It’s no secret to anyone active in the expired auction scene that Huge Domains and their bot are a big deal on GoDaddy auctions.
A thread titled, HUGE DOMAINS SNIPING GODADDY CLOSEOUTS got things going on Namepros. The thread has 21,000 views and 430 replies.
It’s a long read and an informative read, if you have not read it you should bookmark it.
Today Namepros member Dave put forth an interesting post that dealt with the HD bot piggybacking human research. It’s an interesting read that some have known about, to be honest I never tested the piggyback theory. Others are claiming that they play games with the bot to get Huge Domains to pay more for a domain then it’s worth. GoDaddy had a great earnings report this week and announced a $500 million share buyback.
Here is Dave’s post read the whole thread here.
I’ve been warned not to share such information publicly, but I feel I
must so others know what they’re letting themselves in for when it comes
to GD expired auctions and being up against the Huge Domains bot on
GoDaddy, which is usually bidder id 913932.
For a while I thought the Huge Domains bot that runs rampant everyday
worked against a predefined list of domains to go after. I assumed it
had a set list every day and it would bid up to 9-12% of the GD
valuation.
This assumption was wrong! As I discovered a while back.
The HD bot is actually working by piggybacking of the research and
effort put in by us human investors and then simply placing bids based
on that, using a typical 9-12% range of the GD valuation to do so.
I’ve known for a while now key ways to help me identify when it is the HD bot that I’m up against on a GD expired auction.
Today, I bid on two domains that had just 1 bid and less than 30 minutes
remaining. I already knew due to it having 2 bidders the HD bot would
love to come out and play!
In my opinion this is not a fair playing field at all.
You as an investor most likely spend a fair amount of time researching
domain names before you place a bid. All your time and effort is now
being put at risk, or causing you to overspend on your inventory, simply
because a bot with seemingly endless funds can watch what is going on
at the auctions at all times, and piggyback of the effort you’ve put in
on a day to day basis to browse the lists and research.
I advise you to really think before placing a bid on a domain that
currently has no bids. I think if there is a domain you’re really after,
you actually have better luck of getting it for $11 or less at
closeouts. If you wait for the auction to finish, and then keep checking
very frequently until it appears again as a closeout.
Hypothetically speaking, with this knowledge at hand, I suppose it is
possible for someone to lure the bot in on purpose and drive up prices
to make it overpay on purpose. Hypothetically if this were to happen
enough, this may make them reconsider what they’re doing.
Again, purely hypothetical.
If you think a bot and a company that profits from the work of others is
a fair playing field then in my opinion you are wrong. It is wrong.
These sort of bots need banning from any and all types of auction places.
Not fair at all, we have robots and not humans bidding. Can we hire a robot to go to the NamesCon auctions and bid for us? The answer is NO. That doesn’t make sense and isn’t a real person casting a bid. I’m surprised this isn’t a big security concern for goddady as they definitely have issues if bots can do human verification and bid for members.
NOT FAIR – EVERYONE HATES THIS
HD SHOULD BE PUNISHED AND AUCTIONS SHOULD BE BOT FREE!!
fair, who promised us fair.
Page
Dang, so true
Page is spot on. Anyone expecting a fair and level playing field in a business marketplace is setting themself up to fail. Assume the opposite.
Anyone else that wants to create a bot to do the same, can. HD is just putting up the resources and taking the risk to do so. Those that take risks and scale walls others don’t/won’t get to reap the rewards. I can’t think of any other market where that is truer than domaining. 😉
i not have idea about english domains
but in spanish this bot cause me a lot of losses (overpriced auctions)
the bot makes an automatic bid almost immediately after making my bid
the last minutes of the closing time….
based on certain criteria (godaddy estimate value, stibot) =
although the domain It has little resale value or multiple drops
garbage $12 domains are sold in $100-$200 thanks to hugedomains
hardly godaddy can do something against this bad practice
regards
And GoDaddy lets this happen because it makes them money.
All I ask what is in it for Huge Domains to do all of Godaddy’s bidding for hundreds of dollars for crap domains, what is their kickback, incentive, to upcharge all these righteous customers?
The HD bot is just another sucker in domaining.
Whenever I want a domain with no bids I just wait for the auction to end and in app. 80% of the time I can buy it directly for $11. Some I lose. But when I sense the HD bot l, I bid it up with no mercy even if I don’t really want the domain at that level. Bots are stupid, bots can’t read your mind 😉
I must have made GoDaddy so much money at this point I truly feel I deserve an employee of the month award… Hit me up GD!
Your not the only one doing it, so that is why I ask what is the incentive because they clearly don’t care to stop it.
