LIVE DOMAIN AUCTIONS - BOOM OR BUST FOR DOMAINERS?
July 3rd, 2008 Posted in Aftermarket, Domain Auctions | 4 Comments »The photo at left shows a domain in the exhilarating process of selling for $400,000 at a Live Domain Auction. I won’t reveal the domain name, but I can tell you that the handsome guy with the final bid sign (416) is Donny Simonton from Parked.com. (Ignore the redhead guy posing with a peace sign in the front). The seller of this domain slept very well the night after this Live Domain Auction (LDA). However, how many other domain sellers were smiling after the LDA was over? Thus, this question is the subject of my article (but not based on this particular LDA’s results):












Sheraton Mirage Resort. Surfers Paradise. Gold Coast. Queensland. Australia. If ever there was a domain conference to attend based on the location of an event alone,
The domain name industry, believe it or not, is less than eight years old. It depends on how you look at it, but doesn’t it seem like we’ve all been doing this a lot longer than eight years? Lot’s of changes in the industry have occurred in the last few years, but the tidal wave was started by Rick Schwartz with TRAFFIC, Frank Schilling and Dr. Kevin Ham’s astounding success stories, Andrew Miller and Zappy’s buildout juggernaut of Chocolate.com, and the sledge-hammer domain control of (the fore-mentioned pioneers), IREIT and other domain conglomerates like Name Media and Demand Media. These visionaries opened up the floodgates for domainers, and we all jumped into our rubber rafts to run the rapids to try to make it to the party at the Big Bucks Lagoon at the end of the run. Will we make it there, or end up squealing like Ned Beatty in “Deliverance”?
I have been getting a lot of requests for my premium domains that I am weeding out of my portfolio to focus on about ten niches instead of 80. I have sent over 50 emails out by request of domainers who are looking for good buys. I attached my domain lists, totaling about 2000 domains, 95% of them generic descriptive domains of real products and services, and purposely did NOT put prices nor traffic stats on them. I just asked for bids on the domains, and I would consider them.
Well folks, I’m going to sidestep the domain basics for a moment to ask a question about something you may have heard of but know nothing about. It seems like the oddball powers that be are hard at work to replace the IP addresses that make up your valuable domain names. Or are they? Who the hell knows?!! Seems like nobody. I did some research on this little funky name “IPv6″ and I got all sorts of “explanations” or “definitions”.
I know most domainers want to make a nice profit with their premium domains. I’m no different. I’d like to see some big money from domains I own, but something touched me a few weeks ago that made me want to explore new “trails” that I blazed by selling a domain for thousands of dollars less than what it actually was worth, and possibly tens of thousands of dollars less than what it would be worth in the near future.