Dan Commission Update

[Systreg]

@Nigel, it's crazy, it's like having a shop with all of your goods on display, but keeping certain goods locked in a box in the cellar.

They might say nobody wants them, but if nobody knows about them because they're hidden away, then nobody will be able to buy them.

 

[Nigel]

Certainly is crazy - they're even offering pens.fr and pens.it at reg fee even though they are both taken. But pens.uk - premium .uk domain for uk market is nowhere to be seen.

NB: Worth noting that a lot of the ones that 123-Reg (and I assume the same on godaddy) list as suggested registrations , are then shown as unavailable when you try to add to basket. Their systems need a complete overhaul.

 

[DJ]

I had the same issue with Sedo, and gave up trying to resolve it after sending numerous emails. They blamed their algorithm.

If you search honest, honest.uk doesn't come up, but it will if you search honest.uk. I am sure it is one of the reasons that there aren't many end user offers for .uk domains.

Nominet also seem to have abandoned promoting .uk domains completely.

 

[Nigel]

But if you want to write a book they'll throw megabucks at it

 

[Nigel]

I activated the godaddy/afternic integration on dan. I ticked all of our domains and then went in to 'distribution' and applied uplift at 20%. Nothing happened to my dollar prices. Tried it a number of times and will probably email dan support tomorrow. Do you have to wait a while after activating integration before applying the uplift? For now I've taken off integration.

 

[rob]

Funny when you remember that 123-Reg were one of the large registrars that pushed for introduction of .uk!

That is a good point - a great example of some looking for short term £ with not much care over the long term future of .UK

 

[ukbackorder]

I would've thought after 4 pages of how bad this service is that people would simply park their own? There are wordpress scripts out there. $5 or less per month for a vps. In actual fact every 10 minutes spent emailing dan is probably costing more than your time is worth, for a third class system, with archaic pricing. People like this should have long gone out of business but sadly it seems domainers will keep them afloat for no reason. It's simple. Godaddy have always been shit. They now own Dan. It's clear how it's going to go. Yet domainers will continue to lap it up and 'suggest' improvements (which will be ignored) to them. I hate this industry 90% of the time nowadays

 

[webber]

Not everyone has the skills.... even to set up a wp plugin.
We must accept domaining attracts a lot of diverse people; I've heard of web developers, lawyers, mathematicians, plumbers, estate agents, video editors, etc.
But I agree, everything GD buys turns to shit. Dan offered a very good service and very good value.
All current mainstream platforms are pretty bad functionality-wise and quite expensive for what they're offering.
Now either a new contender will step up (which I'm sure GD will eventually buy) or we go self-hosted.

 

[ukbackorder]

There are places where you can park for peanuts. Domainmanage has been running for a long time. Hell for a year I offered free parking for 200 domains with a for sale page, full listing, even live chat service. Four people used it and were sad when I closed it down. Says it all. People want to use shit services then they want to complain about it. It's just lazy in my book. I wish I could get away with treating people like this and them lapping it up. You say 'we go self hosted' yet nobody ever bothered and I doubt they will. If a 'new contender stepped up' nobody would use it. They'd just complain that it's not the old shitty service that they didn't like. The industry is quite parasitic but extremely lazy and increasingly self entitled it seems

 

[Nigel]

In 20 years of selling domains I think the dan platform was the best - great service, great value, and for .uk transfers very quick and smooth. No wonder Godaddy took them out - can't blame dan founders - we'd all have taken the money. Now that platform, and service is still there for now - and for short term thinkers like most of us in the domain market it seems sensible to hang around for now and see if the godaddy/afternic integration brings extra sales. If we can get some of our premium .uk domains featuring prominently on godaddy and 123-Reg for a 15% commission it could work out well. And as a buyer who would you want to buy from? Nigel's domains or from Dan - part of the GoDaddy group? Obviously if service deteriorates or something better comes along then things might change.

 

[ukbackorder]

'Not everyone has the skills.... even to set up a wp plugin.'

Chat GPT. Google. Bing. 24 hours. Done.

 

[DJ]

I would've thought after 4 pages of how bad this service is that people would simply park their own? There are wordpress scripts out there. $5 or less per month for a vps. In actual fact every 10 minutes spent emailing dan is probably costing more than your time is worth, for a third class system, with archaic pricing. People like this should have long gone out of business but sadly it seems domainers will keep them afloat for no reason. It's simple. Godaddy have always been shit. They now own Dan. It's clear how it's going to go. Yet domainers will continue to lap it up and 'suggest' improvements (which will be ignored) to them. I hate this industry 90% of the time nowadays

The ultimate goal (which is in progress) is to self host, but I will still list all domains on the various platforms at an inflated price to cover the commission, as surely the exposure that Godaddy/sedo bring has to be worth it.

