I just received an email from Sedo.com which is announcing a change to their Terms Of Service effective a month from today on March 16th, 2012.
“””We have published revised versions of our policies and User Agreement, including updates to our Rules for Domain Parkers, which will affect your Sedo account.”
“We have also published a new Domain Parking Terms and Conditions page. These new Terms and Conditions collectively take effect on March 16, 2012.”
“”Notable changes to these documents include:
“”When available, Buyers are given the option to submit offers below a Buy Now price listed on a domain detail page. Sellers may choose to ignore or accept this offer, or to adjust their Buy Now price expectations.””
“”Sedo’s standard Sales Contract for Domain Marketplace transactions has been updated.””
“”While Users have a chance to review the Sales Contract before submitting offers on the Sedo Domain Marketplace, Users with Buy Now listings are advised to review the revised Sales Contract in advance, as it contains the terms of their offer to sell, and will automatically apply to fixed price, Buy Now sales as of the effective date.””
“”Domains in your account that are parked with Sedo are automatically opted into Zero Click, a new Domain Parking feature.”
“Each Sedo user is responsible for maintaining a domain list that accurately reflects domains that they still own and wish to sell.”
“If a user account creates failed transactions due to an outdated domain list, that account shall be suspended at Sedo’s discretion, and reinstated only when it has been reviewed and outdated domain listings have been deleted.”
“Continued use of Sedo’s Site or Services, including your Sedo account, on or after March 16, 2012, means that you agree to and accept the revised versioin of our User Agreement. We ask that you take a moment to read these revised documents to ensure that you understand them.”
At first blush, allowing buyers to put a bid on a Buy It Now priced domain may great cut down on the Buy it Now sales.
You probably would expect a higher percentage of these buyers to take a shot an offer a lower amount before buying the domain name at BIN.
It makes the Buy It Now domain look more like a make an offer domain with a top price already set.
Will be interesting.
Going to review the new sales contract now
I wonder who came up with this new feature?
1. Were sellers asking for a way to accept offers on a Buy It Now listing? I doubt it.
2. Were buyers calling Sedo saying “I wish I can make an offer on that domain but I can’t because the stupid owner only has a buy it now price”?
3. Did management say “Screw the domain owners, they don’t know how to price their domains so we are going to FORCE all of them to accept offers”?
I say #3.
I have to say I am kind of offended. I have a few hundred domains priced with fixed price offers that are set as low as I am comfortable selling.
I don’t want to review and deny offers.
Why doesn’t sedo create a DONATE IT button, or how about a button for 0% commission on this sale, those sound like great ideas…
Sedo needs to focus on getting client comments updated in less than one day, having someone there on weekends, or working mobile.
NOT on how to screw domainers out of more money!
Lower Domainers BUY IT NOW PRICES, Increase COMMISSIONS, now I know why everyone moved their domains away from sedo parking.
Also Why doesn’t sedo spend some money so buyers/sellers do not have to wait 1-3 days for follow up on comments that affect sales, they should have common uplinks within there many worldwide offices so they are always connected to buyers/sellers online. I have lost so many deals when buyers have to wait 3 days to hear comments, and go out and find new names, WHILE THEY WAIT FOR SEDO.
Also sedo should have someone working mobile on weekends, or what not, this is a 24/7 business, ADAPT.
This is just a gimmick, trying to take money out of domainers pockets, while increase short term sales, or bring them back to old levels, afternic has been moving up, and sedo lost some of it’s best names to some new providers which have their own sales platforms.
SEDO go back to square 1, domainers are what made you, they are your friends, until you decide to screw them, they can turn on you very quick, and there are way to many options in the marketplace right now.
BYE BYE SEDO
Rob
Not sure why they made the move I have an email out to them
Looks like 30%-35% of all sales each week are BIN which seems like a pretty good percentage.
I can’t see how this is going to do anything positive other than getting some sellers to take lower offers.
At the end of the day its not really a Buy It Now if you can offer less, think of eBay
Hi All,
I wanted to take a moment to comment on the new feature for Buy Now listings, to help allay anyone’s concerns about upcoming product changes:
1. Sellers will be able to opt-in/opt-out whenever they want – this will not be a required part of listing as Buy Now, but can help create a lead list for sellers, even for Buy Now domains. This could also help sellers with their pricing strategies and to learn more about the general interest in their domains. Even better: sellers get their domains promoted on SedoMLS partner sites that require Buy Now prices AND can also entertain offers from interested buyers.
2. This feature is not yet available, but we wanted to make sure that the T&Cs anticipate future product launches. Also, when launched, this new feature for Buy Now listings will be available as a beta to a select group of sellers.
3. We haven’t launched the feature yet but are looking for feedback from all sellers. You can take a quick survey at http://sedo.com/us/sedo/survey/, which will help us improve Buy Now listings for everyone. We take member feedback very seriously, and it’s the driving force behind all updates and improvements at Sedo, including this one.
If you have any questions or comments about this, please feel free to email contact@sedo.com.
Thank you!
Keith White (Marketing Associate, Sedo.com)
They are also implementing a zero click policy on their parked pages. That should help domaiers out with higer amounts of revenue from parking. Right?
List your domains on Sedo, when you get an offer just don’t respond. If the seller is serious, he will ALWAYS find your contact info in Whois and you can then do the deal using escrow.com. Simple, and much cheaper than Sedo.
BOOM!
David
Yes the zero click should increase revenue, it will be interesting to see by how much
“1. Sellers will be able to opt-in/opt-out whenever they want”
Do I have to opt out of the make offer or do I have to opt in to leave my buy it now as a pure buy it now?
