BrandPa.com Experience (Brandable Domain Marketplace)

[Chris Hydrick]

BrandPa.com has announced their presence on NamePros...

Hi there! I'm sorry your experience with BB wasn't pleasant :/ If you'd like to try our marketplace please don't hesitate to do so We're new in the domaining industry but very eager to learn! Let me know what you think or if you have any questions This is us: https://brandpa.com/ (or if you'd like to read about the sellers' rules visit this page: https://brandpa.com/start-selling)

Look forward to hearing from you!

Granted, the above post is from the BrandBucket experience thread, and will likely be deleted for being off topic / wrong thread, it was the first time I heard of them. The founder, @Jowita Emberton, had introduced herself in an earlier thread:

Hi guys! NamePros is a great website to get invaluable information about the domaining industry. As a reader, I'm here pretty much every day. As a writer, I'm starting today

I'm the founder of Brandpa (brandpa.com), a domain name marketplace similar to BB, BR or Namerific. We use AI and human knowledge to create and judge the names’ value according to how easy to pronounce and catchy they are.

I'm here to learn, get to know you and your recent experiences with other brandable name marketplaces We're still developing the business so any insight on our site (brandpa.com) or anything you're missing from other marketplaces will be very useful

Thanks!

I'm creating this thread to discuss their marketplace, and for those who have experiences with them.

Here's what I know so far:

The founder, @Jowita Emberton, runs two other online businesses according to her LinkedIn page.

Delighten.co.uk - Web / brand design firm.

Weddination.com - Polish wedding services

According to her LinkedIn, she has been operating BrandPa since August 2016. Though, the last cached Archive.org screenshot is a server error on October 4, 2016 HERE

BrandPa.com (2006) is registered to Oliver Emberton, founder and managing director of SilkTide.com.

Currently, there are 562 domains published / listed on BrandPa. It appears most domains listed are handregged by the owners. Not 100% on this; I will run a check when my program is working again.

After reviewing their listings, I found two errors.

The domain regged is MonoRaptor.com, but the text reads ManoRaptor.com

The domain regged is UnknownVenues.com, but the text reads UnknownVenus.com

At first look:

Pros

• No Listing Fee
• FREE Logos
• Domain Owner sets price ($1,000+)
• Forwards all offers for sellers consideration
• Brandpa is a pretty memorable / catchy brandable domain.
• Select 'On-Sale' marketing section

Cons

• Low Alexa Ranking (4,557,819)

• New site. Assuming low organic traffic, and low type-in traffic due to quality and quantity of inventory.
• Piggy-back branding off BrandBucket in site footer see below

• Reviews are all from .co.uk domains, yet BrandPa doesn't sell any .co.uk domains. A quick glance at other domains owned by the reviewers and I wasn't able to verify any brandable .com's with history tracing back to BrandPa.

Personal thoughts: I respect that they "allow the seller to submit more domain names" by not charging a listing fee. To me this shows they are willing to work for your exclusivity. Should they gain popularity, I wonder if they'll sustain this business model and/or if their logo / listing quality will decrease over time when resources are spread across the masses.

@Jowita Emberton = Feel free to comment / fill in any of the blanks.

 

[karmaco]

I was a big fan of Brandpa before I sold any names. They have sold three names for me since November 24 2018. I have turned down offers on even more.

If you are not getting offers at least, reconsider names in the portfolio, opening offer price and if the name is worth keeping or not. It’s not Brandpa or any marketplaces fault if no one wants that name.

The next part that nobody wants to hear is the large majority of sales reported on BB are domains that have been on BB 1 to 5 years time. That is a long wait. So Brandpa selling multiple for me around 1 year mark is fantastic.

Brandables require good names and patience. If you are missing either this type of selling of names isn’t for you.

I see people throwing in the towel after a few months because they haven’t made a sale. A brandable market gives possible exposure and more eyes on a domain but there is never a guarantee of a fast sale or any sale. You have to have patience to go this route.

 

[karmaco]

It seems to me that the value these brandable marketplaces bring to the table is the eyeballs they can put on our domain names that wouldn't have otherwise seen the names, by ranking and buying traffic for keywords like "domains for startups" and "business name ideas", and earning media coverage, etc.

