing to improve user or buyer experience. They have not found ways to innovate their platform, attract new buyers, and have solely relied on type-in traffic.

In over 10 years of using Sedo, I can count all the offers and sales on one hand. Most of the arguments for Sedo are "they are popular with oversea buyers". Sedo may sell more names to european buyers because they allow extensions such as .de, and have translated versions of the site for buyers for other countries. That's about it. But Sedo has (insert number of partners)! Does that result in many sales for an average seller? Nope.

Sedo currently charges 10% commission for parked domains, 15% for marketplace listings, and 20% for MLS sales. For that comission, they do absolutely nothing.

What I can give them credit for, is for negotiations of inbound offers. But when you get one offer per 5 years, does that really benefit us? Are other marketplaces worse at negotiations? I don't think so.

You may say, well who cares, it's an additional marketplace to list your names on. So why not? Because even their submission process is a headache. Each name has to be manually verified through forwarding or txt record. It doesn't work all the time and takes way too long.

But that's my personal experience. For those of you who park their names at Sedo, why? How has your experience been?
 
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The views expressed on this page by users and staff are their own, not those of NamePros.
First, most of the change in the world comes when people talk, point out, criticize, and discuss things. Even in the domaining world. Second, these are domain forums. A place to vent, discuss, criticize, make suggestions, etc. That's the whole point of this site, aside from buying/selling.
So, maybe sedo staff will read this and think about changing some parts...

as for ex. the landing pages, to give them a better / fresher design. Or the user interface, to look it more modern.

However, as @poweredbyme said I also never had any problems with adding domains to sedo etc.

An addition which is great I think, is the fast transfer mechanism at afternic. Maybe they could add this too.
 
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So what would make it a great marketplace for end users? Or sellers?
I think a good thing would be an option to see search results showing interchangeable names, or those tagged in the same category, rather than just results with an exact match to the searched keyword(s).

eg: real estate/property, money/finance

Maybe there is this, but I can't find it.
 
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First, most of the change in the world comes when people talk, point out, criticize, and discuss things. Even in the domaining world. Second, these are domain forums. A place to vent, discuss, criticize, make suggestions, etc. That's the whole point of this site, aside from buying/selling.
Hi

i asked, if you sold any names on Dan, and you didn't answer the question.

if, you want to have discussion, then you should be forthright in your responses

don't stick your head in the sand, when something is raised that you don't want to address.

imo...
 
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Each marketplace has its own negatives and positives. Try to eliminate all marketplaces and sell directly. That would be the ideal solution. If you need marketplaces for some reasons, complaining doesn't help much. Because their clients accept to play with their rules. They set their rules for themselves, not for you, me or others. They don't have to change anything for their clients. They will keep doing what works best for themselves, not for others.
That's a hell of a business plan. Do you think that they'll have continued success with it?
 
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Sedo has always come through for me. So my experience has been positive. I don't sell many domains there.

It's odd someone judges a platform as a whole based on their personal results, or lack of thereof. Results are only part of the picture.
 
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An addition which is great I think, is the fast transfer mechanism at afternic. Maybe they could add this too.


Sedo has fast transfer for a long time.
Godaddy is not included in the registrars list of Sedo fast transfer. That's a big disadvantage of Sedo compared to Afternic fast transfer.
 
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That's a hell of a business plan. Do you think that they'll have continued success with it?

In monopolistic markets, yes. In free markets, no. Domain marketplaces operate in a highly monopolistic market. One of the reasons is online payments. Online payments market is extremely monopolistic. The solution would be new domain marketplaces with alternative online payment methods such as crypto. Those new domain marketplaces would bring the needed competition. Otherwise domain marketplaces will likely be monopolistic for a quite long time.
 
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Otherwise domain marketplaces will likely be monopolistic for a quite long time.
Hi

i don't see "marketplaces" as having a monopoly on domain transactions.

you have choices, but majority may choose the most popular or a long-standing service with proven results.

many deals still get done by phone or email and the transactions may take place thru escrow.com or paypal, etc.

so, other options are available.

it's just that marketplaces may be an easier route to take.

imo....
 
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Hi

i don't see "marketplaces" as having a monopoly on domain transactions.

you have choices, but majority may choose the most popular or a long-standing service with proven results.

many deals still get done by phone or email and the transactions may take place thru escrow.com or paypal, etc.

so, other options are available.

it's just that marketplaces may be an easier route to take.

imo....

"most popular or a long-standing service with proven results."

That's where the monopoly is located. If running a domain marketplace business is an industry and the most popular 1-3 has over 80% market share, then it's a monopolistic market. I don't have the exact numbers but I think Afternic + Sedo may have 80% share of total domain marketplace market.

P2P domain deals are a choice but out of domain marketplace industry. For instance, soft drinks is a market, but everyone has a choice to consume their own home made soft drinks. Those choices are not within scope of any market. Because market players earn nothing from those choices. Domaining and domain marketplaces are 2 different markets. Online payments is another market. Those markets are closely interrelated to each other but each one is indepedent from each other. For instance, when some domainers sell domains face to face for cash in hand, such deals would eliminate domain marketplace market and online payment market. In the practice, it would be near-impossible but not completely impossible. So, domaining, domain marketplaces and online payments are 3 different markets and their players are mostly different persons/companies.
 