I got an offer through a bodis lander last week, the buyer was adamant that he wanted to buy through dan.com and he paid 5% on top for the privilege. They are obviously doing something right as this isn't the first time it has happened, so buyers clearly have confidence in them.

 

[Systreg]

This is the latest update email from Dan.com, my bolding below:

We are delighted to let you know about two new updates to Dan.

Firstly, beginning March X, Dan customers will be able to import Lease-to-Own transactions, charged at a 10% commission rate. This widely requested feature will be accessible through Dan’s Sales Activity page.

Secondly, we noticed customers opting into the Afternic distribution network, achieve higher sales volume. Given the commission is now the same irrespective of where the domain sells, we will be automatically integrating all Buy-It-Now listed domain names into the Afternic Distribution Network. If you prefer not to have your domains listed on Afternic from within Dan, you can opt out through your account settings page. It also will no longer be possible to maintain a different price across platforms. If you already have domain names listed with a custom Afternic price, we will update your Buy It Now price to the highest listing price across all platforms.

You can read more about these and other updates on the Dan blog.

Regarding the part I bolded, you might want to check your prices on Dan, because what they've done is, if you have a domain for sale on Dan with a bin price of £14,450, then if you added around 20% to that to allow for currency conversion, that would make the dollar price on Afternic $16,950

They have now taken that higher number of $16,950 and set that as the bin price on Dan as £16,950.

The only way to change that, is for me is to go through over 800 domains and change the price back to what it was on each domain individually, f*ucking ridiculous

[Edit]

Reply from Dan:

Thanks for reaching out.

Im sorry to hear this, I will relay your feedback to the product development team.

All currencies will change to USD. If you list a domain for 5000 GBP your Afternic Listing becomes 5000 USD. We do not incorporate exchange rates as it could negatively impact you. To off-set a difference we recommend increasing your listing price at Dan. If this is not desired, you can always opt out of the network of course.

 

[Paullas]

i have removed all the BINs on my domains on dan now as the platform is mess at the moment.

 

[diablo]

This is the latest update email from Dan.com, my bolding below:

Regarding the part I bolded, you might want to check your prices on Dan, because what they've done is, if you have a domain for sale on Dan with a bin price of £14,450, then if you added around 20% to that to allow for currency conversion, that would make the dollar price on Afternic $16,950

They have now taken that higher number of $16,950 and set that as the bin price on Dan as £16,950.

The only way to change that, is for me is to go through over 800 domains and change the price back to what it was on each domain individually, f*ucking ridiculous

[Edit]

Reply from Dan:

What should have been a positive - a bigger network for sales - has been really badly implemented for non-dollar customers. It would be relatively easy to code in currencies to adjust prices, but they haven't bothered. Early Dan would have done so without hesitation.

I have set my account under settings to: No thanks, list my domains on Dan.com only.

Also, love how the email says: "Firstly, beginning March X, Dan customers..." Nobody has even bothered to put the date in or read the email before sending it to see the omission.

 

[Systreg]

Same here, I've now removed the integration and marked my domains to list only on Dan.

It's going to be a long night changing the prices on over 800 domains, I would have though that when turning the Afternic integration off, that the original £ buy it now prices would revert back to what they were, before they changed them to the bigger $ prices, but no, stupid system, ffs.

 

[Lovekraft]

what a joke, there's a big difference between £5000 and $5000, they're basically listing domains at far lower prices than you have set them to?!

 

[Paullas]

@Systreg do you get more sales by adding BIN to domains?
Why dont you just wipe all the BINs out and put make an offer then over a week then you can go back in and put the BINs back in.

 

[Systreg]

I would have though that when turning the Afternic integration off, that the original £ buy it now prices would revert back to what they were

I suggested that to Dan support, then cracked on with resetting all the prices, I'd done a load already when I got this reply from Dan:

I wanted to let you know that our dev team is looking into reverting pricing from before the rollout. I recommend not adjusting pricing to avoid that you have to re-adjust it later, and I expect to have an update tomorrow.

 

[Nigel]

We haven't integrated yet - thankfully so haven't had to adjust all the prices. We're sticking with dan though because their system is still very good for uk sales. Sold one yesterday, transferred same day to dan and paid to us today. At the moment that super service is unaffected by the godaddy takeover (apart from comm going to 15%).