Discuss your Epik Experience!

[dande]

I think Epik is building the best ever Domain Lander in the history of domaining, and it really needs to be talked about extensively. That's why I am creating this discussion thread. A lot of thought process really goes into the project. And I can see (for the first time) a landing page that is built from the stand point of domainers rather than for just the marketplace itself.

Everything you have ever dreamt of getting or seeing in a professional landing page can be found in the new Epik marketplace landing page design.

Some of my Favorites Features:

1. The ability to optimize your "domain for sale" landing page to actually rank on Google, displaying your sales pitch/domain description. I just did that with few of my generic domain names such as ASAP.TV, targeting certain keywords, and they are showing pretty well on Google. That's a huge plus in my marketing effort.

2. Being able to change background image is another huge one for me. If you are good with pictures and images, you will surely find this very useful. I did that with Nagasaki.org and the result was truly amazing, showing the city of Nagasaki right at the background.

There are too many positive features and I don't want to mention all of them, all alone

So I am leaving you guys to share and discuss what you loves most or dislike about the new Epik marketplace and the landing pages.

The only negative for me is the checkout process. There are too many terms and conditions buttons to tick before checking out. It will be nice if they can streamline those into one beautiful big button

They also need to place the checkout button directly under the payment options. Right now it is awkwardly place somewhere below at the sidebar, which I don't find cool at all.

Sales experience is also welcomed in this discussion. I haven't had any sells so far at Epik because I started using the marketplace just recently, but the future is looking so bright.

 

[branding]

From my understanding, each Registry can make their own rules regarding renewal locks. If this is a .com, there are no renewal locks. But then not every Registrar follows the rules of the Registry. Look at the poor suffering GoDaddy users, for example. GoDaddy quote ICANN rules but Verisign can decide for themselves if there is a renewal lock, or not. It looks like Epik are now doing the same. I cannot tell you if this is a longstanding rule, or if this has changed after their user data was released. Dynadot is one of only a few registrars I know of which don't apply renewal locks on any verisign and donuts domains. In accordance of the wishes of the Registry. I cannot speak for every Registrar, but I think many of them (including GoDaddy) which put renewal locks to domains quoting ICANN rules, which don't apply in ever case. ie .com. So for example. At Dynadot, I can renew a .com today and transfer it out the same day Nice!

Agreed. Those who do enforce a 60 day lock on a mere registrant change are just archaic and should have no place in the domainer community.

It's ridiculous. They (Epik) act all high and mighty making all kinds of promises over here but when push comes to shove they hide behind their TOS and basically tell you to go fuck yourself.

I've addressed this a couple of times before but am really getting stonewalled by support this time. 3 chats later, nothing changed. ICANN, TOS, who cares? They can make it happen if they want to.

They've been lucky enough to make some money out of me buying (someone else's domain I might add) a domain from them after everything that went down.

I'm done. And yes, Dynadot all the way.

 

[branding]

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[Name Trader]

Agreed. They used to allow it. Support is stonewalling me this time.

Any registrar enforcing a registry lock after a mere registrant change upon transfer is archaic and has no place in the domainer world.

You've probably eliminated about 90% of the Registrars of the planet, according to their size

 

[Future Sensors]

You've probably eliminated about 90% of the Registrars of the planet, according to their size

Most of which are ICANN-accredited dropcatch registrars?

 

[branding]

You've probably eliminated about 90% of the Registrars of the planet, according to their size

Lol, maybe. I dunno. The ones I regularly use don't lock down my domain upon a mere registrant change (the domain wasn't transferred).

It's nonsense and they know it.

As for that 10% left, I'm sure they're all in the top of the 'best registrar of 2021' poll

 

[branding]

Most of which are ICANN-accredited dropcatch registrars?

Very clever shouldn't have used them at all, I know. But you know how it is... Spotted a nice one, no other way. Lets hope they didn't store my disposable cc data this time

 

[Name Trader]

Lol, maybe. I dunno. The ones I regularly use don't lock down my domain upon a mere registrant change (the domain wasn't transferred).

It's nonsense and they know it.

