Handicapping Today’s Moniker Live Domain Auction
Wednesday, April 29th, 2009
Many high quality domain names in today’s auction.
Today’s live domain name auction by Moniker at the TRAFFIC conference is scheduled to start at 3 p.m. local time (6 p.m. EDT).
Moniker did a good job getting some high quality domain names at low reserves. Will it be enough?
Attendance at this show is down considerably from past TRAFFIC shows. Word is that about 250 people registered for the show but fewer may actually be there. Thankfully, bidders can participate online. Moniker also improved its online catalog, allowing you to search by category, number of characters, and reserve range. (Now if only it will improve its extended auction bidding interface in SnapNames.)
Here are some of my picks for the auction:
Announced.com – no reserve – at no reserve, this one will surely sell. It’s a great domain for a press release service. Announce.com sold for $90,000 at Sedo in 2006.
Reelect.com – under $5,000 – wouldn’t it be great to see a politician use this?
SaveforCollege.com – $10k-$25k – SavingForCollege.com is a popular web site owned by BankRate.com, and I’ve found people tend to search for “saving for college” instead of “save for college”. But if this domain is near the low end of the reserve range it might be worth it, especially since the domain appears to get 500 type-ins a month.
Punks.com – under $5,000 – at this price the domain is worth it for the wildcat potential.
Sued.com – under $5,000 – a law firm should pick this up in a heartbeat. An investor should, too.
IndianaForeclosures.com – under $5,000 – worth every penny
Here are some domains I don’t like at the indicated prices:
Fixture.com $25k-$50k – I just don’t see how you would use it. If it were Fixtures.com it might work, but people probably want a more specific product.
MarketingFirm.com $50k-$100k – Any end user who would eventually buy this domain name shouldn’t be in the marketing business. Marketing firms need to have a brand.
UsedHummers.com – how did this make it through the trademark filter?
UsedMaseratis.com – again, trademark?
DomainAuction.com – $100k-$250k – Well, I suppose this is being sold to end users by being in this auction, but I don’t think it’s worth that much.
ComedyClub.com – $50,000-$100,000 – Similar to a marketing firm, this domain would be better as a plural and a directory of clubs.
CaliforniaCommercialRealEstate.com – I understand the niched, but this is too long for anything except SEO purposes. And when it comes to SEO, you could just buy the same thing with hyphens.
Further Reading:
- Moniker’s Live Domain Auction Looks Like a Winner
- Moniker Auction: Live Chat and My Thoughts
- Observations from Moniker’s Live Auction
Tags: live domain auction, Moniker, traffic
Off the topic, but can anyone sell names on namejet.com now? Toxic.com auction going on there but it expires on 2015. Any news on this please?
@Domainer – Not “anyone”, but they’re opening it up somewhat
I think Sports.info at 5-10k reserve is very nice.
Very valid points Andrew. Although you could argue that those Used Car domains could not be used for infringing, they are a bit sketchy. Oh yea, also, you’d need to actually have a used hummer dealership to pull it off. No good for the investor.
NYC.tel is one I’ll be watching closely, but it could be too early in the game to jump such a high reserve price
.tel has so far received little hype compared to the .mobi launch.
Announce or announced both PPC sites after all these years. Grand visions of what something could be are of no value unless you have the knowledge and resources to implement them. When it was a PPC era, domains could be likened to real estate. But now it’s different. Someone wanting to build a business starts with a plan and idea motivated by ROI. They don’t just drop $100K on a name and decide to build a business around it on a flash of inspiration that it would make a great wedding announcement service. And that’s why the domain industry is at a stalemate (or as I call it “tag your it” in an economy when you don’t want to be “it”).
You can buy four houses in Detroit for $90K right now. No one can show me a spreadsheet that makes a business case why domains are great investments. This is, after all, 10-15 years later and corporations are just NOT buying the story.
I am the owner of IndianaForeclosures.com which you mentioned under $5,000 “worth every penny”.
I appreciate the publicity on that but it did not sell which I am really surprised at. I know it’s a tough economy right now but there is never a hotter time than foreclosures.
I did sell ForeclosureRefinance.com though so all was not lost. It’s a great time to buy. Lot’s of deals out there.
Thanks, Jim
Jim, I’ll take a look at that one in the extended auction