Sedo vs. Afternic

[Ronald Regging]

I was just wondering what people's experiences were with these sites. I currently have my domains parked at Sedo because it's free, but I don't mind paying the $20 for Afternic if it's a better service.

None of my domains really have tons of traffic, so I'm not really worried about the PPC differences. I just have some brandable domains that I'm trying to sell on name value alone. Just starting out in the business and want to turn a quick profit to justify my expenditures to the wife

Basically I'm wondering if people have had higher success rates with Afternic as far as getting offers and sales. I like Afternic in the sense that you can list minimum offers and the people can see it, and once the reserve is met, it turns into an auction. So I can place a domain with a reasonable reserve and then it gets more exposure once the bidding process starts (im assuming this is how it works).

So, any experiences or opinions would be helpful.

Thank you.

 

[danielr]

I got into this domain business about 3 years ago and when I started out I went for domain sales. But I never sold anything for months. I had my names listed on Afternic and parked at SEDO.

Then as time went by I started going for Traffic and PPC and gave up on Sales. I started buying names that got high PPC and names that would get type in traffic... using name variations or typos.

But in the process if building my PPC portfolio I would sell names. In the past 3 years I have sold about $12,000 sales alone. Most of these sales took place on Afternic... not because they were parked there but because i was contacted directly from the buyer (from the whois). However, my lower traffic brandable names I did park at Afternic and this let to quite some domain sales as well. I have actually sold domains on SEDO that were listing and parked on Domain Sponsor or parked on Fabulous, and I have sold names on Afternic that were parked at SEDO.

But something I believe that helps sales in the large "for sale" banner on the Aftenric landing page. However, I think having a large "for sale" banner hurts PPC. Most internet users do not know what a parked page is and dont even know the differnce betweek a domain and a website. So when they see the "for sale" banner it might spook them to think... why should I click on anything on this website when it will be sold and I cant return (here today gone tomorrow).

This is why many parked pages like SEDO have a very small print "this domain may be for sale" where Afternic has a large banner for "domain for sale".

But I dont expect my names (except for a few) to actually be found on SEDO or Afternic from a domain buyer. I only list about 30 percent of all the domains I own for sale. Many new domainers learn a hard lesson and buy domains in expectations of selling them on ebay, afternic, or sedo for extremely large values and learn some tough lessons in the doman business... I have been there and done that.

I just recently sold off a good portion of my brandable domain names (lower traffic names) to media company... note this sale was rather large and i did not factor it into the individual sales that avearged $4K per year.

 

[Easydoms]

Some very good points made in response. I agree with your comment about LARGE and SMALL for sale ads.

 

[Ronald Regging]

I really appreciate the advice danielr and I think I'm on the same path as you. I have a very small starting budget, so I've only registered 4 domains that I think are brandable and I am hoping to sell them to make some money to grow in the business. Eventually I would like to build a portfolio of PPC generating traffic sites to provide a somewhat consistent extra income. I'm not at that stage yet, I can't afford to register a huge variation of typo domains in hopes of generating traffic or to buy pre-established traffic domains. Trying to start out small in a sea full of sharks, against all odds huh?

I'm sure I will make mistakes and learn from them, but that's really what any endeavor in life entails.

I decided to list a domain for sale on Ebay just to test the waters and see if anyone was interested. I've had a few offers for a particular domain and while I would have turned a quick profit, I felt it was worth a bit more than what I was offered. Maybe not, I don't know. I just feel it has a lot of potential if developed properly and I thought there would be a lot of organizations on the end-user level who might be interested in it. So I listed it on Ebay and emailed a bunch of prospective buyers to inform them about the auction. I guess time and the general consensus of the interested parties will tell whether or not it's worth more than I was offered.

Live and learn...

 

[biggerboy]

I would list at afternic and park at sedo.

 

[loscocco]

Yeah i just got an email today from Afternic offering double my parking revenue for a month if i switch. Has anyone done this or would advise it? is there some catch?