Strategy Help - GoDaddy Expiring - 5 minutes left - 0 bids

[Beezy]

Twice today I saw auctions with zero bids with 5 minutes left...I make the first bid and it triggers a bidding war both times.

Obviously this strategy is flawed? Are people seeing the bid and then jumping in? (they were good names)

Should i wait until it drops to $11?

How do you approach these auction situations?

Thanks!

 

[CrocodileDundee]

If the domain is at 6/7 minutes with no bids, just leave it and buy it when it hits the closeouts ASAP. I've noticed when I bid during those last few minutes, I always get countered.. so I stopped bidding to see who wins the domains and it was HugeDomains.com.

 

[Name Trader]

@Beezy - I wouldn't be the first one to bid. Then. If it drops to closeouts. I'd buy it at $11. Wait time is usually 1-5 minutes as [B]@CrocodileDundee[/B] already mentioned. With that method, you are not the one to start the bidding frenzy, but you still need to be quick on the closeouts, because there are probably more than just you employing the same strategy.

 

[wwwweb]

I'm going to wait and see who the owner is before I make any strategy changes. Right now I have 2 ideas...

1) Stop bidding on domains in Expired Auctions and wait for the to hit Close out.

2) If somebody with deep pockets like HugeDomains is gaming the system, I may bid on junk domains to hurt their margins. You could essentially inflate sales prices for certain niches on their dime. Say you bid on all 6L domains ending in Poo. If this "bot" keeps placing automatic bids, NameBio will report a trend of recent 6L sales ending in Poo under $100. The problem with this is somebody is going to end up getting stuck with a bunch of poo. lol

I learned this lesson last year when I saw this pattern, there is no point, you are better off taking chances in close out, then spending $100 chasing each one of these domains. In doing so, if you bid $12, then it jumps to $17, say you bid $30, then you extend another 5 minutes, you are just keeping the auction alive, getting more eyeballs, maybe you beat the $99 bid, at this point you might have exposed the name to others, who think there is something valuable there, then you have to fend them off from $100 on, just one big headache.

Most of the ones I did whois on were huge domains, I would assume they have some sort of filters to avoid junk.

I would say this theory is nonsense, but I saw it myself, and you yourself saw it. All the auctions I was in they were bid up close to $100 with that single fixed trigger bid, not counter bids. Really the only thing in common is a bid during the 5-6 minute market that provokes this single bid, almost like a mechanism.

 

[wwwweb]

Someobody has a script that picks up last minute bids, and bids upto $9x on them, it's very strange pattern, I last saw it when huge domains was bidding, just see who the winner is, if you lost out.

You are showing your cards, don't bit let it go to closeout. Somebody is gaming the system with AI based on last minute attempts by people who want a certain domain.

 

[Asfas1000]

I don't think your bid triggered anything...people wait till the last 5 minutes to bid just like you do

 

[DNVantage]

Should i wait until it drops to $11?

How do you approach these auction situations?

Waiting till last couple of minutes is standard. No seasoned bidder wants to draw attention to the name by bidding earlier.

If you really want the name, then it is too risky to wait for auction to be over without bids.

I wait for the closeout, only when I don't have funds to get into bidding war.

btw, you don't want to wait for the absolute last minute to bid, due to network lag issues. I have lost couple of domains as net connection had an intermittent glitch or increased lag. Also, server time is usually ahead of your browser page time by few seconds.

Another tip, keep logged in from two browsers, if possible from two different computers or devices. I have lost an auction due to browser crash. Rare but happens. Refreshing the page on two separate browsers is easier. ( Alt-Tab, F5, Alt-Tab, F5, Alt-Tab, F5, ...)

 

[Beezy]

For the domains that you lose out to, where do they end up? HugeDomains?

I haven't been losing out. I just spend more money. Ugh.

 

[Beezy]

If the domain is at 6/7 minutes with no bids, just leave it and buy it when it hits the closeouts ASAP. I've noticed when I bid during those last few minutes, I always get countered.. so I stopped bidding to see who wins the domains and it was HugeDomains.com.

Interesting.

