Questions and Gripes from readers about Go Daddy Auctions

By: Raymond Hackney

I usually get a lot of emails from newer domain investors about Go Daddy Auctions. Lately
there has been two common themes.

1) This is some B*llSh*T or How can they renew ? These are emails from people who won an auction and then got the email that the domain was renewed.

There seems to be confusion that we tried to clear up with our interview with Paul Nicks last year.  People are going to use all the tools at their disposal, I get people all the time telling me they are seeing how high their domain goes in auction before they transfer out. I also get emails all the time from people who see their name in the daily sales recap post, “I am renewing”, ” I am transferring”, “Let your readers know the winner will never get the domain”

Some people ask me are these people paying $80 to get these real world appraisals ? The answer is no, they just transfer them out to another registrar for whatever transfer deal that registrar is running.

Some people are late in renewing, others completely overlook domains to the last minute and then there are some who purposely let their domains run through Go Daddy Auctions to see where the name ends.

Paul Nicks has told me they are not going to change the system, Go Daddy prides itself in being the most registrant friendly registrar and they are going to allow every opportunity for the current registrant to keep their name.

Paul commented in a reply to why people can still get their name back after someone else won the name in auction.

“Good question and one that I sincerely hope I can clarify. First, I’ll
underscore a point I made in the interview, we created the system to
give our registrants the ability to keep or redeem their name as long as
possible. With that as the backdrop, hopefully the following
explanation will make more sense.

For many TLDs we are given a grace period of up to 45 days after
expiration to decide whether to keep or drop a domain. On the 25th day
after expiration, after three attempts to contact the registrant, we put
our expiring inventory onto the Go Daddy Auctions platform to see if
any of our other customers are interested in acquiring them. During the
entire time a domain is at auction the current registrant is able to
redeem that domain, albeit for a fee.

On the 42nd day we will cancel the domain name if no other customer
has expressed an interest in it via either the auction system or a Go
Daddy backorder. If, however, a customer has expressed an interest via
either of these platforms we will move the domain to their account on
day 43. Since the domain is still in the Go Daddy ecosystem we do allow,
in rare circumstances, the original registrant to get the domain back
via our redemption system up until day 45 which signifies the end of the
grace period.

Our help documentation (http://support.godaddy.com/help/article/608/what-is-your-process-for-handling-expired-domain-names?locale=en)
specifies day 42 for deletion because our registrants need to
understand that if they do not redeem prior to that date they could lose
their domain forever. However, we will continue to err on the side of
the registrant when it comes to the edge cases where a domain owner
calls asking whether they can get their domain back after day 42.

I hope that helps ease any confusion around this topic.

-Paul”

The second group of emails that have shared a common theme, have been from those people who have renewed their name and then reauctioned looking for the same prices. They want to know why they are not seeing the same number of bidders and the same pricing ? A lot of time that does not happen.  A perfect example will be the current auction for GMMM.com owned by Adam Dicker.

This name was expiring in June while Adam was out of town. The domain had 4 days left in auction when it got renewed.

Gmmm 06/24/2013 07:09:43 AM (PDT) 108707758 $1,585 Closed Expiring Auction 58 12 177.

That was copied from the auction when it closed, it was at $1,585 with 58 bids.

It is on 7 day public auction now and is currently at $270,

08/27/2013 07:00:00 AM (PDT)

114465511

$270

Open

Public Auction

22

232

Category | Bid History | Character Details | Description

The auction ends tomorrow at 10 a.m. Eastern Time.

I have always thought and I know some disagree, that the expired auctions just get a lot more interest. I actually don’t care if its public or private personally. If the price is right on a name I like, I don’t care, I do have friends that do care and bid much less or not at all on public auctions.

Maybe some people don’t rebid because they felt duped by bidding on the name when it was expired only to see it renewed. In the case of GMMM there were 14 bidders who made those 58 bids, the public auction currently has 5.

Please feel free to leave comments on whether you have ever bid on a public auction after you participated in the expired auction.