Let’s hope it stays that way. Let them be careless.
The sooner they will be out of business.
LOL .. I regged BotHire/Com in 2006
so what if its not the bot “all” the time, what if its a person bidding you up. dont we all wait for $12 if we can get it, or $11…
i put some more though into it here back in August
dn.biz/blog/2019/08/28/712/
Page
Page maybe you should have read the thread on namepros instead of trying to clear or make acceptable what godaddy and Huge Domains are doing. The posts on Namepros make it clear what huge domains is doing.
The difference is that another human investor likely deserves to be involved if they’re bidding, because they would’ve taken the time to research the domain prior to doing so.
Huge Domains is profiting of the time and effort put in by others.
I wouldn’t mind the HD bot so much if it was only allowed to work against a set list of domains it was given, and if it didn’t have the ability to be watching all expired auctions all at once.
What if GoDaddy secretly owns Huge Domains and they are using them to bid up domains
Thanks for sharing my post Raymond.
In case anyone is confused by the “I’ve been warned” statement, I did intend to add additional information to my post, but changed my mind and forgot to edit that part out.
Traditional auction house laws are very strict in many states, these guys skirt in between such laws in their keyword definition of an auction, or if that exchange as they perceive it.
Maybe Huge Names is a large shareholder of godaddy, who knows how many different scenarios or NDA’s could be in place regarding this relationship.
I was watching PayNow.co in the GD auctions.
It went to closeouts and after two days it disappear.
One week later it turn out at the expire GD section with seven days to go.
Yesterday it closed at $810.What am i to think?
Do you care to explain that GoDaddy ?
We live in a wicked fallen world in which plutocracy and favoring the rich is the prevailing agenda. And those who become rich often seek to prevent others from having the same opportunities in life they had themselves. The many lose out for the benefit of the few. But this will not last indefinitely and there will come a definite end. In the meantime, it is still good to do what one can to expose darkness and promote light.
And who on earth would warn you against sharing such information and why?
I had intended on sharing additional information in the post but later changed my mind and forgot to edit that part out.
So many thoughts come to mind when I hear about Godaddy and especially Godaddy Auctions
If Washington is a swamp then Godaddy is a toxic cesspool
The skullduggery has been going on for many years on many forms from nodaddy to Adam Dicker and billions of Dollars in fake bids
I voted years ago with my wallet
They lost my domain business
They lost my hosting business
They lost my backorder and auction business
And
It hasn’t hurt them a dam bit lololololo
But my frustration level is way lower and my productivity way higher without this albatross in my life
I say all the more power HD
If Godaddy is gonna let it happen
If the authorities are gonna let it happen
And most of all
If the market is gonna let it happen
Then who am I to stop em
I gave up on GD long ago
But because people can MAKE MONEY with em
And because Godaddy is MAKING MONEY off them everything’s hunky dory
Joe Styler and Paul Nicks would be a great ticket in 2020
They could put a positive spin on a funeral
Wait
Let me see if understand what Joe Styler is saying
Joe says that godaddy “closeouts” are very competitive
Joe says Godaddy has limited the calls on their API to make bidding fair
Yet in addition to their AUCTION BOT winnings
HUGE DOMAINS also wins virtually every single closeout!
Domainers have been lured into the Godaddy diner with the promise of a couple cent savings on their meal and by the time they sit down for lunch they realize their waiter has eaten theirs
Public companies face strict reporting and operating rules and these are most certainly not actions
Someone will call GROWDADDY out AGAIN either before dessert is served or when they do not get the meal they paid for after
Absolute scammers for more than a decade
Reminds me of an old saying
If their is an elephant in the room
Introduce it
That say slogan hangs in the old
CEOs office except it says
If there is an elephant in the room
KILL IT
BUT GOLF UNLIKE DOMAINS IS A VERY CIVILIZED SPORT
Yes, it’s true Godaddy has opened up the HDbot and allowed them to game, and cherry pick the closeouts, most likely a Thank You, for F’ing all of you into paying 10X more for crap domains! SUCKERS
lol namescon in austin. bring it back to vegas. texas is garbage
I think this is some good advice as I was just hit by the same thing. It seems they put a $250 bid out there so you are forced to bid above that amount to get a name. If you see a name you want do not bid on it early as that invites the bot to place its $250 bid in the last minutes of the auction. If there is a name you want, wait until the last minute to bid on it as they place their bids in the last 5 minutes. Still not sure if that will even work because when you bid it adds an additional 5 minutes to the auction which might alert the bot to bid against you. It seems like a pretty shady deal that Go Daddy is allowing to happen but why wouldn’t they. I just had to pay $255 dollars for a domain I should have been able to buy for $12.