news Thank You and Good Bye Afternic.com

[AbdulBasit.com]

Hello everyone,

I think this is the longest gap I’ve taken in between two posts but I’m sure this will come as a surprise to many of my fellow domain investors that I’m leaving Afternic.com

As many of my readers know that since January 2020, I’ve been using Afternic.com price request lander. It’s been almost 6 years using them and I had an overall great experience. With all the challenges and ups and downs including economic crisis and uncertainty in global market due to wars, I still had many extra ordinary months with the help of Afternic team. It was really nice working with so many Afternic brokers and especially my rep Adam Ramsdell who did all his best he could to get the maximum sales out of my portfolio. I sincerely appreciate Adam and the entire team whoever was involved in getting the sales happen smoothly.

There are two main reasons for leaving Afternic:

1. I’m no longer interested in paying any commission.
2. Like the way I opted Afternic from Uniregistry, now I would like to prefer handling and managing the portfolio and leads myself.

Overall, it’s been a rollercoaster ride with a lot of inconsistencies which I believe is part of the business especially domain investing. It took a lot of time to think and decide about this decision but I believe now is the right time to go and move onto the next level of my domaining journey.

Currently I’m in the process of trying something new and I’ll share more details in my next post, so stay tuned.

Thank you!

 

[love4ever]

@AbdulBasit.com

I respect your decision, and I totally understand your frustration with Godaddy's greed.

But with all respect to people who are applauding this move, most of them agree with it because they hate Godaddy (most of us do), not because they believe it will be the best option.

IMO the wise thing to do is to keep your domains at Afternic & Sedo, and increase the prices to compensate for the commission difference, this way you will keep sales coming from registrars path, and use whatever lander you like.

Atom users do this and it is working fine, they list domains at Afternic at 10% higher price than Atom's landing page to compensate for the extra penalty, this way you will get the same revenue per sale regardless where the domain was sold.

Very true & 100% logic , To keep Afternic & Sedo, and increase the prices to compensate for the commission difference .

I think abdul wants something exclusive ! But a person should be logical & practical and avoid stubbornness !

I believe in this market in order you to eat ( profit ), You have to feed ( commission ) , No other way .


.

 

[AbdulBasit.com]

Very true & 100% logic , To keep Afternic & Sedo, and increase the prices to compensate for the commission difference .

I think abdul wants something exclusive ! But a person should be logical & practical and avoid stubbornness !

I believe in this market in order you to eat ( profit ), You have to feed ( commission ) , No other way .


.

Thanks for your suggestion. I can understand your point of view.
Time will tell how things are going and I'll share the results either way.

 

[alcy]

ithink the only take away here is...

less exposure can never ever result in more sales

 

[boker]

ithink the only take away here is...

less exposure can never ever result in more sales

Probably this was said to Reza, when he decided to go on his route for what latter became dan.com or Margot, from BB and others. You reach a point where you want to do everything your way. There is no progress when everybody goes on the same route.

 

[Syed Hassan Raza]

Salam sir i want to park my unused domains on afternic accoount but after parking it for 3 days it is not showing adds on my domain can you please help me out i have talked to afternic customer support but it doesn’t make a difference i registered my afternic accoount 20 days ago.Is this because my account is new or what? but i have used a go daddy 2020 registered account unfortunately after parking my domains there where also no ads on them kindly help me to resoolve this issue.

 

[JB Lions]

Probably this was said to Reza, when he decided to go on his route for what latter became dan.com or Margot, from BB and others. You reach a point where you want to do everything your way. There is no progress when everybody goes on the same route.

? He’s not building a new marketplace.

——
Seems like most domainers are engaged in self sabotage. There are some basic things people can do to get more sales.

Putting domains in the registrar path.

Offering Lease to Own option will get you more sales

Pricing your domains will get you more sales. I don’t understand Price Request, where you have to reply with a price. Why put up an unneeded hurdle when you can go ahead and put the price up from the beginning. Same with Make Offer. Most of your domains should be priced. I can understand some exceptions like your top domains or domains that could be affected by something currently happening in society.

We like to call domains Internet real estate. Well most real world real estate is priced. Just like most things in this world that are for sale, but for some reason, many domainers, don’t do this basic thing.

