Atom marketplace (formerly Squadhelp Marketplace)

[JudgeMind]

Hey Folks,

I've just started using squadhelp.com to list some of my brandable. So far I have 76 domains listed, there is no fee to list. I've had some decent action so far in the way of interested buyers but no sales as of yet. I've only been with them for 1 week now.

A bit of a summary review of SquadHelp:

PROS

• No Listing fee
• No Logo design fee
• Ability to submit your names to end users holding naming contests
• Ability to chat directly or send a message directly to end users.
• Stats of your marketplace domains are shown in the marketplace dashboard.
• Their customer service and support has been great, 24hr a day chat.
• Ability to increase or decrease the list price of your domains or to show a discount. You can decrease or increase the price yourself by $200. If you want to lower more, you can contact support.
• End users can shortlist your domains before they make a decision on which they want to purchase. The number of shortlists is shown in you marketplace dashboard.
• When you submit your names you get to set the price you wish to get. Because their commissions are high I recommend listing at a higher price to offset the commission costs.
• Their landing pages are fairly basic but they work. Because the marketplace is fairly new, I'm sure we will see style improvements in the future.
• One thing I really like is they accept multiple extensions. I have listed .co and .io along with .com
• Each seller gets a direct link to their marketplace portfolio, HERES MY PORTFOLIO. It is handy if your trying to p[promote your portfolio through social media.
• I like that their marketplace doesn't have tens of thousands domain listings like BB. They are fairly strict on the domains they accept to list and so this helps keep the number of domains in the marketplace down and gets your listings more exposure.

CONS

• Their commissions are very high, depending on the domain name they are usually between 30% and 35%. However, there are no listing fees, no logo design fees, so in the end their commission is very similar to brand buckets.
• Their logos are not top quality, in fact I requested to have some of my logos remade.
• I think they have a big backlog of logos to design, the wait time for logo design has been around 1 week, but your names are still listed while the logos are being designed.
• After your names are accepted you need to agree to their commission rate, at this point you also need to apply your own keywords, descriptions etc. I found this was very time consuming.

 

[JudgeMind]

‪Some of my colleagues with 200-600 name premium listing portfolios have left squadhelp in the last couple of months. They felt the marketplace was too saturated and they weren’t getting exposure. Exposure = sales.. they had no sales for months.‬

so those who are experiencing slow or no sales are not alone. Hoping sh can work to help sellers get more exposure.

 

[wwwulff]

I have worse experience here I am now sitting on 502 premium domains but no sales for me in last 6 months!!

WOW - That's incomprehensible, sorry for you

 

[Charybdis]

I have worse experience here I am now sitting on 502 premium domains but no sales for me in last 6 months!!

Have you listed all 502 domains on the Afternic Fast Transfer network? Is Fast Transfer turned on for all domains?

 

[synecdoche]

‪Some of my colleagues with 200-600 name premium listing portfolios have left squadhelp in the last couple of months. They felt the marketplace was too saturated and they weren’t getting exposure. Exposure = sales.. they had no sales for months.‬

so those who are experiencing slow or no sales are not alone. Hoping sh can work to help sellers get more exposure.

I am assuming all the SH premium names are already on Afternic FT and already on SEDO (through SH syndication). The only variable to play with is the landing page. What would be the realistic options if one had to take all the names away from SH - my sense is DAN or NS3/NS4 or NS5/NS6 are the only different possibilities. Not sure how much an impact this change will have, considering that names are already on Afternic and SEDO. Maybe pricing can be made more flexible, as an additional lever.

Anyways, similar boat here, 130 premium names at SH, and my last sale was in October 2020. The only action I have taken is stopped adding names and pointing any new names to DAN.

 

[Charybdis]

I am assuming all the SH premium names are already on Afternic FT

No, you have to manually add your domains to Afternic (before authorizing them first on Squadhelp for Afternic listing).

Only SH-owned domains are syndicated to Afternic by default, although I checked my SH-owned names and not all of them were on the Fast Transfer network.

