Moniker SES: Steals of the Year
Thursday, August 21st, 2008
If you didn’t bid in Moniker’s SES auction, you missed out on some great deals.
If you haven’t already heard, Moniker’s live auction at Search Engine Strategies in San Jose was a flop. It’s just further proof that selling domains to non-domainers (unless they are into adult) is a challenge. The official tally on Moniker’s web site is about $16,000 in sales. It doesn’t include a sale of Groceries.us which appeared sold in the auction for $4,000 but isn’t on the list for some reason.
But domainers that didn’t log in to bid in this auction — including me — made a huge mistake. There were a ton of great deals to be had. If you read Domain Name Wire often, you know that my pet peeve is when people say a domain sold at auction “was a great deal”. This time, however, those people are absolutely right. Check out these prices:
ConsultingCompany.com $2,100
AirlineUpgrades.com $700
AirlineClubs.com $600
CobraPolicy.com $400
UpstreamProvider.com $300
Anyway you look at these, they are great deals. I especially like AirlineClubs.com at $600.
All is not lost if you didn’t log in for the live auction. The extended online auction runs through August 28. Because the online auction will utilize the SnapNames platform with its huge domainer base, I wouldn’t be surprised if these domains would have performed better in the online auction than the live auction.
Further Reading:
- $2.6 Million Social.com Sale Could Make Moniker Auction a Big One
- Moniker Live Domain Name Auction Today in Santa Monica
- Moniker Accepting Submissions for Premium Year-End Auction
Tags: Moniker, Search Engine Strategies, SnapNames
I wish they would build a module that allows me to bid without having to install Windows on my machine.
Andrew
Airlineclubs.com $600 my purchase
You are missing a ton of sales… For instance ad.com sold for a few hundred thousand as did many others.
Matt
ad.com did not sell
Nice grab Michael!
Elliot, if we let all Mac users bid then it would be more competition for us
The funny thing is a few years ago people would have told you Mac’s aren’t real computers. That has all changed.
Congrats Michael.
Among the good deals IMO was EarlyBirdDiscounts.com for $200.
The Affiliate Summit auction closes today and although 8,800 domains is an extraordinary number of domains to look through, the reserve prices are the lowest I have seen in years!
There are definately bargains to be had if one is interested. I have a number of domains in the auction, (they can be are specific affiliate niche sites and can be searced under the keyword affiliates and affiliate) that get traffic, are listed #1-4 on Google’s first page, have great page rank and earn revenue, but there is no where on the auction site to display this key information.
I also wrote to my sales rep and Monte about the public relations effort on this auction and was told that they had notices on the Affiliate Summit site, Moniker and SnapNames site. Forgive me, but that is not a PR strategy in my opinion.
Years back,I invented a number of product for the juvenile market – including the Peek-A-Boo Cover. This is the baby blanket that fits over the infant car seats with elastic and has the opening for the baby’s face to peak thru.
It is selling across the world now. In 1993 it was unheard of so hired a PR company to spread the word. For about $15,000 we were featured on “The Gadget Guru”, Good Morning America, countless local TV and radio shows,over 200 newspapers including the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal, 18 magazines 6 trade journals (a couple of the same ones more than once!) and my most proud achievment Inventor’s Digest!
In fact while I was at the JPMA trade show in Dallas the local tv station did an interview at my booth on the trade show!
That is the power of a good PR firm. It really works to get the word out to all distribution channels, and from every angle.
They pitched it from the inventor, mom in business, women business owner, kids on the go, luxury baby item angle etc…
This is the kind of effort that these kinds of auctions need. I think that we all would be willing to pay a higher sales commission if it meant that it would translate into some promotional effort beyond what is currently being done.
Does anybody else feel the same way? I know that it is a touchy subject to critique the very people who can veto your names being in the auction. But then again I don’t think that they are going to black ball you for offering ideas.
Yes some good pickups I would say.
It prompted me to check on airlineclubs.co.uk & airlineupgrades.co.uk and to my surprise they were still available!
Well not anymore
It is a buyers market after all.
Ed
http://www.ozdomainer.com
Kelly – I agree with you that better marketing is needed. However, until Moniker proves they can do it, why list anything for sale with them?
