Recently I sold a domain name on Sedo. I didn’t make a whole lot for it ($199 less fees) but the auction was successful. Considering it was just good timing they were having a domain hacks special event and, it so happened, I had one which would be a good way to sell (get rid of) it.
First you had to apply and go through their approval process (which took a few days), as they had specific requirements, and weren’t accepting just any domain hack. Didn’t cost me a dime to see if they would accept it (or not) nor any listing fees if accepted (a direct auction of theirs cost $59 to list!). Thankfully mine got approved which gave me confidence that they saw some worth in it and possibly I could sell it for a good price.
I was contemplating what reserve price to put on it. I took into consideration what Sedo mentioned for their application process about if a reserve was set too high, they wouldn’t accept the domain. Since I really didn’t know the value of the domain, I thought it was a good enough domain with potential for an end user, that I went with $199. I didn’t consider it be a high reserve and not far off from a low reserve like $99.
It was a 7 day auction event and, once it got started, I was excited that only after a few hours someone had bid $126 on it. With plenty of time left, I was certain it for sure would hit the reserve and go beyond even. Boy was I wrong! It stayed stagnant at the $126 all throughout the auction. I was getting worried (coming closer to the end) that it wouldn’t hit reserve and wondered if I should have put the reserve at $99.
Luckily though that lone bidder came back in the last 5 minutes of the auction and bid it up until it exactly hit the reserve price. I guess he wanted the domain (whereas no one else did) but not a penny more than he had to pay!
It was disappointing that there wasn’t any bidding war (only one bidder bidding against himself!) that it could have sold for more. At the sametime, am glad it sold because 2/3 of those domain hack listings didn’t even get a bid and not many sold either. Some complained the domain hacks auction event was not properly managed or promoted by Sedo. I was expecting a lot more action too but it wasn’t happening. More fizzle than sizzle.
In any case, I’m glad the domain sold and I didn’t put a lower reserve. The $60 fee would really have stung if sold at $99 (if it wasn’t bad enough paying it at $199 and netting $139). Even though it was a 15% commission stated, I didn’t know ahead there was minimum charge of $60…double ouch.
Right after the auction ended, I wasn’t sure the exact procedure or the length of time it was going to take to complete the transaction in getting paid, as I never sold anything on Sedo before. Just they have been around a long time and have built a reputation in being transparent in completing domain transactions. They have their own in-house escrow service that they don’t charge for (they make it up in the sale completion fees though!) as is included in the domain sale. Once buyer’s funds have cleared, they take control of the domain and transfer to the buyer. This same type of service is called a concierge service at escrow .com, where they charge double the escrow fees for it. I found that out using their service when I sold a domain name for $2500 to an end user who had contacted me over Christmas (lucky for me, who no longer celebrates Christmas, getting an unexpected gift!). Good thing though the buyer and I split the escrow fees.
Is definitely a safer (and faster) way to transfer a domain, and getting your funds sooner, by having the escrow service take control of the domain and handle the part of transferring to the buyer because, once they have control of the domain, they release your funds. Whereas if you had to wait for the buyer to confirm that they got the domain. before funds are released to you, it could take a longer time and issues could come up.
I read around in forums some took 2 weeks to a month to complete a transaction on Sedo, but I wasn’t sure how fast or slow they were going to be, once the buyer paid, as basically this was just a simple domain push to Sedo’s escrow account, so really shouldn’t take long if both buyer are seller are quick….and we sure were.
So this is how it went:
Day 1 – Domain sold on auction which ended at 10 in the morning (MST). Early afternoon get an email from Sedo indicating they had received buyer’s payment. Wow that was fast! Thank you buyer for being so prompt. Maybe then this transaction is going to be completed real fast. Sedo indicated not to do anything further until I hear from them. Then I noticed that the fee charged was $60 when was stated as 15% (should have been $30). I thought Sedo made an error and contacted the rep through the transfer center in my account.
Day 2 – No further update from Sedo. Thought they would be asking me to push the domain to their account but that didn’t happen. I guess they need more time to clear the buyer’s payment? And didn’t get a reply from the rep about the $60 commission either. Now if that was escrow .com I would have already got a reply from them so I thought in this area Sedo was a little bit slow. They take a day or more to reply for simple things. Buy hey it was Friday, maybe the guy left early for the weekend…can’t blame him after working hard all week!
Day 3 – it’s the weekend. Sedo doesn’t work on weekends but I do.
Day 4 – Again nothing happening as Sedo closed for the weekend.
Day 5 – Monday morning, my rep was up bright and early (probably it was in my time zone not his in the east) telling me to push the domain to Sedo’s account. Yay! That means they going to release the funds after they accept the domain. A simple push, which I immediately did, and just awaiting Sedo to accept the domain. Not today though as no response from them nor did they accept the domain push.
Day 6 – Sedo in the morning accepted the domain push and said their accounting department will release the funds within 1 or 2 business days. Okay so this is going to take longer since they only seem to do one thing a day (nothing on weekends) and now he has transferred it to the accounting department to handle the money end. But lo and behold about an hour later, funds were in my paypal account. That was a lot faster than what they said! They really impressed me now in how fast they released the payment by accomplishing two things in one day. Of course the most important one…getting the funds!
So overall the rating I would give Sedo for this transaction is 8/10, knocking a point off for each of the 2 things I was dissatisfied about in this transaction. One, it wasn’t made clear about the commission from the start as was advertised as 15%. I had to dig around to find where it was stated there was a minimum charge of $60, which was still not clear.
I don’t think this is a fair charge for domains sold for under $300 and, especially, for the poor guys who sold their domain in this auction for $109 and netted only $49. I mean some of these domain registrations on these domain hacks (depending on the extension) can get high $30 to $50 (maybe even more) per year. Mine I had to recently renew for $20 which was cheaper than what it would have been if was at other registrars. I could take the hit as it didn’t cost me much for this domain, as was part of a package of 9 domains that I paid $155 for. I still have 8 more to sell and the $139 covered a large portion of my investment.
The other thing was a little slow response time that should have made this transaction completed a day or two earlier because they didn’t reply on Friday for my simple question and they didn’t accept the domain push on Monday, after I immediately pushed it (in the morning) but took another day for them to accept it. They did though make up for it by releasing funds the same day but then it could have been at least a day sooner as was an easy transaction for them because buyer was fast in paying (the same day the auction ended) and seller was fast in pushing domain (the same day requested). The only delay here was the extra time Sedo took.
What I learned is there are unknowns (besides the hidden fee structure) when going into a sedo auction. Like you don’t know who the bidders or buyers are. They are just labeled as bidder 1, bidder 2, etc. And once is all done, you have no clue who purchased your domain and, once completed, the listing is removed from their search so no one later knows the domain is sold and at what price. If you like a discreet (secretive) way of buying and selling domains, Sedo definitely is the place to go!
In any case, I’m happy how overall Sedo handled the transaction (in their laidback sort of way), as at least it was stress-free. That $2500 domain sale through escrow .com had a couple unnecessary bumps, which increased the stress levels, but then they too got the job done (in week’s time) with the funds released to my bank account.
Some people are just not happy, always find something negative to say but not me…haha!
262/365