They're taking these massive commissions in exchange for generating the leads for us and getting eyeballs on our names, which is solid. It makes sense, if they can find a buyer who wouldn't have otherwise been able to find our names - and suggest those names to them, and get us these huge $2000 sales for basically handregs and random brandables, that's a win for everyone.

BUT if your domain name is desirable and gets type-in traffic and that's how somebody finds it, you're giving up a big chunk of money, and exclusivity, and having to wait 30 days to sell elsewhere, for nothing. If the buyer already wants your domain, then using these marketplaces is a bad idea since you're giving up such so much when you've generated your own lead without the help of the marketplace. You're bringing all these potential buyers into the marketplace too, and paying a high price to do it.

So by opening up the floodgates and removing quality control, it seems to me that a brandable marketplace is going to dilute itself. If you as a domainer have a quality name that buyers are actively seeking out, you're shooting yourself in the foot by using a brandable marketplace since people are going to find your name on their own because they're looking for it and you risk the buyer finding something else they like better at the marketplace.

If you have handreg, lottery-ticket type names, you're more incentivized to list them since you're a lot less likely to generate those leads on your own and you benefit more from the traffic other people bring into the marketplace since you aren't bringing in your own, and you may luck out by having a buyer that somebody else brought to the table deciding to buy your name instead.

But if you have the quality names that are bringing in traffic and buyers, you risk losing those leads, and for what, the privilege of paying 25%, 30%, plus $8, plus not being able to promote it anywhere else?

Sure, you might still get sales, but how do you know you wouldn't have gotten that sale anyways, and been able to keep ~21%+ more of the money by using dan.com or your own lander instead? Not to mention having it listed on Afternic, Sedo, etc.

Which, imo, leads to an overall reduction in quality of listings and value that the marketplace can offer to people with decent domain names.

It seems like opening things up to many more names is shortsighted, or at least works against the people with the best quality names.

It means people with higher quality names are punished because they're bringing in the traffic, paying a huge commission if their names sell, and helping promote a bunch of lower-quality names that aren't bringing traffic into the ecosystem.

So people with the names that a brandable marketplace would WANT to list (the names that can bring in leads and sell on their own merit with inherent value), are the ones who are punished by a lower barrier to entry.

If it's $8 to list a name, and the logo designers are paid $5, that leaves $3 to promote each name. It doesn't seem like it's going towards SEO since I'm not really seeing any notable organic rankings for BP, so what does that buy in paid traffic... a couple of clicks maybe? Are they even running paid campaigns, and if not - what is BP doing to generate traffic for our domain names?

I like BrandPa and my limited dealings with them have been pleasant and I wish them the best, I'm just trying to wrap my head around how this change is a good move for domainers with great names.

Since BP make all of their money from commissions, I'd imagine BrandPa would want to encourage the most sellable names to be on their platform, but by diluting the value of their platform, they're encouraging the lower quality names and discouraging great names imo. I hope this works out for them, but I can't really wrap my head around it.

Not sure why you are aiming this at Brandpa. The other two SH and BB have significantly higher amount of domains and dilution as you said. They also charge higher commission and charge for the privilege of looking at your names.

The point of the $8 is to make sure they don’t become the unruly beast the other two are too fast. Brandpa has been going over 3 years now and they have only 13,500 names. SH has two and a half times that and BB even more.

You pay Afternic, GoDaddy,Dan, Sedo,everyone a commission. There are benefits to being on a brandable market and thats why so many do so. Fielding fake offers, low ballers and non paying bidders from DAN etc gets real old and is time consuming. Brandpa pays pronto too and the other two don’t.

You do what works for you. But if you are criticizing Brandpa and leaving the other two who also have significant flaws out it seems rather targeted and disingenuous.

 

[wwwulff]

I would not put too much into the different metrics - I have some names that have between 100 and 200K visitors over the last 90 days and I doubt it can bee true (194,999 is the highest) - Regarding hotness and favorites then I would not put anything in to it - The last name I sold had a low hotness score and only 1 favorite selection and many of the other I have sold did not score high on any of the metrics mentioned - But maybe there are someone with other experiences?