Fizz
EarlyBirdDiscounts.com for $200 that was me as well. Those were my 2 pickups.
GPS,
First, very cool website. I bookmarked it because I had no idea that they had voice- activated GPS available. We have taken our GPS with us when traveling and while she “talks” incessantly to us, it is very difficult to program while you are driving. I think that having one that you can program by talking to it would be a huge advantage.
The reason I continue to list with Moniker is that I have really believed all along that being the first in the marketplace, they “got it”. I questioned some of their decisions and chalked it up to expansion and mergers etc… I really have had a lot of faith in their ability to adapt with the changing landscape. Hopefully, they will realize too that there is some room for improvement and consider some changes.
One option might be for Monte to start his own blog ala Frager Factor and try and jump the industry barriers. He certainly has the personality and finesse to do it, and I think it would do wonders for the auctions and the conferences. I wish Rick was still blogging….There is so much opportunity to cross market in social networking via RSS feeds etc…but now I am just rehashing Frager again.
Could somebody at Moniker/SnapNames hire Owen Frager and get domaining in the mainstream?????
Kelly,
Got it, thanks for sharing your point of view and creative thinking.
Re: the website……you’re too kind! I think it’s the product that’s cool, not the website! It’s attempt #1 at teaching myself to develop……….it leaves a little bit to be desired, but you’ve got to start somewhere.
Wow, this must have been painful to sit through.
I read a fair amount of SEO blogs, and didn’t see much chatter about this auction out there.
CobraPolicy.com $400
UpstreamProvider.com $300
I think these prices are more than fair. Doesn’t look like they were cheap.
AirlineClubs is definitely good deal.
Jobsourcing.com for $400? Somebody just hung themself.
That’s the steal of the SES domain auction.
And Andrew, it’s been over 15 years since any knowledgeable IT person has said that the Mac is a “toy”. I remember in 1990 talking to a salesperson at Egghead who thought that Mac’s couldn’t be “upgraded”.
Now, I run Window’s apps on my Mac Dual Core Xeon about 15% faster than the best PC. Yep, Mac runs both Mac OS and Windows — God forbid PC users have to really *ahem* upgrade to Vista. Muuuuuhahahahaha!
Good article, Andy. By the way, I never complimented you on Kesmodel’s “inside info” on your domaining history. I don’t think 90% of your readers realize how influential you have been in the domain industry.
Stephen,
I remember my freshman economics class in 1996. The professor asked if anyone had a mac. A couple people (out of several hundred) raised their hands. He joked that macs weren’t really computers, and his tutorials were only available on PC. Of course, that’s when we got them on 3.5″ disks.
But I don’t want to turn this into a Mac discussion
Thanks on the book reference too.
Ok. No Mac discussions. We win.
Yeah, that book unlocked a few treasure chests, didn’t it?
Stephen – yeah, that’s an understatement. Kesmodel did an incredible job. No one has researched the domain industry with such vigor as he did.
Wow, thanks for the article and the comments. I was considering the NY traffic show for selling my domain. Not any more. Where would you guys recommend selling a premium domain… “deposits.com” ?
Curtis,
TRAFFIC is still the best place to sell a great generic domain like Deposits.com. While Moniker/Snapnames handles the auctions at these events that we have been discussing, and may not have focused enough on promoting them as all of us would expect, given the huge potential upside for all involved… The Traffic show is a different animal altogether.
I would suggest that you contact Rick Schwartz about putting your domain up for auction and see what he says about a suggested reserve price. Then I would ask him what methods they will use to promote your domain on your behalf in order to insure that you get the right eyeballs at the auction.
Good luck to you! Awesome domain!
Thanks Kelly! I will do just that.
If you’re interested, I’ll keep you posted on what happens.
Please keep me posted! I have very high regards for Rick, and I think that he will definately make sure you get the most money possible. I am very surprised that you haven’t received more offers on Sedo…
I agree with Kelly. This was mostly a venue problem with SES.
And Moniker has adjusted its auctions terms to make them more favorable to sellers now.
[...] you viewed the results from Moniker’s auction at Search Engine Strategies, you may have thought that no search engine optimizers (SEOs) understand the value of a good domain [...]