news GoDaddy to acquire domain sales platform dan.com!

[MadAboutDomains]

Looks like GoDaddy is acquiring Dan.com!

Via Domainnamewire... https://domainnamewire.com/2022/06/28/big-news-godaddy-is-acquiring-dan-com/

 

[alcy]

I've had the DDC club for more years than I can remember...cancelled it about a month ago and they still charged me about 350. Had to file a dispute with my bank...shortly after I got the 'official' notice from daddy my money had been returned.

The customer service rep spent quite a while pushing my request for a bigger discount than the initial one they offered me (of course they dropped it about a third as soon as I said cancel). She said it went up the ladder two levels but the final number was not acceptable to me. She indicated that many had called to complain and/or cancel.

I only have about a hundred names left there from auctions but I will be transferring them away as they come up for renewal. Too many registrars offer much better pricing without the 'club' crap.

I have never seen anything more insulting in domaining than charging for club membership...until i saw them double it.

 

[laur77]

We understand that the first reaction many Dan users have can be a negative one. However, please know that this is not your typical exit.

100% of Dan's employees including management and Reza won't leave the company and the reason for that is because we're given the chance to do what we do well at a larger scale.

We will build out our vision just with more resources at our disposal which we needed to push forward faster.

Give us some time and we will make our roadmap clearer and when that's in place, we believe the sentiment will turn positive.

Good things are ahead for domain investors!

Congrats on the agreement and for your exit, but if your real intentions are to build positive sentiments to domainers, the main asset of your business, maybe you should start by being honest to them and name this exit what it is: an exit. "Joining forces" is not synonymous with exit and domainers are not retards.

"100% of Dan's employees including management and Reza won't leave the company and the reason for that is because we're given the chance to do what we do well at a larger scale."
Common, you are not leaving because the takeover must be a smooth process ensured by the DAN.com actual employees, because of GD contract, and not for that cheap line.

The fact that all your communications are full of distortions is not creating trust at all, but the opposite.

 

[frank-germany]

Congrats on the agreement and for your exit, but if your real intentions are to build positive sentiments to domainers, the main asset of your business, maybe you should start by being honest to them and name this exit what it is: an exit. "Joining forces" is not synonymous with exit and domainers are not retards.

"100% of Dan's employees including management and Reza won't leave the company and the reason for that is because we're given the chance to do what we do well at a larger scale."
Common, you are not leaving because the takeover must be a smooth process ensured by the DAN.com actual employees, because of GD contract, and not for that cheap line.

The fact that all your communications are full of distortions is not creating trust at all, but the opposite.

"domainers are not retards"

most not
but DAN actually never cared too much

 

[laur77]

"domainers are not retards"

most not
but DAN actually never cared too much

Honestly, until now I had a very good experience with undeveloped/dan.com team, each time I have contacted them they were acting careful enough, that's why I am saying that now it would be a shame to start having this kind of attitude toward domainers, I repeat, the main asset of their business. It's ok, take the GD money but don't take also GD attitude from day one and pretend to be the same decent corporation.

 

[Joshh71390]

Hmm sounds like business as usual... Once your business is as optimized as possible, the only next logical answer is to try to scale up your business by buying customers... -> I think the business model is especially ripe for the picking in such an industry such as registration as they are esentially a middleman -> with a subscription based revenue model... so it's very easy for godaddy to -> say okay you guys are billing 10m per year ... for this many .coms this many .nets ..... renewal rate is 89%... yes we can offer you , ... years worth of revenue and ... it's then as simple as onboarding all the users into their system, however theres not really much else that needs to be done... Ive never in my life had to contact support about a domain name.... itself... godaddy doesnt need to do anything EXTRA compared to if those customers all just registered at godaddy originally.

its very similar to the practices of webhosting resellers buying and selling clients... if your not dropping that many clients... you can esentially scale your business overnight.

 

[eyedomainous]

In my experience, Dan favored European domainers so the Godaddy sale should level the playing field.

For example, I noticed when I nameserver a domain to Dan, it displays a page of mostly European domains, (instead of 'other domains from this domain seller'), until I add the domain name to my account. And, if a domain is not 'configured properly', Dan takes it as an opportunity to load a "get inspired" page, of mostly European domains, instead of notifying the account owner, or displaying their 'other domains'.

 

[MadAboutDomains]

In my experience, Dan favored European domainers so the Godaddy sale should level the playing field.