The basic things above = more sales

Then there is the whole other world of proactive domaining. Outbound, social media, etc. Again, will get you more sales.

 

[alcy]

Probably this was said to Reza, when he decided to go on his route for what latter became dan.com or Margot, from BB and others. You reach a point where you want to do everything your way. There is no progress when everybody goes on the same route.

I am talking about exposure vs sales

a specific singular thing

u are talking about everything in universe related or not to it.

how can this be a debate

 

[boker]

? He’s not building a new marketplace.

——
Seems like most domainers are engaged in self sabotage. There are some basic things people can do to get more sales.

Putting domains in the registrar path.

Offering Lease to Own option will get you more sales

Pricing your domains will get you more sales. I don’t understand Price Request, where you have to reply with a price. Why put up an unneeded hurdle when you can go ahead and put the price up from the beginning. Same with Make Offer. Most of your domains should be priced. I can understand some exceptions like your top domains or domains that could be affected by something currently happening in society.

We like to call domains Internet real estate. Well most real world real estate is priced. Just like most things in this world that are for sale, but for some reason, many domainers, don’t do this basic thing.

The basic things above = more sales

Then there is the whole other world of proactive domaining. Outbound, social media, etc. Again, will get you more sales.

So, you know for sure that if this step is successful he will not go ahead building his own marketplace?
11k domains with over 1k inquiries a month and around 20 sales using godaddy landers and registrar path. Do you think that he can't raise his sales, dealing directly with his buyers.
I agree with you that price request is making you loose sales, but in the same time this can help you to maximize the price it sold.
A recent example is debridge.finance owner, who was hunting for debridge.com for years. He"s selling domains that most of them will have already 2-5-20 end users already. If a guy has a company already (or just a dream) about let"s say 'tech team', he will check some registrars, he will go to the landing, he will check whois. he will even make an offer, even if a company is already using techteam.com. We are not talking mostly about 'botavo' but the buyer could choose 'botave' or alternarives. He owns 3-4 letters, or 2-3 words with specific words.

 

[boker]

I am talking about exposure vs sales

a specific singular thing

u are talking about everything in universe related or not to it.

how can this be a debate

We are all taking about the same thing at the end...how much money can you get from the same domains, no matter the way.

 

[JB Lions]

So, you know for sure that if this step is successful he will not go ahead building his own marketplace?

Your examples were people building marketplaces for everybody. That takes a lot of money and tech skill.

Somebody asked him why don’t you go ahead and do it yourself and use WordPress his reply was:

“Well, I would want people to contact for their interested domain seprately. Going to one lander and then sending query will not be clear which domain the potential buyer is interested and will need to ask first. It seems complicated.”

He’s just trying new landers/company, experimenting, not building the next Dan

 

[boker]

Your examples were people building marketplaces for everybody. That takes a lot of money and tech skill.

Somebody asked him why don’t you go ahead and do it yourself and use WordPress his reply was:

“Well, I would want people to contact for their interested domain seprately. Going to one lander and then sending query will not be clear which domain the potential buyer is interested and will need to ask first. It seems complicated.”

He’s just trying new landers/company, experimenting, not building the next Dan

Reza started the same way, do you think that Abdul or any of us would know exactly how everything will evolve over the years?

 

[boker]

Your examples were people building marketplaces for everybody. That takes a lot of money and tech skill.

Somebody asked him why don’t you go ahead and do it yourself and use WordPress his reply was:

“Well, I would want people to contact for their interested domain seprately. Going to one lander and then sending query will not be clear which domain the potential buyer is interested and will need to ask first. It seems complicated.”

He’s just trying new landers/company, experimenting, not building the next Dan

We are not even talking about repeated buys from a happy buyer, about how many people hate godaddy and will try everything to not work with them, about how how godaddy, sedo, afternic brokers can screw things up (it happened for me with a few hundreds domains, for sure it happens a lot). Also, the connections you make dealing with all kind of entrepreneurs, from tech guys to millioners.

