Sneak peek into whats next for Aftermarket Auctions

[AnthonyP]

Here is a sneak peek into whats next with regards to Aftermarket Auctions. With the increasing popularity of this method of selling domains we have decided that an overhaul is due to provide more automation and to provide more flexibility about the end times and presentation.

Our primary goal is to make auction lots independent. Bottom line, each domain can have a different end time.
With varied end times we can begin to group domains together based on more logical divisions, for example
a) We could provide a single seller with their own forum. So that their other lots benefit from marketing efforts they make to drive users to that forum.
b) We could provide an "Ending soon" forum with all the auctions ending in the next 24 hours.
c) We could provide a themed forum with all the lots ending at a similar time, much like our existing monthly Aftermarket Auctions.
d) We could offer a "No Reserve" forum.
e) We can have a view of recently active lots.
f) We could create an invitation only forum, where a seller only wishes to deal directly with certain sellers.


Our secondary goal is to provide, different ways to complete a sale.
a) A buy now button for domains with set Target Prices.
b) End time extensions, offers in last x seconds gets extended by y seconds. This can include offers in last 24 hours extends by 24 hours.
c) A push to auction for standard listings (so when you get an offer on a domain valid for 7 days, you can push to auction in real time and that bid is valid for the auction time).
d) Expiring offers, this is to cater for our standard listings where an offer is binding for 7 days, but can maybe be extended to allow buyers to provide a final offer valid for only 24 or 48 hours.
e) Starting prices, just like a reserve except public.

If you have any feature requests you can add them here for me to ignore.

 

[neddy]

I think that the majority of these ideas are great initiatives Anthony.

These are the ones I would particularly like to see implemented sooner rather than later!:

1. Extended auctions - if a bid is made in last 5 minutes, an auction automatically gets extended for 5 minutes - and so on and so on. This potentially will give sellers a much needed boost.

2. Independent / individual auctions with the ability to have different finishing times. Sedo does this.

3. I very much like the push to auction feature, but for reasons mentioned previously, I think you have to address how long prior offers are valid for. Currently it is 7 days. (Maybe that needs to be changed?) To me, it is inconsistent to force a buyer to honour his bid for a further time period just because a buyer decides to "push to auction" when there may only be 2 days validity left on the existing offer.

Sedo allow people to push to auction but any bid and or subsequent auction must be completed within the 7 day period.

“Marketplace Auctions run for a maximum of one week (7 days). A Marketplace Auction can be started up to five days after a buyer has submitted an offer and closes seven days after that offer was submitted and not when the auction was started. Therefore a Marketplace Auction could run for as little as 2 days”.

http://sedo-int1.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/26#How long do domain auctions last

Other feature requests

1. Is it possible for Netfleet to actually conclude an aftermarket auction sale? In other words, invoice buyer, receive payment, pay seller. I know a lot of us would be prepared to pay more commission for this sort of service. Drop were doing this.

2. Domain bidding history:

I know this has been discussed before, but I would like to suggest again that if a domain hasn't had an offer for say 6 months, then the previous bids get wiped and it's start again time. Just like Real Estate, we need to live with current market conditions.

3. More comments on offer pages. I really do believe that this will encourage a deal being done if people were allowed to communicate. e.g. "Thanks for your offer but it is too low for me. To assist you, I would be prepared to look at payment terms over 6 months".

One final suggestion! I think Netfleet should charge commission; or if that's too difficult, a small listing fee.

I hear others scream "Why do you say that"?

Because I think that Netfleet is doing a fantastic job. You've come such a long way, and you provide a great platform for people to sell domains. I sincerely compliment you. I therefore think it is only fair and reasonable that you be paid for your efforts.

Whilst you may lose some listings, I think that you will benefit from having "quality over quantity".

Just my opinions! I hope others will contribute.

 

[Nova]

Our secondary goal is to provide, different ways to complete a sale.
a) A buy now button for domains with set Target Prices.

That alone would be fantastic.

 

[Chris.C]

I think that the majority of these ideas are great initiatives Anthony.

Agreed.

1. Extended auctions - if a bid is made in last 5 minutes, an auction automatically gets extended for 5 minutes - and so on and so on. This potentially will give sellers a much needed boost.

+1

2. Independent / individual auctions with the ability to have different finishing times. Sedo does this.

I don't understand this one as much.

Why do people want their auction to finish by itself when you could lots of people watching a group of domains with the potential for some "window shopping"?

3. I very much like the push to auction feature, but for reasons mentioned previously, I think you have to address how long prior offers are valid for.

Or at least clarification that about the potential for offers to be extended.

1. Is it possible for Netfleet to actually conclude an aftermarket auction sale? In other words, invoice buyer, receive payment, pay seller. I know a lot of us would be prepared to pay more commission for this sort of service. Drop were doing this.

