As of time of publication, 24 domain names have bids.
The auctions expire over the next three days with Sunday having the most closing auctions.
This is a ground breaking auction in some ways since it’s the 1st auction I can remember anyone selling all the domains based off of a metric.
Ok just so we are all clear here Verisign provides this Data Analyzer Traffic Score report on a daily basis to any and all ICANN accredited registrars that request it.
Oversee.net owns more than one registrar and therefore can and obviously gets the report.
The program has been around a while, I want to say for at least 6 months but it could be longer.
The purpose of the data release is to encourage more registrations of dropped domains, after all the more .com registrations the more Verisign makes.
So Verisign isn’t just doing it to do it, they are doing it to increase registrations and therefore their bottom line.
Nothing wrong with that.
The assumption is if a domain has a high score its going to have traffic and going to be worth registering for less than $8.
But it’s just an assumption.
Like other measuring tools, like Alexa.com traffic data can be inaccurate and certainly not all traffic is created equal.
So a drop name with traffic may have as its source of traffic; bot traffic, spam traffic or other monetize-able traffic.
Now its a fair assumption that SnapNames has been taking advantage of the list, registering domains on the drop and now has the benefit of seeing the traffic on the domains it registered.
Remember there is no more tasting so basically if you register a domain that you think has traffic to find out it has none, you own it.
Now they have put up over 600 domains they registered based off of Verisign’s info but have had the benefit of tasting the traffic for a couple of days as a quick check of these domains find most were registered on June 1.
So again a fair assumption is that these domains maybe didn’t have the traffic or at least monetize-able traffic and therefore Oversee is now selling them for 7x their cost.
Smart Business.
Of course they know they aren’t going to sell a large percentage but they are trying to recoup some of their registration fees for what I’m guessing is dead inventory.
For every 1 they sell they cover the cost of 10.
So here the point of the post, since Snapames is promoting these domains as having a high Verisign Score, basically selling domains based on metrics not on quality, then Snapnames.com should be giving you parking stats as well, at least visitor counts.
While SnapNames is giving allowing you to see the Verisign Score for each, what they aren’t showing you, which IMHO they also should be showing you is at least one day of parking stats.
After all the domains are parked.
By DomainSponsor another OverSee.net company.
So Snapnames has those stats.
They should be disclosed alongside the Verisign score.
If your going to sell domains by metrics alone then disclose all the metrics and let the buyer decide.
Just my opinion.
Agree, should be transparent but as they say it is “caveat emptor”
Buy at your own risk.
If we can assume that if Oversee makes smart business decisions then the logical assumption is that they already considered this and decided the auction is more likely to be a greater success without the full metrics. Ergo logically the stats wouldn’t be that impressive. So I agree with you Mike, and for that reason it’s probably not a great idea to bid for the “traffic” alone.
Just browsed the list. There’s a name with no bids I sold for $500 on snap before. Checked the old parking stats and nada – 1 uv a week.
This is nothing different from what Sedo, GoDaddy, And Dynadot is doing with their own traffic stats and valuations. They’re all exaggerated to the max.
By the way, DynaDot provides this data free to larger clients (it’s a fairly low threshold, worth checking out).
I registered some domains based on the data when VeriSign’s service first came out. I’d say it’s directionally correct, but almost all the domains are just expired sites. I got a ton of 404 traffic on the domains but made little revenue.
The only reason this pathetic ‘game’ exists is because too many campaign managers still don’t know how to opt out of domain/content network traffic… And of those that do, a full half of them are incapable of calculating analytics in terms of conversion and ROI, so they happily buy the worthless garbage traffic because G salts it with just enough desirable stuff to keep their campaign running black- barely… but sometimes, not.
As the game becomes more and more efficient, we will all look back in this point in “the history of marketable traffic” and chuckle at how people could’ve been so dumb.
Go to that snapnames list, look it over…
Now, imagine you’re a business. Hell, pick a business, any business. Peruse that list of horseshit “system gaming” domains and tell me what business you run that might want to pay for the traffic originating from ANYTHING on that list.
And I’ll just say this… It’s amusing to see some of the long standing garbitrage assholes suddenly “find religion” on the issue of distinguishing quality traffic. As peddlers of that swill for years, they’re suddenly interested in offering up something decent to the upstream client, now that parking took a dump.
Oops. upstream = downstream
Michael,
You own a registrar and this information has been available free to registrars for awhile.
Have you registered any domains using this database and what were your results?
I disagree with this all together. Snapnames, Moniker and Oversee are private companies and can auction off names however they like. The Verisign data has been used for years by many domainers and regardless of whatever metrics they show why do many domainers feel entitled to have all the information.
Almost 99% of this names are worthless and the use of the term “Generic Word Strength” is a joke but how about the other auctions which happen every day that people bid on using thier own tools for valuation.
All Snapnames is giving here is another value to figure. They are not selling the names based on a revenue multiple and if they were someone would complain what revenue factor they are using.