 

[JB Lions]

We are not even talking about repeated buys from a happy buyer, about how many people hate godaddy and will try everything to not work with them, about how how godaddy, sedo, afternic brokers can screw things up (it happened for me with a few hundreds domains, for sure it happens a lot). Also, the connections you make dealing with all kind of entrepreneurs, from tech guys to millioners.

You quoted me twice, responding, talking about other things. And it seems like you’re not reading what he wrote/what I quoted. Why not just ask him.

 

[boker]

You quoted me twice, responding talking about other things.

The first quote was the reply, the second was just a few other arguments meant to you and I didn't wanted to mix them up.

 

[tradenameNet]

How about start a AI tool for end user: hey Abdul, I am looking for a domain in stuffed animal design business. My budget is $10,000. Can you recommend ? I can wait 3 months. You can negotiate on my behalf. I don’t mind what extension it is. I like it to be short , maybe shorter than 8 characters. …..
Abdul ( thinking and running ): Here are possible domains , I am also negotiating with Mark Mann on stuffed.com see if he can lower his price. Also I see these domains are developed but not used actively. Let me talk to them see if they are willing to sell …

 

[AEProgram]

So, you know for sure that if this step is successful he will not go ahead building his own marketplace?
11k domains with over 1k inquiries a month and around 20 sales using godaddy landers and registrar path. Do you think that he can't raise his sales, dealing directly with his buyers.
I agree with you that price request is making you loose sales, but in the same time this can help you to maximize the price it sold.
A recent example is debridge.finance owner, who was hunting for debridge.com for years. He"s selling domains that most of them will have already 2-5-20 end users already. If a guy has a company already (or just a dream) about let"s say 'tech team', he will check some registrars, he will go to the landing, he will check whois. he will even make an offer, even if a company is already using techteam.com. We are not talking mostly about 'botavo' but the buyer could choose 'botave' or alternarives. He owns 3-4 letters, or 2-3 words with specific words.

One thing he will find out very fast is how many of those 1k inquires were bots. If he has good names, which the sample that he shared seemed to be really good, he will have more bots inquires. It's not that the bots are targeting good domains, it's just that those names usually were once websites or linked to a lot so bots are more likely to hit those sites and fill out forms, click buttons and create a lead.

My bet is he is in for a shock with the serious drop in leads but I think he will do the same amount of sales, his names seem to be ones that people think of and go type it in to check if it's available.

 

[boker]

One thing he will find out very fast is how many of those 1k inquires were bots. If he has good names, which the sample that he shared seemed to be really good, he will have more bots inquires. It's not that the bots are targeting good domains, it's just that those names usually were once websites or linked to a lot so bots are more likely to hit those sites and fill out forms, click buttons and create a lead.

My bet is he is in for a shock with the serious drop in leads but I think he will do the same amount of sales, his names seem to be ones that people think of and go type it in to check if it's available.

I think the same, lots of the 1500 leads where bots or price request, domainers and not only. hunting for something cheap. But 20 sales with 11k domains it can be done only with the landing page. If I would be in his place, I would put BIN on domains under 5-7 k and the landing page set it as a small marketplace, atom or BB style, when you get another 20-30 suggestions from his own names, when a buyer doesn't like the price or looking for ideas, but this is his choice and he has time to test everything in 6-12 months.

 

[Digital Kush]

Then moving to Efty.com?
Their listing process is based on monthly subscription?

 

[AbdulBasit.com]

Then moving to Efty.com?
Their listing process is based on monthly subscription?

Yeah, I've moved the domains to Efty "price request" lander - https://www.abdulbasit.com/domaining/moved-all-domains-to-efty-lander

Their subscription is based on monthly and yearly. No commission until you use their EftyPay (5%).

 

[MasterOfMyDomains]

Their writing your autobiography Abdul
They have it all figured out for you lol
Many benefits to going solo
Interact with the end abusers
Less commission
Learn a new angle
No stalled leads.
Maybe a new career path
And you all think he is broke, terrible financial decision.
He will crawl back to afterdan.
Best thing he could have done. Dump daddy. But leave your names at afternic, just not for sale or drop listers will feast.

Best of luck, thanks for sharing your past and present ventures

Not a big fan of price on request but look forward to numbers you share.

This domain may be for sale
but
Price on request
Kinda says its for sale

Gooogle index.ing?