I predict three major changes at domain auction house Bido.
A week ago I wrote about the lack of high quality domain names for sale at Bido. Others agreed, and Bido co-founder Sahar Sarid chimed in. While Sarid was somewhat coy about planned changes at Bido, he dropped several hints. After reading his comments on Domain Name Wire and his five posts about accurate domain pricing on his blog, here’s what I think is in store for the site:
1. More than one domain a day. I’m not sure if this means unlimited or ten, but I suspect it will increase from the current one-a-day auction format.
2. Perhaps relaxing of $1 starting price, but a penalty if the domain doesn’t sell (see #3)
3. Incentives for sellers to submit quality domains.
The third change warrants more attention. How do you get sellers to submit quality domain names and not have to wade through thousands of worth(less) domains? I’ve written before about seller submission bias and how to solve it with economic penalties (see How to Solve Auction Submission Bias with Financial Incentives).
I can think of many options for Bido.
One is to put the onus for quality on the buyers by using the wisdom of the crowd to select domains. But Sarid’s posts seem to pin responsibility on sellers.
If you pin it on sellers, there are many approaches.
1. Refundable listing fees – charge a fee per domain that is refunded if the domain receives 2 or more bids.
2. Graduated listing fees for more promotion – the more the seller pays, the higher his or her domain shows up on the bidding list for the day.
3. Traditional listing fees, perhaps based on starting price.
There are challenges and benefits to each of these approaches. Obviously they all require proving that your auction platform attracts bidders.
I suggested to bido and sedo several months ago that there is a void in domain auctions that would attract endusers and sellers alike. That void is a lack of themed auctions which even mediocre names have the potential of selling. IE one week or month have a jewelry auction, next phone names, eco names, health insurance names,animals, farming, military, modeling the list could go on and on. with the exception of a few endusers these auctions now seem to be mostly domainer events.
Joe, I seriously doubt having a themed auction would bring in many more end users.
“How do you get sellers to submit quality domain names…”
You see it in the movies sometimes.
One person has a gun with let’s say 6 bullets and he’s holding off 100 people.
The 100 could easily overrun the gunman but nobody wants to be one of the 6 to get shot.
Similarly, no one wants to be first to submit a quality domain to an auction that starts
at $1 with no reserve and lasts just 1 hour.
It’s too risky.
To take an extreme example, how much
would Toys.com have sold for on BIDO?
IMHO BIDO will not get quality domain submissions until it can be proven that
good domains will receive good bids.
Some of the risk to the Seller has to
be removed.
As it stands, BIDO is good for Buyers.
BIDO is not good for Sellers unless you
want to sell domains you know aren’t really any good or you no longer want.
And that last sentence seems to be where it’s at, at least to me.
@ # 2 Andrew
But it sure makes advertising TO end users much easier…
This week on Bido… Loan Industry domains.. etc.
LoanDomain1.com
LoanDomain2.com
LoanDomain3.com
A couple good emails or phone calls to some specific companies and somethings can happen.
I agree on the Themed Auctions and it should really be considered!
Sahar mentioned in his latest post that the new improvements (Pre phase 2) are to be detailed in an upcoming post “The Importance Of Accurate Pricing, Part LXXVII”
I agree with #2 and #4 re: themed auctions. This would make promotion to end users a lot easier. It would also give Bido a chance to excel where the other auction houses have flagged a bit. Domainer Mardi Gras for example, only finalized their auction list about a day before the auction. No chance of end-user promotion there..
I just got the update email from bido. It only mentions improvements that while lovely, aren’t going to do anything to improve the bottom line IMHO. Some of the stuff that we speculate is coming sounds good, but none of that good stuff was in the email I got today.
Here is what I think: Bido – Sacrafice 10 of your top category killer domains, or in kinder words put them up for auction at Bido. When these domains sell for big dollars (keep your fingers crossed, at least I think they will) you will have just instilled the confidence neccessary in the rest of us so that we will be willing to put up better names than stuff like MyCabana.com and AffordableTelescopes.com.
Why would I take a risk on auctioning off a top name at Bido when you won’t? There are lots of costs in launching a business like bido, one of which is probably going to have to be the sale of some of your top domains. The good news is even though you’ll be losing some of your top names, you’ll get paid well for them (assuming they sell well). And if as a result your auction business takes off you are going to be the big winner in the end.
Bido seems to be full of great ideas, but they seem just as scared as the rest of us to auction off a 1 word category killer .com.
Sorry, I don’t intend to be so harsh, I just think it would be good for all of us if bido were successful. I’d love to help but I’m not going to be the 1st one to submit a 6 figure name, are you?