 

[etruscan]

Big news for brandpa sellers announced on their twitter account

• We now allow sellers to list their domains on other marketplaces, so long as they continue to point those domains to Brandpa. In other words, if someone types in your domain, they must be taken to Brandpa. Previously listing your domains on other marketplaces was prohibited and could result in your account being banned.

 

[Oliver Emberton]

Oliver from Brandpa here. We don't spend a lot of time on NamePros, it's true!

Just caught up on this thread, and there are a few things that were out of date, so I thought I'd update you:

1. Listing fees dropped to $5 for everyone in March 2021: https://sellers.brandpa.com/lower-listing-fees-faster-changes-and-more/ (if they're $6 for you, it'll be because of VAT, which is applied in the UK + EU)

2. Agree with @pixabrand that it's often worth asking our designers for the logo you want (all sellers get to chat with our designers for that reason, but not all do). A competitive logo can definitely make a sale more likely, and we have data to prove it.

3. We now allow sellers to change the price of a domain every 30 days, at your discretion, unless it's currently under offer / being sold. We also now let you remove domains instantly and list on other marketplaces.

4. We added a range of perks for better sellers (e.g. free listings), more here: https://sellers.brandpa.com/introducing-seller-levels-and-benefits/

5. The loss of domain statistics was temporary, and we brought back significantly improved stats for all our sellers in March: https://sellers.brandpa.com/the-return-of-analytics-and-the-end-of-hotness/

Hope this helps!

 

[Chris Hydrick]

*Any domain added and sold between 2/20 and 5/25 I would have missed*

@Grilled Not sure where you're getting those sales figures, but off-hand I know we sold a domain yesterday from a seller on his second sale, so that can't be right.

The seller mentioned owns 59+ (mostly aged) domains on Brandpa. (also a brandbucket seller)

1 of the sales is confirmed. (domain added/sold between mentioned gap in my scans)

The other sale hasn't changed WHOIS yet.

Aside from these two, I can't verify any other sales. (members please share if you've made sales!)

Thanks @Oliver Emberton for stopping by and filling in some blanks via PM. Hopefully in the future you'll have the pleasure of reporting more sales.

Hope to see you @Jowita Emberton around NamePros more often!

 

[AndrewMayers]

Very happy to announce ,sold 1st name on Brandpa :-
Domain name : VoltN^com
Sale Price : 1495$
Received 1121.5$ on paypal after 25% brandpa commission
Purchase price = 4.99$ namesilo promo
Hold period- 6 month

Very good sale sir , brandpa is awesome.

 

[varmuk]

Sold 2nd domain on brandpa,more details later
thank you Brandpa

 

[creataweb]

Just sold another name at BP. Will post soon after it's completed.

 

[creataweb]

So far I've sold 2. First one was within a month and fast payment. Second was within a few months and payment pending to me. Might try to submit more names soon.

 

[hookbox]

The wholesale aftermarket kills brandable domain sales to end users. Above the fold on page 1 of Google under "brandable domains" is the brandable domains for sale link to Namepros. How many startups search for brandable domains and come across Brandroot, Brandbucket, Brandpa etc.....and also come across the Namepros brandables for sale threads. Who in their right mind would pay a couple grand or more for a name that they could easily buy at Namepros for 20 bucks. Every single one of these websites should ban any of their members that sell those same names on Namepros. I absolutely would if I ran the show. It kills sales for any brandable seller not just the members of these sites.

 

[BrandCougar]

Approx 2,300 to 2,500 published (live names) at the moment from my understanding.

The Brandpa site only accepts 5 domains (per user) per day and their average acceptance rate is running at 10 to 15%. (some weeks its running at 15%, some weeks it seems to throttle down to a 10% acceptance rate - but it has been somewhat consistent in that acceptance range for the past 5 months is my observation)

So from a volume perspective - you will be lucky to get 3-4 domains accepted per week to the site (based on 35 submits per week @ their 10-15% acceptance rate).

The path to building a portfolio with them is long and takes patience. Recently, from what I've observed, they don't accepted bulk "BB portfolios" transfers to the site. It is a simple matter of plugging along submitting 5 names per day and wait 3-4 days for each batch to be review to see what has been accepted. Slow and steady - they aren't looking to choke on bulk submissions.

Why do they do this?