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It is good to have domain marketplaces, otherwise people won't know there is a domain market where millions change hands in a single transaction,.. and will think, I forgot to renew, so I want to buy it back for twice the renewal cost, and current owner will make 100 percent profit, so he must be happy as well... The main problem, is, as I say everywhere: arbitrage. People go to registrars, and registrars go to marketplaces to get the domain for cheap, and to sell high simultaneously, instead of getting 10-20 percent commission only, or maybe even wait until expiration and quietly dropcatch or grab at their own registrar... Look at amazon, ebay, where buyers and sellers meet, and buying and selling prices are the same, but domain industry doesn't work this way.
Is there a monopoly where AN and Sedo have 80 percent share.. If so each should try to make themselves better to attract domainers and endusers, but they don't. Marketplaces/agents like make offer style, because they can make a deal without making a payment. They create enough room for themselves to cheat, by hiding buyer info, as if actual buyers care. And the way Epik thinks now is like: Others scam you anyway, we can't allow this to happen !
 
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Domaining and domain marketplaces are 2 different markets.
Hi

marketplaces, are the result of the expansion of domaining.

MP's, also include all domain forums, the drop catchers > snap, namejet, dropcatch, park.io, sav, docky, dynadot and all the other registrars who auction expiring domains.

if, you are participant in any of the above on regular basis to buy/sell or discuss domain names, then you are engaged in the act of "domaining"

imo....
 
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I refer to domain reselling, domain investing by "domaining". Sorry if I worded domaining wrong. Let me word my point in a different way, domain reselling or domain selling act is a market, is an industry which is different from running a marketplace business. Both are different businesses, markets, industries.

Markets need marketplaces when they expand enough. So I agree. But marketplaces are different type business. For example, marketplaces make profit from fixed or announced commissions. Hence they will never make loss per business transaction. However marketplaces are also market as they are sold and bought but usually not in marketplaces: I haven't heard there are marketplaces where one can buy/sell domain marketplaces. It means there maybe markets without marketplace. Markets and marketplaces are different things.

Hi

marketplaces, are the result of the expansion of domaining.

MP's, also include all domain forums, the drop catchers > snap, namejet, dropcatch, park.io, sav, docky, dynadot and all the other registrars who auction expiring domains.

if, you are participant in any of the above on regular basis to buy/sell or discuss domain names, then you are engaged in the act of "domaining"

imo....
 
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I have sold relatively many names on Sedo. Nothing has sold on Dan. Only annoying low balls come from Dan.
But of course, Sedo has many shortcomings.
Their auctions are horrendously inefficient.
And lately, they seem to have been touched by the general crisis of capitalism predicted by Marx.
I had a personal manager there, he recently resigned, and a new personal manager was not assigned to me.
The payment was delayed by a week compared to their rules, that is, it happened after two week, they said that this was an accounting error.
Now they cannot do an external escrow transfer for two days. They advise you to endure it.
They can also be trolled when pranksters offer large sums and do not pay them.
 
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Please allow for multiple business days for your external transfer request to be processed.
Sedo :oops:
 
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Is anyone able to make an external escrow transfer at Sedo now?
I made a request on July 18th and Sedo still can't do it.
 
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Sedo is not bankrupt by any chance?
There can be no risk of selling an expensive name and not getting money?
The inability to perform basic operations that they easily handled in the past and the laxity of the staff evoke bad thoughts.
 
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Igor, I'm sorry to read that... if external transfers are going the way you say then it's a shame, I used their service a lot.
 
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Igor, I'm sorry to read that... if external transfers are going the way you say then it's a shame, I used their service a lot.
I have also used their escrow many times before, but now it looks like they are just kidding me.

Support of Sedo, July 27, 2022:

As stated numerous times previously, the transfer department will email you back once it has processed. We are unable to process your request in the Customer Support department. If you feel the email has not found our transfer department, please feel free to email them again.

This is despite the fact that I submitted an escrow request on July 18 and repeated it twice.

So I moved the escrow deal to another company, Epik. If this is not the collapse of Sedo, then what is it? I am now managing at Sedo a large sale for 25,000, and I am afraid that my client will not receive this money. In this trade, Sedo gets 15%, which is 3750, and also the deal is close to breaking, and it does not look like Sedo is making an effort to complete it.
 
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Unfortunately big companies don't seem to care when we lose deals or not. They move on 5 mins later while we have to deal with the consequences.
 
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Unfortunately big companies don't seem to care when we lose deals or not. They move on 5 mins later while we have to deal with the consequences.
That's why I left for a small company.
You can see where the last two .ai name sales were on NameBio.
 
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I noticed, and I try the same but some buyers won't even budge... and I've lost a few sales that way. They put on their mind they only want to use company x but don't want to help pay the heavy cost.
 
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I noticed, and I try the same but some buyers won't even budge... and I've lost a few sales that way. They put on their mind they only want to use company x but don't want to help pay the heavy cost.
I used to sell names using escrow.com , but then this company stopped working in Ukraine, I had to switch to Sedo, and now I have to switch to Epik. But I have not yet had clients who would refuse to work with Epik.
 
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I've had quite a few, especially less savvy ones that go search stuff they don't understand...
 
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It's also funny that Sedo does not work with the state of Texas. The Texans offered me $35k for worlds.ai , but in the end, they didn't buy it. Probably Sedo is afraid that hot Texans will shoot them for a bad job. And this has a certain meaning.
 
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That is interesting and funny xD
 
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