NF should definitely be able to make extra money via escrow, COR, domain renewal fees etc and I think it's a great service many domainers would appreciate.

I know this has been discussed before, but I would like to suggest again that if a domain hasn't had an offer for say 6 months, then the previous bids get wiped and it's start again time. Just like Real Estate, we need to live with current market conditions.

I dunno, could this be optional? Surely having previous offers on a domain is almost an indicator of quality.

As long as the previous bid wasn't high enough to the point of scaring off future bidders, or too low that it's embarrassing, I like the idea of bidding history. Though I guess it would be nice to be able to remove them ourselves if we think it detracts from our listing.

3. More comments on offer pages. I really do believe that this will encourage a deal being done if people were allowed to communicate. e.g. "Thanks for your offer but it is too low for me. To assist you, I would be prepared to look at payment terms over 6 months".

Agreed! I hate not knowing who the buyer is, or not being able to leave some feedback along with my counter offer.

Though it does have the upside of not wasting time on negotiating with tire kickers.

One final suggestion! I think Netfleet should charge commission; or if that's too difficult, a small listing fee.

Begrudgingly agree.



That said, I MUCH prefer a commission model over a fee model if the system can be automated from NF's end. Given the inherent volatility in domain prices, ie having to pay a number of fees when auctions fail bothers me.

I know the small end of town is often unloved (full disclosure - that's the end of town I consider myself in), but if the system can be automated I think there would be quite a bit of money from COR and domain renewal fees that come with selling the smaller $XXX domains if there is enough volume.

That said obviously if the system can't be largely automated then I completely understand that NF might not want to invest it's time/money into listing domains that fail.

Whilst you may lose some listings, I think that you will benefit from having "quality over quantity".

From my perspective quantity in the market is just as important as quality.

The more domains that are up for sale and the more buyers that are in the market is better for everyone involved. It adds liquidity and it grows the industry.

If nothing else reducing the upfront costs of selling domains should increase the volume of domains being sold, and having more people selling their domains will lead to more buyers because most people who lists their domains for sale by auction often do a bit of their own marketing, emailing contacts or prospective businesses which brings people to the auctions and once people are made aware of the value of domains they may remain ongoing buyers AND retail clients have deeper pockets!

Just the other day, I saw a domain dropping, so I contacted a client who I know had previously invested in domains in this industry and I said "XYZ was dropping are you interested?" they said "Yeah we are, $250 proxy please". Mind you this was a domain that I as a domainer wouldn't have bid more than $25 because I can't leverage it like they can, but if that retail client hadn't of bid the domain then the domain would have sold for $25 because because I'm quietly confident there were only two parties bidding on that name but instead it went for $XXX.

So once businesses understand the game they are happy to play, and play hard, but domainers need reasons to go out there and get them to come to the table and this doesn't normally happen until we have domains that are definitely going to sell (ie at auction).

So I don't think it we should write off the "quantity" end of town. They bring value over the longer run. It's like Facebook only tailoring its services to super-cool people who can bring at least 1000 friends to the site, when in reality letting make it available to everyone to get involved is what really makes the site grow.

With that said, that would be another thing I'd really LOVE to see - some more informative videos and informative articles about the value of investing in domain names so that prospective buyers can be quickly educated in a streamlined, cost effective manner. And I think NF stands to gain the most out of a more informed business community.

I have often thought that biggest thing prohibiting the markets more rapid growth is the lack of marketing of the values of domains and minisites. The only parties I see with a genuine vested interest in educating the general public are NF, Drop and Domain registrars, and the margins are bigger for NF and DROP and they have more authority not to mention I think they'd stand to make a hell of a lot more with more buyers in the market.



That's my two cents.

 

[AnthonyP]

1. Extended auctions - if a bid is made in last 5 minutes, an auction automatically gets extended for 5 minutes - and so on and so on. This potentially will give sellers a much needed boost.

This is an important feature of Aftermarket auctions and makes lots of sense as the auction end time is not time critical, I will be sure to include this feature.

2. Independent / individual auctions with the ability to have different finishing times. Sedo does this.

We will have the capability to do this and I am sure there will be many auctions running on different timetables, we will still experiment with keeping some auctions initial close times aligned so that we get a critical mass of interest, but with extensions based on bidding activity even these will finish at different times.

3. I very much like the push to auction feature, but for reasons mentioned previously, I think you have to address how long prior offers are valid for. Currently it is 7 days. (Maybe that needs to be changed?) To me, it is inconsistent to force a buyer to honour his bid for a further time period just because a buyer decides to "push to auction" when there may only be 2 days validity left on the existing offer.

