Aftermarket domain sales robust despite lower numbers on Go Daddy Auctions.
Last month Go Daddy Auctions sold 31,896 domain names.
That’s down from 35,094 in May. The number of domains sold on the platform has been on a downward trend for several months.
I reached out to Paul Nicks, Director – Domain Name Aftermarket at Go Daddy, to find out what’s behind the decline:
Seasonality is a factor during summer months.
We’ve also seen a direct correlation with an increase in back-order captures and a decline in closeout expired inventory sales. As back-order captures typically aren’t counted in auctions sale numbers, this shift is manifesting as a downward trend in expired domain sales.
Public sales have been increasing steadily though. We believe this is due to an increase with our buy-it-now inventory generated by recent partnerships. In May, Go Daddy set a new sales record in that arena, so we can’t equate lower expired sales with waning demand overall.
If you’re keeping score at home, sales of Premium Listings and premium listing partners’ sales (e.g. Afternic) are not included in Go Daddy Auction’s monthly numbers. Neither are domains captured with a single backorder.
Here’s a list of the top 10 sales on Go Daddy Auctions last month:
britt.com $64,980
expcapital.com $30,000
onboarding.com $20,000
paysure.com $20,000
8o.com $18,800
edx.net $18,000
sherpapetgroup.com $18,000
xod.net $18,000
outdoorguide.com $16,000
lolblog.com $15,777
One reason for sure is they let domain owners renew the names they auction off within 2-3 days after you win AND PAY FOR THE NAME. Then you wait a week or so to get your money back.
They would make less $ and sales but would have more quality and credibility to their name if they waited until the name WAS SECURED and then auctioned it off. I’ve lost many GOOD/GREAT names recently due to people getting live appraisals by doing this. Total BS, needs to be cleaned up and STOPPED. Also, GD should offer a financing option and charge interest for buyers above the fold. Another revenue stream.
That’s it for me.
Does your list of the top 10 mean the sale of WAN.com did not go through? That ended on the 29th I believe
@Chris
He does not know WAN has gone thru or not, it hadn’t changed by press time, so he did the responsible thing, and not posted it. BS sale we all know this.
@Ron
Certainly a big black eye for the GoDaddy Aftermarket if that is the case.
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Michael,
I agree that it’s annoying when someone renews a domain you have won and paid for, but, on the other hand, I have acquired some great domains for cheap, domains I might otherwise not be able to afford.
However, I do agree that this practice should stop, that auctions should end after day 45 after expiration.
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Ms Domainer,
I complete agree on both counts. It’s just something that is EASILY solved yet continues. The more it continues, the more people will abuse the system.
Otherwise, I can’t really complain because like you said, I pick up awesome names there as well. It’s just annoying and wrong.
I believe the reason they dropped is because GoDaddy changed their renewal emails.
Now, you get a big, fat red bar across the top of your email that says “YOUR DOMAIN HAS EXPRIED!!!”, or something to that effect.
That catches my attention and I think it catches other domain registrant’s attention.
I noticed as soon as they did this the quality of domains have plummeted immensely at GoDaddy. The quality plummets because the best domains are getting renewed now.
As a funny consequence, you have many people in GoDaddy now overpaying for the domains that are left. It appears to me that many domains are now selling for end-user prices, which as we all know won’t work from an investor’s vantage point. You either have to be a developer or be able to make PPC on those domains for it to viable now in many cases.
There are still some deals at GoDaddy, but I started working the GoDaddy the very first day they started selling them through auction and I have NEVER missed one singe day in all these years. What I can tell you is the days of great inventory at GoDaddy Auctions are over unless they remove that big, red banner on all Expired Domain emails.
Back to Topic…
Seasonality is a major factor in June-Aug Sales. Less eyeballs and worktime and much more play going on.