To avoid submission overload like BB went through back in early 2015. They are throttling the input volume to tightly manage their processes and keep a pulse on their review & publish cycle. Recently they even "turned off" the submissions process for a 2 week period in early March to catch up on their review volume. Clearly a disciplined group.

Once a domain is accepted, it might take 2-3 weeks to get the name live. (which is reasonable)

Sales rate: not published, but we consistently hear of sales from various members on the site so Brandpa is moving product, but no hard data on what their rate of sales are.

I hope the feedback is helpful. They are worth a try, but don't expect open arms to a bulk transfer from BB/NR/etc. They don't seem overly horny over BB recycling.

Personally - I like their approach.

 

[Isac]

I believe it goes to 2 people for assessment. If it passes the first person it then goes to another who has another look over it. If they both agree and like it it then goes to designing logos and publish.

Second person never likes it

 

[Yusupbabay]

My accepted domain is "HOT" in BrandPa! $6,995

shopsia.com

 

[Josh R]

MetroService.com

This domain is damn good, as already taken in about 15 categories, 15 odd years old and has a wide scope,
What I believe, it can even hit xxx,xxx if properly brokered (its only my appraisal, I do not know what you or other think), as I am not very good marketer so going to put on brandpa and will see if can hit BIN with in some months. btw I can only hope.

There is chance on branded domain platform for this domain to be sold quickly. I also own the .net version of this domain

I sold that on Flippa last year. I guess you were the buyer.

 

[Uppercredit]

First name accepted after submitting 37 names...
Congratulations to me in advance

Restohealth.com

 

[Yusupbabay]

domains listing in brandpa today :

lazado.com $2,895
https://brandpa.com/name/lazado

 

[wwwulff]

How long was it listed

About 6 months

How recently?

3 weeks

 

[wackawacka1]

For any new sellers, I was able to register as a new seller this morning after trying to do so for the last couple weeks but getting a message that they weren't accepting new sellers.

 

[Haykay2005]

Just curious how much did you sell it for. I know you won't be giving out the name?

Sold @ $2,200. Thanks

 

[DomainsMaven]

How long those domains you have on Brandpa

About 9 months on brandpa, but no sale yet. 128 domains listed so far.
I guess i will wait and see. I will update everyone by end of this year.
Stay safe.

 

[Haykay2005]

You can see my portfolio now.

125 @ brandpa with no sale is strange but that's domaining for you .your names are not bad, so sales will definitely come. I have sold 2 out of 57names

 

[BrandCougar]

>> Plz someone tag her


Why?

So you can continue whining?

You were an annoyance on the BP Slack channel and seem to be continuing your behavior here.

Jowita/Oliver respectfully tolerated it - more patience than most site owners would.

-Cougar

 

[BrandVenue]

The rule is stupid, not to say something else.
Since brandbucket requires money from you to even apply to sell a domain, in the use of credits, now brandpa wants to make $50 for each 10 names that you submit and are approved...

Oh well, bye bye, I will use undeveloped or any other websites that are free, why should I pay when others offer services for free.

If there is a brandpa representative here on the board, I would love to hear their opinion about this.

I disagree with your above statement. If it was their intention then they'd accept a lot of new sellers and a lot of names. But it's not the case.

I track BrandBucket, SquadHelp and Brandpa's Nameserver everyday using DomainIQ and these are the results from past 7 days

BrandBucket - Domains added last 7 days = 486, daily average 69 domains added

SquadHelp - domains added last 7 days = 1078, daily average 154 domains added

Brandpa - domains added last 7 days = 171, daily average 24 domains added

It's clear Brandpa is growing it's inventory at very slow pace. They are not after $50 listing fees for 10 names every new seller joins.

Besides they don't get $5 listing fee themselves as they pay that $5 for doing logo to logo designers.

 

[wwwulff]

What I wanted is only number.

I have been a member of BP for a year and a half and I have sold 9 names and my portfolio is 64 - You can make the math yourself.

I am also selling via BB - I had an average of 280 names listed last year and sold 8 - Again you can make the math yourself

I saw one telling us in the BB thread that he had almost 1000 names with BB but did not sell a single one last year - Why these differences? In my opinion, because it is more about quality and sense of what types of names that sells than numbers