When the new system is up, will ALL buy it now listings be converted to make offer listings so ALL sellers will have to log in to opt out?
Why not have a send the seller a message button instead, most end users need to be educated, or sedo give 5% commission to lower the sale price, and make the sale, a commission rebate on a lower buy it now offer hmmm
I think this is giving them a competitive advantage over their MLS partners as well…
Currently our domain names listed on the exiting markets generate leads for the market owners and insiders which may use in anyway they want to bait and switch: they own and trade their own names. This policy will improve their intelligence gathering and liquidity of their own domain names.
There is a need for domain name reseller markets that not own their own portfolio of names, donot make alliances with buyers and sellers, and do not have any other conflict of interest policies.
@Ron. I agree. I’ve said this to SEDO before. If they would change their “make offer” to “contact seller” or “inquire on pricing” or something along those lines it would mean more sales in my opinion.
I have a domain with a $2k counter offer from the buyer as of 10am this morning, the comments are still under review, based on what the buyer has stated, we are close, and gone back a few times, It is really stupid that during normal business hours in the US, which is a pretty big market, sedo can’t review 4 figure domain comments, and get the deals moving.
Its only a matter of time before SEDO and other brokerage companies (that are competing with their customers by being also ‘principals’ selling their own inventory of domains) will be ‘disrupted’ by a diy marketplace.
Sedo’s customer service (only avail M-Fri during ‘banker’s hours’ ) shows their lack of care about their customers – who are denizens of the web; which is open 7x24x365
Their lack of ‘real time’ or even near real time customer support is further evidence of their being behind the curve
And their pricing – is ridiculous. I recently had a $ 69 offer on a domain, but their minimum $ 50 fee made it economically unrealistic for me to consider it.
Given that everything is automated in their system, the $ 50 fee was totally unreasonable; given the size of the potential transaction.
One less deal that SEDO didnt make money on – at least not from me.
Time will tell. I predict ‘internet time’ for changes in their operating style; necessitated by inevitable competition.
But what do I know? (g)
The whole “buy-it-now-its-a-domain-name-fire-sale” mentality sure is getting old.
Sellers who do use buy now prices and get offers less than their BIN should reply by Raising the buy now price even higher.
I like the idea. It’s similar to the old eBay buy-it-now concept. I suppose it would be better if we could choose if make an offer would be available or not in conjunction with buy it now.
Folks you can always set your minimum offer to be the same as your buy-it-now price. Same as the old eBay days where you set the reserve same as but-it-now. Problem solved?
Keith from Sedo says “Sellers will be able to opt-in/opt-out whenever they want – this will not be a required part of listing as Buy Now, but can help create a lead list for sellers”
A lead list? Is Sedo actually going to provide us with a list of leads so we can follow up with potential buyers?
Keith please tell us all this is so !!!
I have sent numerous emails and talked to live help, to ask them why they do not have 24hr live help or even live help over the weekend.
I said that in this day and age and size of Sedo, it should be paramount to have live help, especially over the weekend, i even said that it shows you do not care about your members and customers, if this is the way you operate, i then closed my account down.
The easy way round the (BIN) buy it now, is put on your selling page – PLEASE NOTE –
I have put a buy it now price, because i feel this is a fair and reasonable price for this domain and this is the price i am asking for it and therefore i will not take a price lower, so please do not send me an offer for this domain.
RED
Yes, we looked into relabeling “make offer” to “contact seller” or “inquire on pricing” or something along those lines…. but tests showed we got more qualified leads by implying prospects should make a $ offer…..
We may make that label dynamic and/or customizable in the future, though….
Hey Mike, I noticed there is a line in the new Terms that addresses the right of seeking attorney fees from the losing party in event of pursuing legal action on deadbeat buyers/sellers. You had previously cited the lack of such a provision in an earlier post you wrote, and that it was a major hole in the contract. Maybe you can comment on this update further in another post. Here’s how the line reads:
THE BUYER AND SELLER AGREE THAT THE INJURED PARTY IS ENTITLED ATTORNEY’S FEES FROM THE OTHER SHOULD LEGAL ACTION BE NECESSARY TO ENFORCE RIGHTS PURSUANT TO THE PURCHASE AND SALE AGREEMENT.
Well, it is known fact that most of “enduser” domainsales are generated by “buy now” link on parked page. With all due respect to Sedo Marketplace at sedo.com website, most enduser buyers are not aware of sedo.com! Now, how can Sedo try to promote _both_ sales (by placing “buy now” fixed-price link on the parked page) and increased parking revenue (by using zero-click parking setup)? Did Sedo think what are they doing and what they really want? Isn’t it obvious that zero-click setup, delivering the vistor directly to advertiser, will make “buy now” link invisible as the visitor will never see it? Zero-click setup is a perfect way to switch off the most powerful sales channel!
As for zero-click. I hope Sedo did not join the club of known and popular parking companies who are using almost illegal sponsors like this famous “you won free ipad” youtube-style so-called sponsors in their zero-click-parked domains-
http://listofscams.blogspot.com/2011/04/guessologycom-scam-alert.html
http://www.ussherpress.com/blog/?p=594
http://domainnamewire.com/2011/08/18/scammy-surveys-cybersquatting/
Interesting to read comments of John Berryhill at domainnamewire…
Can Sedo confirm what sponsors will _we the domainers_ be promoting by using SedoParking through zero-click?
This will be an excellent change once put in operation fully.
PS- I’ve filled the survey form accordingly!
Breaking:
Sedo “sells” jp.com to highest bidder @ $1,100. (Auction ended Feb. 16)
Posted tonight @ Sedo market place, in case you missed it.
How embarrassing.
But congratulations, Bidder #4 ! ! !