One idea for for the new push to auction to have the end time set to the current bids expiry date. So if there are two days validity then the push to auction basically creates a 2 day auction. So if a seller wants a 7 day auction then they need to push to auction on the first day. We will allow the seller to make the end time shorter than the 7 days so that they can make the initial end time a sane time of day, like 2 or 3 PM for their target audience.

1. Is it possible for Netfleet to actually conclude an aftermarket auction sale? In other words, invoice buyer, receive payment, pay seller. I know a lot of us would be prepared to pay more commission for this sort of service.

Yes this is in the pipeline, we have some administrative changes to make first. As you pointed out there are varied solutions which can be used to achieve this process so there is nothing groundbreaking here, but we plan to make the process as transparent as possible and to ensure that both parties have clear communication of where in the process the sale is.

2. Domain bidding history:
I know this has been discussed before, but I would like to suggest again that if a domain hasn't had an offer for say 6 months, then the previous bids get wiped and it's start again time. Just like Real Estate, we need to live with current market conditions.

Can you point out where this was discussed before so I can read the history on this. I assume we are talking more now about standard listings here. Without much research on the subject I think this makes sense, but is probably controversial since the process of adjusting a sellers perception of value is both difficult and painful for them. The traditional reply to this is to make it optional for sellers to reset their own history.

3. More comments on offer pages. I really do believe that this will encourage a deal being done if people were allowed to communicate. e.g. "Thanks for your offer but it is too low for me. To assist you, I would be prepared to look at payment terms over 6 months".

More comments sounds good since good communication is key to concluding a sale. Would you embrace a comments system if all the comments where forced to be public once the seller responds, so they become part of the listings history. This makes each page more interesting and lets other potential buyers have a bit of history on the domain price?

One final suggestion! I think Netfleet should charge commission; or if that's too difficult, a small listing fee.

We still see the .au Aftermarket as being in a growth phase. It might not be a tiny infant anymore, probably more akin to a teenager at this time, but we still think it needs nurturing to encourage growth. To this end we will continue to fund the growth of this market and will try to keep listings free where possible. We will charge commission for services where we are putting effort or incurring risk, for example our monthly Aftermarket auction where we actively market domains, or when we invoice and completed sales on behalf of clients.

With regards to an aim of quality over quantity, I think we could achieve the identification of quality by rewarding quality behaviors. For example, by adding a profile section for the sellers. Maybe we can rustle up a rating system to help identify good sellers with an icon. Good sellers in my book make counter-offers, have concluded a few sales by being realistic with their pricing and see a low-ball offer as an opportunity not an insult.

We will have an opportunity to discuss standard listings and ideas on improving them in due time.

I think it is worth pointing out that a domain portfolio is a neighborhood and that each sale you chalk up and each domain you develop shines more light onto the rest of your domains and slowly increases their value too. So a sale today at only 80% of your goal value should be seen as an investment in the rest of your portfolio.

 

[neddy]

That's my two cents.

That's a lot of words for 2 cents. What's your hourly rate?

 

[neddy]

Can you point out where this was discussed before so I can read the history on this. I assume we are talking more now about standard listings here. Without much research on the subject I think this makes sense, but is probably controversial since the process of adjusting a sellers perception of value is both difficult and painful for them. The traditional reply to this is to make it optional for sellers to reset their own history.

Can't find it immediately, but will try and do so. Yes, talking standard listings. There are some listings that haven't had an offer for over a year!

A seller will never want to reset their offer history. "I can't sell it to you for that figure - I had an offer of $XXXX 18 months ago". If you applied the same principle in Real Estate, you wouldn't pass first base.

More comments sounds good since good communication is key to concluding a sale. Would you embrace a comments system if all the comments where forced to be public once the seller responds, so they become part of the listings history. This makes each page more interesting and lets other potential buyers have a bit of history on the domain price?

I think that's a good idea. Could stir up some action.
.

 

[Chris.C]

That's a lot of words for 2 cents. What's your hourly rate?

Funnily enough it's about two cents hour.



Also I have another question, does NetFleet have any intention to branching into auctioning sites?

Obviously flippa is a great platform, but given the strict rules of owning .au domains and given that NetFleet also has a lot of Australian web developer eyes watching their auctions as well as domainers, just thought it might be the natural progression?

 

[AnthonyP]

Also I have another question, does NetFleet have any intention to branching into auctioning sites?

Obviously flippa is a great platform, but given the strict rules of owning .au domains and given that NetFleet also has a lot of Australian web developer eyes watching their auctions as well as domainers, just thought it might be the natural progression?

Food for thought for sure, seems like a natural progression as you say. I had not actually thought about it until this point.

 

[Chris.C]

Food for thought for sure, seems like a natural progression as you say. I had not actually thought about it until this point.

I say it's a natural progression because I think a lot of domainers are naturally progressing into doing this themselves.