How long until after the auction does the domain appear for $11 in the closeouts? I know there is always a delay.

Does hugedomains (or anyone) have a bot to grab those somehow?

I know there are google chrome extensions to alert you when a webpage changes/updates, i wonder if that would help. Hmmm..

 

[CrocodileDundee]

Delay varies, anywhere from 1 minute to 5 minutes I have found, I just sit there mashing the refresh until it appears lol. No idea about the bot, I just know when I try and snatch it I end up getting crushed and it's always by proxy bids.

 

[Beezy]

All conspiracy theories welcome in this thread

 

[m0ss]

I always wait for the domain to hit closeout unless the domain gets a bid. The it's all engines go! I really thought no one else noticed SharperFocus com today. Then with 2 min left it got 6 bidders and went for 350. Same with treessme com

When another bidder places a bid I just put a proxy bet where I evaluated the domain and check later.

 

[wwwweb]

For the domains that you lose out to, where do they end up? HugeDomains?

Is hugedomains still using this strategy it seems if you bid at the 5 minute mark, some kind of bot triggers with a $99 bid automatically, anybody else notice this?

 

[canswift]

If you wait until closeout sometimes the domain has a backorder. That means you won't get it. I've given up on GD auctions, it's too hard to find deals.

My understanding was that if someone went through GD's back-order "service", all GD did was to whomp a bid on the name as soon as it hit the expired auction listings. I don't believe GD waits to see if it goes to close-out so they can get it for their customer any cheaper.

 

[wwwweb]

It is close to it, I think it could be $97 98 99, or even upto 101

I think we have our answer, this keeps happening, as people usually bid next increment up, these keep getting bid upto the 97-105 range in one step.

If you want to let it go, you will see who owns it in a week, you might get your answer.

It is just amazing how it happens at the 5-6 minute mark, and it is just a single bid placed close to $100.

 

[joro001]

I have had this happen to me more times than I care to remember.

I simply don't buy it that over and over again with 5 minutes remaining I place a large random proxy to like $87 or so and often I get taken right up to my proxy by one main bidder and the bidder bails out making me pay up the max, or I get into a bidding war for more.

I have stopped bidding on godaddy now unless there's a name I really want which will go high anyway or as others are saying let them go to a closeout.

Frankly, godaddy has lost my trust in the auctions with these very strange bidding patterns and no bidder aliases to know what is going on.

 

[canswift]

Can anybody tell me what happened to those names in GD auctions which has starting Bid more than $12. Ex. $50 and ended up with no bids . Where they will go ?

I've followed quite a few of those listings, the ones with with higher starting bids. They do not go to closeout, but cycle round again for another 14 days at that higher starting bid. I've seen some go round and around in that 14 day cycle for months.

 

[CrocodileDundee]

For the domains that you lose out to, where do they end up? HugeDomains?

 

[johname]

They purposely make the time to $11 random to discourage waiting

 

[RU]

Don't buy domains on GD expired auctions, only closeout! IMO
I hate 'proxy bidders'.

 

[Soofi]

auctions are never fun!

 

[Domaingel]

I usually wait until the last 2 minutes to bid to avoid all the attention. Sometimes I get distracted and I come back and the auction is closed. It sucks when it keeps extending the time and each time more people notice and start bidding, so sometime I bid when there is 5m 5secs left in the auction so it doesn't increase the time.

 

[DNVantage]

so sometime I bid when there is 5m 5secs left in the auction so it doesn't increase the time.

@Domaingel, 5m 5secs is a nice tip. Usually 5 secs is more than enough but 5m 15s/30s might be safer, *depending on net connection*, cause by the time GD server gets the bid, it might be less than 5 min's. My 8 mbps connection is quite flaky when there are too many users, I get random lags of a minute or more sometimes, specially during weekends!

 

[Chris Hydrick]

Every domain I've bid on gets a bid with 6 minutes remaining. It frustrates the cheese out of me!

 

[Chris Hydrick]

Try $87 see what happens, if your comfortable owning it

Just tried it... :P

Do you assume the proxy bid is $99? Meaning a $97 bid wouldn't yield an automatic bid?