As much as I’d love to see auctions with traffic stats I think this is a pure example of how many domainers believe they are owed something by the auction houses which in fact they are not. If you dont like what you see then dont buy it.
Some will argue thats its better for the auction if they disclose revenue however who’s company and business plan is it? Not yours or mine but SnapNames.
I personally dont have a problem with this.
Meyer
I played with the list for a few days registered some domains, but felt like it wasn’t the best expenditure of a lot of time.
Oversee is a criminal enterprise that is weeks away from bankruptcy
I understand the point that stats would help but any traffic these names get most likely will be fleeting. Thus, stats would be meaningless anyway.
With so many good names dropping every day now and with all the resources Oversee has access to, I am astonished that they can’t get better names than these.
I spend a total of 30 minutes each day assembling a list and dropcatching and can run circles around Oversee. Here is a list of catches from the past 2 days.
5×10.com
drugrehabpa.com
disdainfully.com
hdmiconverters.com
bulimiasupport.com
ecommercearticles.com
401klimit.com
dictaphonetranscriber.com
writingnotebook.com
h1n1facts.com
did this traffic data program start after economically feasible tasting was put to rest?
dodd-frank authorises awards to whistleblowers. 30% over 1M.
whistleblowing for profit.
“Now its a fair assumption that SnapNames has been taking advantage of the list, registering domains on the drop and now has the benefit of seeing the traffic on the domains it registered.
Remember there is no more tasting so basically if you register a domain that you think has traffic to find out it has none, you own it.
Now they have put up over 600 domains they registered based off of VeriSign’s info but have had the benefit of tasting the traffic for a couple of days as a quick check of these domains find most were registered on June 1.
So again a fair assumption is that these domains maybe didn’t have the traffic or at least monetize-able traffic and therefore Oversee is now selling them for 7x their cost.
Smart Business.”
——————————————–
I have a question …or two, if as you said there is no more tasting and snapnames had to pay the full reg fee for all these domains then why are the majority of them no longer registered according to verisign’s whois today ?
If most were registered by snapnames on June 1 2011 then they should show as being reg’d until 2012 if they sold or not.
There were a small few that showed a 2012 reg date but from the ones I just looked at it is not the majority or even close to it.
I guess there could be a number of reasons but any ideas what’s the right one?
I’m pretty sure I checked a sample from the right list but to be honest the names were so unmemorable I’m not 100% sure now, all I did was refresh the snap page right after the end of the auction, then copied it. 😉
Do any of these ring a bell for you? These are all available today according to verisigh’s whois and were all taken from the snapnames page.
blackfoto.com ————- No match for domain
blackmailorder.com ——- No match for domain
bluefaq.com ——- No match for domain
bluenoel.com —– No match for domain
bluetaste.com ——– No match for domain
dentonhealthcare.com – No match for domain
echocottage.com ——- No match for domain
monsterweapons.com —– No match for domain
fortunefrog.com ——– No match for domain
gotoanguilla.com ———– No match for domain
helloalgeria.com ——– No match for domain
hitechspot.com ———– No match for domain
honolulugolfcourses.com ——- No match for domain
insideresort.com —No match for domain
interestcarloan.com —- No match for domain
ipoone.com ———- No match for domain
ipsrc.com ———– No match for domain
ishmo.com —-No match for domain
isomalia.com ——– No match for domain
issix.com ——– No match for domain
isthree.com ———– No match for domain
ivytax.com ———- No match for domain
jobssenegal.com —No match for domain
kalamazooyouthsoccer.com —-No match for domain
kidbelt.com ——-No match for domain
kinads.com ——- No match for domain
lansingmortgages.com ——– No match for domain
lawhalf.com ———– No match for domain
likerev.com ——– No match for domain
linuxand.com ——– No match for domain
lowestnews.com ———- No match for domain
…plus many others
Something doesn’t ad up but I’m not sure what, what’s your thoughts 🙂
Mike,
So, let me see if I understand this correctly. Please correct me if I am in error.
1. Oversee has access to metrics relating to vast numbers of domain names – including domains registered through registrars that Oversee owns and/or controls (i.e., Moniker).
True? False?
2. Oversee does not make this information available to registrant customers during the time period in which these registrants would still have the opportunity to renew these soon to be deleted domain names for the registrants own respective account.
True? False?
3. But pending deletion, Oversee will use this same information to “snap-up” dropping domains (which I assume includes domain names held by Moniker customers) to resell at a PREMIUM PRICE without ever having granted its own customer base access to significant, meaningful information that might have provided justification for renewing these domain names instead of simply “blind” dropping them for lack of information.
True? False?
4. However, instead of looking at this scenario and saying, “WTF!”, while raising vital issues of moral and ethical implications in the domain marketplace, scavenging domainers are collectively outraged because the same company that won’t even offer ITS OWN CUSTOMERS the opportunity to benefit from the metrics of domain names these customers originally registered, won’t provide every other domainer in the world with even more detailed metrics.
True? False?