 

[Ostrados]

Have you listed all 502 domains on the Afternic Fast Transfer network? Is Fast Transfer turned on for all domains?

Yes all listed at Afternic.. the funny thing is that I get regular sales at Afternic and I have to pay SH commission on these sales!

So I have no sales from SH platform for the last 6 months but I still pay commission on my SH domains sold at Afternic during that period. Which means SH for me now is more a liability, they are just lowering my net profit without contributing to my sales. It is obvious that nothing will improve and I think it is time to leave SH.

 

[Ostrados]

WOW - That's incomprehensible, sorry for you

Yup I think my yearly STR now is lower than 1% which is unbelievable!

 

[Charybdis]

Yes all listed at Afternic.. the funny thing is that I get regular sales at Afternic and I have to pay SH commission on these sales!

So I have no sales from SH platform for the last 6 months but I still pay commission on my SH domains sold at Afternic during that period. Which means SH for me now is more a liability, they are just lowering my net profit without contributing to my sales. It is obvious that nothing will improve and I think it is time to leave SH.

I read that if you have 501 or more domains at Squadhelp, then they offer this service for free: "Complimentary Portfolio/ Best Practices Review by SH Marketplace Consultant" - have you tried this? Is it any useful?

 

[Ostrados]

I read that if you have 501 or more domains at Squadhelp, then they offer this service for free: "Complimentary Portfolio/ Best Practices Review by SH Marketplace Consultant" - have you tried this? Is it any useful?

No I didn't try because I already know the best practises, I have everything 100% optimized including: description, root words, possible uses, visual images..etc.

SH worked for me very well in the past using same strategy, the reason it is stopped working is over saturation in the marketplace, and sadly there is no cure or workaround for that problem.

 

[Charybdis]

No I didn't try because I already know the best practises, I have everything 100% optimized including: description, root words, possible uses, visual images..etc.

SH worked for me very well in the past using same strategy, the reason it is stopped working is over saturation in the marketplace, and sadly there is no cure or workaround for that problem.

But if it's really free, then it couldn't hurt to try. Maybe they could share some statistics with you which are not available in your account. I guess you don't need to follow their advice if you don't agree with them.

And maybe the competition is fierce now and if other sellers publish similar names like yours but at lower rates, then you should lower your rates too, or wait longer to sell the domains.

 

[NameWell]

But if it's really free, then it couldn't hurt to try. Maybe they could share some statistics with you which are not available in your account. I guess you don't need to follow their advice if you don't agree with them.

And maybe the competition is fierce now and if other sellers publish similar names like yours but at lower rates, then you should lower your rates too, or wait longer to sell the domains.

I'm curious about that too, but I need to grow my portfolio a bit more before I'll be able to use it So if you'll decide to try it please share your experience here.

 

[Recons.Com]

But if it's really free, then it couldn't hurt to try. Maybe they could share some statistics with you which are not available in your account. I guess you don't need to follow their advice if you don't agree with them.

And maybe the competition is fierce now and if other sellers publish similar names like yours but at lower rates, then you should lower your rates too, or wait longer to sell the domains.

In theory, it could hurt if you consider that the owner could be better at it than the hired staff that probably doesn't have any formal education or super qualifications in the field and that the owner has way higher skin in the game. Plus he knows his names better. That is the reason he bought them.

 

[Charybdis]

In theory, it could hurt if you consider that the owner could be better at it than the hired staff that probably doesn't have any formal education or super qualifications in the field and that the owner has way higher skin in the game. Plus he knows his names better. That is the reason he bought them.

Maybe the SH consultant can see all the previous sales data on the Squadhelp platform and maybe the consultant could suggest to lower the prices, I don't know. If the consultant has access to a larger dataset then he could offer unique insights.

Anyway, if the service is free, then it shouldn't hurt to try it.

 

[Ariff BD]

March Squadhelp/afternic Sales

.com

BlueTriton $1999 - afternic (squadhelp listed)
NutriQore - $2199 SH premium
JadeAndRose - $2429 SH premium
SharpHawk - $1699 SH premium
urfashionstore - $499 - Sedo SH WLM

.ly

Start - $6799 SH premium

.ca
VitaminShop $3300 (WLM)

Show attachment 187368

You Sold .ca in squadhelp? Standard Listing?

