Since Bido.com has now opened it’s auction system to more then one domain name a day, getting ALL the notifications for Each domain auction daily in my email box is getting annoying.
The basic settings in Bido is to get email notification 1 hour before an auction starts which is a nice reminder and I wish other domain auction services allowed the option, but getting 3, 4, 5 emails in a row is a bit much.
Here is how to change that auction notification email setting.
~ Log in to your account at Bido.com
~ Click Settings on the far right upper Nav Bar.
You should now be on a page that looks like this:
~ Simply Uncheck the highlighted box and click Save.
~ A small pop up window will display that your settings are saved.
This will prevent you from getting any domain auction notification emails but currently it’s the only option and I would rather get none then a bunch.
If anything, Bido may want to consider a "group" email notification for all the domain auctions that are happening that day, instead of sending several.
Since I am talking about Bido, I wanted to hear your thoughts on if the Multiple auctions per day has Helped or Hurt the bido site so far?
I think it may have had a negative effect. If you look at the bido.com sales history, it’s not looking all that great. Quality isn’t all that great either. Hmmmmm
ChipsForPoker.com No Reserve and didn’t even get a bid.
CVQ.org ended for $110
SUW.org $108
UUJ.net $272 OUCH!
Several lately have ended in the $xx range.. and appears things have went south around 7-13 after the LearnHypnosis.com auction that ended for $1,031. I have been a supporter of going to multiple auctions, but if the Quality isn’t there, I would rather only see one auction a day.
theoretical
I made the same suggestion about grouping emails together for a single day’s events so hopefully that gets implemented. I’m trying to be patient but with several of my auctions coming up I hope that some of the kinks get worked out sooner rather than later.
I think the quality issue will improve once the crowd sourcing/user voting on submitted domains starts to work itself out. Many of the domains that were listed there the last week or so were not put through that process (or not very rigorously), but it appears to pick up throughout this week and next. I’ll keep my fingers crossed
dcmike77
The names still seem to be crap but the ones in auction recently were probably still in the ‘transition’ stage. But there seem to be a couple decent ones this week (finally):
- Bankrupt.us
- Trips.mobi
- GiantDomains.com
If these go for less than $1k each, then I’d say houston, we have a problem.
Jamie Zoch
@dcmike77
I personally am not loving these but Bankrupt.us is the best of the 3. 95.net on 7-27-09 is NICE. Some nice .org’s and CCC.com’s coming up as well. Only time will tell.
Jarred
Hi Jamie, thanks for the blog post and coverage of Bido. Thanks for the feedback about the multiple auction start notices, that’s something we aim to improve soon. Grouping the notices into one “daily digest” format will be an option our members will soon have.
Multiple auctions per day has been different than when we only ran one auction per day. We will be watching the comments here of course to hear what people think about this new format, thanks for the opportunity for us to hear what your readers think here on your blog.
In regards to the quality issue, in addition to multiple auctions per day, one of the other new changes that made us excited to offer the community is crowdsourced voting of what goes up for auction. Previously, Bido itself would select from submissions the best and send them to auction. Now, however, the Bido members themselves are empowered to do the selection process for No Reserve domains. Quality of what is sold is dependent on what is submitted and subsequently voted on by the members. And for the Reserve priced domains, there’s a listing fee format that ensures only high quality Reserve priced domains will be listed on Bido.com for auction. We know our buyers time is valuable and the shopping experience on Bido is quite different than the alternatives. Buyers on Bido know that they are dealing with sellers whom are ready, willing, and able – as indicated by accurately priced domains that are listed on Bido.
The reason Bido was built was to have a platform for buyers and sellers to transact. The prices you mentioned above about some recent sales are indicative of the state of the marketplace. A couple years ago, some of the recent sales from Bido would have (and did) sell for multiples of what they command in this day and age. The world is a different place now, and the values and volume of transactions are different than what they were then. It’s been reported early on, even when Bido started just over a year ago, that Bido was predictive of marketplace fluctuations, as indicated by the three letter .com auctions we ran at that time. People were wondering what was happening with values of three letter .com domains when Bido predicted they would fall, and they fell significantly across the marketplace, at any venue, within days thereafter. For the feel of the pulse of the industry, all one needs to do is watch our auction archive (link in the footer of our site).
We are committed to providing a unique platform for buyer and sellers to transact. Bido provides value to buyers, sellers, and people who want to learn about domain names as well. While we may not have all the formats ironed out (for example, like you mentioned, multiple email notifications you indicated may be annoying), we are committed to addressing the things that are in need of attention. We do have a lot more in store and other features that we feel will help the industry overall that we are looking forward to releasing in the near future. We greatly value your thoughts and the opportunity to discuss here on your Blog, so thank you.