As for that 10% left, I'm sure they're all in the top of the 'best registrar of 2021' poll

Except for Epik

 

[branding]

Except for Epik

Well, who knows what will happen. About 2 months left till the poll closes I think

Seriously though, they used to be kinda ok. Not taking into consideration their bad security practices, issues like this makes me regret using them at all.

Saddest thing is, I know they can lift these locks as they've done so in the past. Big FY to NP users I guess.

 

[Name Trader]

I still use Epik for dropcatching when "bottom fishing".

 

[cillx]

Sent an ACH payment on the 27th of October. Funds have not been added to my account yet. Don't know whether they received it or not. Support is unresponsive.

12 days passed and no clue about this payment. Didn't reply to any of my emails now suddenly replying me after 11 days to tell me that they were provided with an invalid tracking link!

 

[Jurgen Wolf]

I respect myself.
So no any new orders from me after Sep'13.
The remaining domains I drop or slowly transfer away...

 

[doofer]

In case anyone is as dumb as me just thought i'd point out that if you select a payment plan for your domains listed on Epik, once you've selected said plan, you need to click on 'apply, then on the right of the page you need to tick the 'start now' box. For a long time I wondered why the payment plan doesn't appear on the lander, bit daft I thought, how will people know that there is a payment plan !? Who knows if i've lost any potential sales due to not knowing this ?

 

[karmaco]

I don't use the API. Only the regular website backorders at Dynadot. It's hard to tell. Because every domain is different. And I had a slight change of strategy using Epik (going for lower hanging fruit). In the beginning, the few times I backordered on both, only about 2 or 3 domains, Epik beat out Dynadot. And since that time, I stopped using Dynadot backorders (although this was primarily a price issue rather than a success rate issue). Before I used Epik. I was only backordering at Dynadot, my success rate was maybe <30%

I don't actually pay much attention to the success rate, because it really depends on each name and the likelihood that it will drop and stay dropped long enough to be picked up by somebody other than dropcatch. I'm not competing for super competitive domains, else I'd use dropcatch. I still use dropcatch infrequently. But at $59 for every drop catch, it quickly becomes expensive, if the domain drops and stays dropped long enough to be picked up by Epik at $8.49

With this strategy. I can afford to transfer the domains to Dynadot after 60 days. Which give me 2 years of registration to decide whether to keep or drop the domain

Why use Dynadot which has a poor catch rate for $24.99? You can use DropCatch discount backorder and bid anywhere from $10 to $58 and have much greater chance of success.

 

[karmaco]

I bought an expiring domain from Epik. Support continues at feeding me nonsense. I merely want to unlock the domain which already was at apik, renewed at Epik and remained at Epik but they continue to refer to ICANN 60 day locks upon ownership change and their TOS.

Things got bad when they got hacked but now it seems they're enforcing some really outdated policies that make no sense at all.

Don't keep my domain hostage for no good reason when you just made money out of my purchase.

That policy has been in effect for years. I complained too. They used to say those locks don’t happen if you prove your identity with them but that may have changed.

They also used to make it hard to transfer out after expiration now you can at least in the first few days after exp. transfer out without issue.

 

[Name Trader]

Why use Dynadot which has a poor catch rate for $24.99? You can use DropCatch discount backorder and bid anywhere from $10 to $58 and have much greater chance of success.

The $10 bid is a scam. That allows HugeDomains to bid on any $10 order they take a fancy to. So the only real backorder is the $58 backorder which disqualifies HugeDomains from bidding on the same domain. After I started using Epik for dropcatching, I was catching the majority of the domains I bid on (not all of them of course). But since I started about 2 months ago they are keep changing the rules for approving the transfer out. Like recently, they send me an email telling my I must quote my email address (the same one they send me mail to) before they will approve the transfer away. They won't accept an email from that same address without me stating the same email address is my email address. Go figure! I don't think the right hand knows what the left hand is doing. I'm going to stop using them if they keep changing the rules like this. Sheer stupidity.

The $58 backorder gets rather steep really quickly. 10 domains is $580. Or could be much more if there is more than 1 bidder. Which inevitably there is.

 

[Name Trader]

Is there any cheap backorder company which has several or more backorder servers, I could consider instead of Epik?

 

[branding]

That policy has been in effect for years. I complained too. They used to say those locks don’t happen if you prove your identity with them but that may have changed.