 

[Recons.Com]

Maybe the SH consultant can see all the previous sales data on the Squadhelp platform and maybe the consultant could suggest to lower the prices, I don't know. If the consultant has access to a larger dataset then he could offer unique insights.

Anyway, if the service is free, then it shouldn't hurt to try it.

Yeah, people who could understand branding to that level and handle data analytics like that would command salaries way higher than a small company like SH can afford.

And lowering prices is not desirable given that they probably priced many names lower and they take 30-35% of the money.

 

[OnlineDomainShop]

I have around 350 premium domains at squadhelp, Last month i sold a name after 9 days of hand reg for 2499$ , exposure is less but sometimes it worked for me. I paid 35% commission to squadhelp for the sale but still happy due to quick turnover.

SH seems slow but i think worth it. Patience is the key.

 

[br1ll1on]

I have around 350 premium domains at squadhelp, Last month i sold a name after 9 days of hand reg for 2499$ , exposure is less but sometimes it worked for me. I paid 35% commission to squadhelp for the sale but still happy due to quick turnover.

SH seems slow but i think worth it. Patience is the key.

is that the only sale you've had on SH this year?

 

[OnlineDomainShop]

is that the only sale you've had on SH this year?

2 sales in last 3 months.

 

[Recons.Com]

I have around 350 premium domains at squadhelp, Last month i sold a name after 9 days of hand reg for 2499$ , exposure is less but sometimes it worked for me. I paid 35% commission to squadhelp for the sale but still happy due to quick turnover.

SH seems slow but i think worth it. Patience is the key.

With 350 names and 3-5% str everyone was hoping to get at least, you should be getting 1-2 sales every month from them.

Time to state the obvious: bb, bp, sh are dying out.

It is the business model where growth leads to death and scaling up doesn't work beyond 20k-40k names.

 

[br1ll1on]

2 sales in last 3 months.

out of 350 I have 60 premium as of now (started domaining late November) with 0 sale on SH but strangely enough I've had 6 sales on DAN and Afternic this year (out of 236)... maybe SH isn't all that top tier or maybe I just need bigger portfolio

 

[OnlineDomainShop]

out of 350 I have 60 premium as of now (started domaining late November) with 0 sale on SH but strangely enough I've had 6 sales on DAN and Afternic this year (out of 236)... maybe SH isn't all that top tier or maybe I just need bigger portfolio

Yes overall ctr is very low , As far as i know there are sellers with even 8k names and unlimited boosting options at squadhelp which is a night mare for small portfolio owners like me. I've never seen my any domain on first page of squadhelp results.

 

[br1ll1on]

Yes overall ctr is very low , As far as i know there are sellers with even 8k names and unlimited boosting options at squadhelp which is a night mare for small portfolio owners like me. I have never saw my any domain on first page of squadhelp results.

me neither, never on first page even when I tried super boost ... I think I'll just hold at 60 and divert new listings to DAN and afternic

 

[karmaco]

Maybe the SH consultant can see all the previous sales data on the Squadhelp platform and maybe the consultant could suggest to lower the prices, I don't know. If the consultant has access to a larger dataset then he could offer unique insights.

Anyway, if the service is free, then it shouldn't hurt to try it.

Aren’t marketplaces charging astronomical commish supposed to help you get higher prices not lower prices? You go any lower you might as well sell on your own imo.

 

[JudgeMind]

Not sure how much an impact this change will have, considering that names are already on Afternic and SEDO

I don’t think it would have much impact on STR. Point is, they are saving 10%~15% on commission and achieving 2-3% STR just by using afternic. The similar STR they had when they were using sh.

for me, the current STR I have is above what I would achieve by strictly using afternic landers.

 

[Recons.Com]

for me, the current STR I have is above what I would achieve by strictly using afternic landers.

For now, probably. As, even for you, I believe it has been trending downwards considerably.