Jamie Zoch
@Jarred,
As always, thank you to Bido for listening and taking action. Although I am a “Bido Expert”, I have yet to vote on any domains but on the flip side, I guess nothing has really made me feel like I should spend my time to do so yet. I really do like the idea of the expert voting but think that just being a “Bido Expert” should not allow you the right to vote. From my understanding, it’s pretty easy to become a Bido Expert. If it’s easy to become an expert, who says the “expert” really knows what’s best.
~
I 100% agree that submission quality makes a big difference, but Bido is also not “forced” to run more then one auction a day either. I would rather see one quality domain auctioned then 4 so/so ones. Just my 2 cents.
Francois
In another post Sahar said he was not very motivated to advertise in domaining sites because he does not trust the scheme “domainers selling to domainers” and because his marketing budget is limited.
I respect his decision but the problem is the domains you outline above are all domains oriented to domainers and NOT end-users.
So if you don’t advertise strongly to the audience of the type of domains names you are selling then you will not make any sale or will only sell for low amounts.
If I will be Sahar I will raise the sale commission they are charging (sellers will not care pay 10 to 15% if the domains sold for much more).
Current commission is really too low so they cannot generate enough incomes to can strongly improve BIDO advertising.
FREE social marketing has his limits.
Victor Paez
I agree…It should be (1) domain per hour. First domain starting at 9:00am thru 9:00pm.
There are many bogus domains out there. But, there are a few that did not get what they were worth.
Basketball.fm
BridalGowns.de
Basketball.fm sold for $148 and
BridalGowns.de sold for $77 what a steal!!!!!!!!
Basketball.fm was appraised for over $6,000 and
BridalGowns.de for $4,500
And ,you see DOT DE on Sedo are selling for thousands of dollars. But, you put them on Sedo and they don’t even get a bid. I have GolfGear.de and it is appraised for $57,000…yes $57,000. But not one offer. I think I started the bid at $5,000…another steal.
What’s up with that,
Victor
Jarred
Francois, I know that you are upset with us because we declined your offer to advertise with you. While Bido is not regularly advertising on your site or your newsletter (we have done some in the past with you as you remember) we are advertising elsewhere on a number of sites. We have good market penetration, as do you with your list, they are very comparable lists to begin with. I think Sahar was being polite with you but for the sake of factual information, Bido does advertise and has a healthy monthly ad budget. I’ll refrain from mentioning where due to the fact that it isn’t fair to Jamie that I list presumably competing blogs here on his. But Bido is advertising, as you know, since you saw the ads and approached us to advertise more with you.
To add to this topic, really the bigger picture is that, as evidenced, Bido can only advertise so much. The last fact I will mention is that on this very DotWeekly blog, Jamie wasn’t accepting advertisers when we inquired several months ago. Our campaign would still be alive here had he been open to the idea. The truth is far from what you make it out to be.
Regarding the burden of marketing, it is mostly with the sellers of the domains, we provide the social platform to maximize the sale for the sellers but we cannot be responsible to market to the world. We are working on more tools and information to empower those that choose to sell with us to do their own marketing. We cannot stress the importance enough that sellers market their listings to the world.
Regarding the commission structure, thank you for the feedback.
Sahar Sarid
Hi guys,
Jarred said above (forth comment) most of what I could say as well. Market is extremely weak and we see it all over. We have a lot of work ahead of us and while we understand things aren’t perfect, we are doing our best to make them better.
Francois,
The responsibility to market is on the seller, not us (within or outside of the domain community). Most in the domain channel know about us very well via blogs and few banners on sites within the community. As most are well aware, the domain community is a very small community. We believe the better balance of spending is to make a good product.
Cheers,
Sahar
Ozie Jackson
A lot of people complain about quality of domains but I thought a mid level domain auction was the whole point of Bido? I don’t think anyone expects motorcycle.com or Munich.de to be put up for auction at Bido. For the Bido experts who are doing the voting I think you should vote on domains not based on your own perceived notion of what quality is but based on factors like, “If someone were new to the industry would this be a good enough domain to get them started with a small development site?” or “Is there potential for this domain to go up in value based on my experience in the business?” or “Could someone market this domain to a end user for a few hundred bucks?” I think this would be far more beneficial than the “these domains suck” approach, especially to less experienced domainers who can’t afford the big ticket items. Domainers trying to gain a foothold would benefit and this would help the industry as a whole. If the attitude becomes “I don’t like any of these domains so I will not participate”, I think it defeats the purpose of what Bido is trying to do.
I am confident that the timing and notifications of the auctions will eventually work itself out. But if you signed up as an expert and have a vote please use it.
Sahar Sarid
Good points there Ozie,
Voting by the way is open to all verified members, not only to Bido experts.
Best,
Sahar
Victor Paez
Here is another example: BandShirts.de sold at Sedo for $5,429…someone over paid! BandShirts.de is less attractive than GolfGear.de.
Another, xxlShop.de sold at Sedo for $2,115 and Haeuser.net (houses in german)sold for $9,378. I have Houses.fm for sale..it seems that putting these domains at auction is a waste of time and money!!