——————–
EPILOGUE
Is it any wonder this country is in such social and economic upheaval when the rally cry of doing business in America is “ME! ME! ME!”?
there is still tasting, if you are a registrar. but only a small amount is permitted before the fees kick in. registrar’s can taste, they can allow a small amount of tasting to their customers, or both. but under this quota, a registrant (be they a registrar or a customer) can’t build their whole strategy around tasting as they once could. hence people say “no more tasting”.
as mhb says, the registrar most likely has parking data to go along with verisign’s traffic data for these names, and they could show it to the prospective buyer. but they aren’t doing so.
@efficiency
“as mhb says, the registrar most likely has parking data to go along with verisign’s traffic data for these names, and they could show it to the prospective buyer. but they aren’t doing so.”
Instead of “prospective buyer”, what about showing this data to current domain registrants who can use this info to determine whether to drop or renew a domain name currently held by the existing domain owner?
@sdm – does the world’s largest registrar (godaddy), who, correct me if i’m wrong, puts domain names into parked status by default, show that ppc data to it’s customers? is godaddy itself a “domainer”.
this ICANN system is one where there are no restrictions on registrars competing with their own customers. and, correct me if i’m wrong, there are currently proposals to loosen things even more, so that registries can once again be in the registrar business, as they were many years ago.
and then there are the longstanding exclusive partnerships between some registries and certain drop-catch sellers. these names pass through multiple potential competitors before reaching the “open market”.
one could argue the idea of the auction is a way around the reg fee restrictions for names placed on the registries. if someone will pay more than the reg fee for a name in an auction, why encourage current registrants to renew (by giving them ppc statistics)?
it’s all quite amusing. especially, the labels placed on the various players, given that all more or less doing the same thing, only at different points in the chain.
it all starts with the search engines. they are the top of the chain. that’s where most advertisers go. it’s where ppc is born. if we go with these arbitrary laels, google is the top “domainer”. they have a few huge sites in their “portfolio”, and many small ones, developed by “end-users” (blogger, jotspot, deja vu, etc. – all renamed of course, which makes many people think they are google “products”, developed by google engineers).
it’s all quite amusing.
@efficiency
Every contract carries an implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Implied_covenant_of_good_faith_and_fair_dealing
I didn’t realize domain registrars were exempt.
Btw, who made GoDaddy.com the domaining poster child for what best practices in this industry should like like?
SDM
Mike,
So, let me see if I understand this correctly. Please correct me if I am in error.
1. Oversee has access to metrics relating to vast numbers of domain names – including domains registered through registrars that Oversee owns and/or controls (i.e., Moniker).
Yes but every registrar has access to the same info if they want it
2. Oversee does not make this information available to registrant customers during the time period in which these registrants would still have the opportunity to renew these soon to be deleted domain names for the registrants own respective account.
NO they don’t but most registrars do not pass this info to their customers either
3. But pending deletion, Oversee will use this same information to “snap-up” dropping domains (which I assume includes domain names held by Moniker customers) to resell at a PREMIUM PRICE without ever having granted its own customer base access to significant, meaningful information that might have provided justification for renewing these domain names instead of simply “blind” dropping them for lack of information.
Same as above
4. However, instead of looking at this scenario and saying, “WTF!”, while raising vital issues of moral and ethical implications in the domain marketplace, scavenging domainers are collectively outraged because the same company that won’t even offer ITS OWN CUSTOMERS the opportunity to benefit from the metrics of domain names these customers originally registered, won’t provide every other domainer in the world with even more detailed metrics.
Same as above
@sdm- good luck enforcing that implied convenant. however, it could be that some states are different than others? maybe wikipedia editors are just a bunch of clueless nerds? (sorry that slipped out. it can’t true in all cases.) is it a coicincidence that so many lawsuits are filed in texas? maybe have a look at texas law in search of your wikipedia-cited convenant. then have a look at ICANN’s standard registrar agreement on ICANN’s site, or at your registrar’s site. does it say that suits against the registrar must brought in the registrar’s home state? do registrars always get the home advantage? where is your registrar based? what’s the law in that state? i recall at least one case where a texas-based registrar (operating primarily as a domain registrant, or “domainer”) used this clause to make things more difficult for a foreign company that was suing it regarding a trademark. it has a somewhat lengthy discussion of the forum issue. should every domain registrant read their registrar’s registrar agreement? when they register a domain, are they agreeing to these terms? where is your registrar based? basic caveat emptor.
the thing to consider with what mhb is writing about is that many registrars could be doing some tasting based on the verisign data but, if we look at the stats, are they?
the cynical view would be that these are “regurgitated” names. they’ve been tasted. and then spit out. and now they’re actually being marketed to non-registrar domainers as “tasty”, by coupling them with traffic data.
if this is correct, then you gotta give mhb +1 for calling them on it.
btw, as andrew points out dynadot is in some ways a little different than most registrars. they’re one of the few who have continued to do tasting even after the grace period quota rules took effect. and well before this snapnames auction.