They also used to make it hard to transfer out after expiration now you can at least in the first few days after exp. transfer out without issue.

I guess they covered their ass in their TOS although they've never applied an uniform policy.

I usually just contacted support, sent them a mail, sometimes Rob would help out and my domains would get unlocked. No issues albeit a tad annoying. But not anymore.

I cater a lot to tech related businesses, most of my sales are in that niche. They're perfectly aware of what happened with Epik so once a sale is made, keeping the domain there is a definite no go.

Oh well, I forgot about another account I have so I have still some left at E but should be able to clear out most before the end of the year.

 

[branding]

Is there any cheap backorder company which has several or more backorder servers, I could consider instead of Epik?

Yes, sav. But do your research. Cheap comes at a price. Also had good results at catched, albeit not for .coms and I'm sure whether or not they use multiple registrars.

 

[Jurgen Wolf]

Hex also has Backorder Lite.

 

[Name Trader]

Hex also has Backorder Lite.

Have they improved their control panel? I've only had 1 domain with them, which I couldn't manage properly in their control panel. I couldn't wait until I could transfer it out. It seemed like forever

 

[Name Trader]

Could someone post the top 10 backorder services and how many servers they have hitting the .com registry? Not 100% related to Epik. But it would be helpful to see how Epik ranks among the top dropcatchers.

 

[eternaldomains]

Been waiting for a day since the stated day to get my domain out. Live chat support talks like a friggin robot pointing me to everything else. My buyer is hounding me for it. Can't I get my auth code already FFS??

 

[Name Trader]

Show attachment 203894
Been waiting for a day since the stated day to get my domain out. Live chat support talks like a friggin robot pointing me to everything else. My buyer is hounding me for it. Can't I get my auth code already FFS??

Up until maybe a week ago. They released the domains on the date stated. But since then they had added approx 2 days to the release date, without changing the day it will be released. So your domain should be released within 24hrs. Nothing to panic about. And you won't ever get a reason why from anybody in support. Tell you customer to calm down as well

 

[Name Trader]

I've started a trial over the next 4 days contrasting Epik Dropcatching and SAV Dropcatching. There are some nuances between them. At Epik, unless you are the first to order the backorder, your backorder is toast, if they catch the domain. The first bidder wins the domain. No auction. If there are 2 bidders at SAV it goes to a 10 day auction. Probably not applicable in most cases (nobody else wants my domains) You pay up front with Epik, you only pay for domains you win at SAV.

So for me. This is a straight out fight between Epik & SAV Dropcatching. There are 6 domains ordered at both Epik & SAV. It's only a small sample. But it should be enough to be conclusive or inconclusive

I actually like the fact at Epik, that if you are the first backorderer, you will win the domain outright. I am the first backorderer for all 6 domains. I think its worth a lot. It's probably the same at SAV too, no other backorderers. I'm not keen on going to auctions for 10 days. Which I don't think will happen.

So the real test here is who is the fastest to catch these domains All .coms between 6-11 chars long, 2 keywords/initials.

Neither Registrar would I want to keep my domains at though. From the few domains I have at each.

 

[branding]

I've started a trial over the next 4 days contrasting Epik Dropcatching and SAV Dropcatching. There are some nuances between them. At Epik, unless you are the first to order the backorder, your backorder is toast, if they catch the domain. The first bidder wins the domain. No auction. If there are 2 bidders at SAV it goes to a 10 day auction. Probably not applicable in most cases (nobody else wants my domains) You pay up front with Epik, you only pay for domains you win at SAV.

So for me. This is a straight out fight between Epik & SAV Dropcatching. There are 6 domains ordered at both Epik & SAV. It's only a small sample. But it should be enough to be conclusive or inconclusive

I actually like the fact at Epik, that if you are the first backorderer, you will win the domain outright. I am the first backorderer for all 6 domains. I think its worth a lot. It's probably the same at SAV too, no other backorderers. I'm not keen on going to auctions for 10 days. Which I don't think will happen.

So the real test here is who is the fastest to catch these domains All .coms between 6-11 chars long, 2 keywords/initials.

Neither Registrar would I want to keep my domains at though. From the few domains I have at each.

Nice! Do keep us posted.