Comments on: Why the Live Domain Auction Bombed (and Why I’m Not Surprised)

By: Domain Name Wire » News » Is It Time to Suspend the Live Domain Name Auction? - The Domain Industry's News Source

Wed, 11 Feb 2009 16:16:28 +0000

[...] the live domain auction brought in only $800,000 over two nights selling 110 domain names. It wasn’t a big surprise given the economy and what’s going on in the [...]

By: Stephen Douglas

Stephen Douglas — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 12:38:03 +0000

@Dave C – Your domains are great for content buildout for organic search, but they aren’t auction material. However, don’t fret. The domain appraisal game is a strange bird.

FYI: A high-selling phrase domain does not constitute another domain value that uses that phrase with another “noun” suffix, where you’re using the high-selling phrase as an “adjective”.

For example:

“Expert Help” is an adjective/noun. If common generic terms that make sense are used, then the phrase domain is a great brand domain for a company’s prodserv.

“Expert Help Express” is an adjective/adjective/noun. Two adjectives together in a domain creates an unwieldy longtail domain.

Turning the original valuable phrase (as an adjective/noun) into a double-adjective-noun domain adds more characters (diminishing its branding value), and dilutes the strength of the core phrase “Expert Help”.

Any dilution of a core phrase domain by turning it into an adjective to support an added noun will lessen its value exponentially based on character length and meaning. So an adjective/noun phrase domain worth $480k that is used with an additional word that turns the original phrase into an double adjective will most likely give you a very limited value domain.

By: James

James — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 23:04:27 +0000

Yes you’re right names under 10k semes be whats selling now.

Good to see .ME again did god compare to the others on the auction.

By: Andrew Allemann

Andrew Allemann — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 19:54:15 +0000

@ Dave – none of those domains belong in the live auction.

By: Domainer

Domainer — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 16:07:28 +0000

I have to agree with Bernard about the “Financial Aid” domains.

Just because XYZ.com might be worth $ 100K.
(hypothetical), does not mean that XYZAB.com should be worth $ 1K.

XYZAB.com might not be worth $ 8.

By: bernard

bernard — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 13:40:32 +0000

Dave, you are a great domain flipper! See FinancialAid.com sell for $480k, register on 10/6/2008 some great domains at Godaddy.com for $8, and sell it a few weeks later for $10k.

Wow!

By: Dave C

Dave C — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 01:44:11 +0000

Perhaps, ot also was an issue of domain quality? At T.R.A.F.F.I.C. New York, Moniker auctioned FinancialAid.com for $480K; and FinancialAide.com for $320K; I had submitted the following lesser-but-somewhat-related domains for this past week’s auction, all at less than $10K Reserve, but Moniker selected none of them, not even for their silent auction:

FINANCIALAID911.COM
FINANCIALAIDBAILOUT.COM
FINANCIALAIDFINDING.COM
FINANCIALAIDFUNDING.COM
FINANCIALAIDFUNDS.COM
FINANCIALAIDZONES.COM
FINANCIALASSISTANCEAID.COM
FINANCIALBAILOUTAID.COM
FINANCIALDISTRIBUTIONS.COM
FINANCIALSUPPORTASSISTANCE.COM
FINANCIALSUPPORTGRANTS.COM
FINANCIALSUPPORTINFO.COM