For example, I noticed when I nameserver a domain to Dan, it displays a page of mostly European domains, (instead of 'other domains from this domain seller'), until I add the domain name to my account. And, if a domain is not 'configured properly', Dan takes it as an opportunity to load a "get inspired" page, of mostly European domains, instead of notifying the account owner, or displaying their 'other domains'.

Show attachment 219190

How does GoDaddy buying them fix this specific problem?
I had no inkling that Dan favoured any domains specifically, least of all European ones cause it doesn't make sense.

 

[karmaco]

In my experience, Dan favored European domainers so the Godaddy sale should level the playing field.

For example, I noticed when I nameserver a domain to Dan, it displays a page of mostly European domains, (instead of 'other domains from this domain seller'), until I add the domain name to my account. And, if a domain is not 'configured properly', Dan takes it as an opportunity to load a "get inspired" page, of mostly European domains, instead of notifying the account owner, or displaying their 'other domains'.

Show attachment 219190

Are you in Europe? If so there is your answer.

Also if you want people to see your other domains change your account settings to do so and stop blaming DAN for things you don’t even know is in your control.

 

[alcy]

In my experience, Dan favored European domainers so the Godaddy sale should level the playing field.

For example, I noticed when I nameserver a domain to Dan, it displays a page of mostly European domains, (instead of 'other domains from this domain seller'), until I add the domain name to my account. And, if a domain is not 'configured properly', Dan takes it as an opportunity to load a "get inspired" page, of mostly European domains, instead of notifying the account owner, or displaying their 'other domains'.

Show attachment 219190

look like we both enjoy a good conspiracy theory.... cool

 

[eyedomainous]

Dan.com began as Undeveloped.nl. The website was in Dutch, with a stated mission to be "The Dutch marketplace for domain names." I knew that when I joined Undeveloped in 2016. So its not news, or a crime, for a Dutch owned domain marketplace to favor Dutch names.

How else can one explain a Pizzeria.com lander loading 5 unrelated .nl and European related names?
A non-biased domain marketplace algo would offer contextual domain alternatives to prospects.

"How does GoDaddy buying them...?" Godaddy would not favor .nl or European domains over contextuals.

@karmaco "Are you in Europe? If so there is your answer." Makes no sense. And, I recently changed my account settings when I saw they don't always work, as intended, on Pizzeria.com, etc..

@alcy "from my experience" an evidence supported conclusion is not a conspiracy theory.

 

[okaydomains]

The big takeaway I got from the article was Lease To Own is coming to Afternic.

 

[branding]

@karmaco "Are you in Europe? If so there is your answer." Makes no sense

It does actually. Especially if you're in NL. You would prefer the ccTLD.

Think Google. They don't provide the overall best search result but the best search result depending on who is searching.

That being said...

Suggestions seem pretty random, agreed.

 

[MadAboutDomains]

On the point about it favouring Dutch names, I think that they are just baaaad at domain discovery. Their whole system for searching domains is bad in general, buggy, useless. I still don't think they do favour nl domains even with that screenshot in evidence.

 

[hemirate]

I f*****g hope not.

Godaddy is a terrible company and they are going to push Dan to the ground

 

[hemirate]

Sales proceeds from Dan, we used to get it within 24 hours after closing the deal, can we expect the same from Afternic? Certaining No.
Support was instant in Dan, but it takes weeks in Godaddy.
Dan commission was only 9% but we need to pay 20% commission for Godaddy.
Dan has been a dynamic but it is sad it is merging with a static company

Well, this is a good time for a new startup to scoop up and take Dan place.

 

[hemirate]

whelp this has to be the worst June,April fools joke ever…

Just feels like a slap in the face by Dan, I get it you’ll take the money but come on.. sell it to someone else not godaddy, I would approve of Epik over Godaddy…

F you, Dan!

Edited by moderator to remove vulgarity

I hope you are joking when you say you favour Epik over Godaddy.

Granted Godaddy is crap, Epik is a diarrhea burst.

They literally took one of my high-valued domain names before redemption period expired.

It's been known for years they are a rogue registrar.

 

[alcy]

I hope you are joking when you say you favour Epik over Godaddy.

Granted Godaddy is crap, Epik is a diarrhea burst.

They literally took one of my high-valued domain names before redemption period expired.

It's been known for years they are a rogue registrar.

or u just forgot to read tos saying u got 15day past expiry b4 its removed. which u can.increase by asking..its just not.default... of course why someone doesnt renew high value names b4 15 day past expiry is another story...but maybe yo dog ate yo homework

 

[Haroon Basha]

I hope you are joking when you say you favour Epik over Godaddy.

Granted Godaddy is crap, Epik is a diarrhea burst.

They literally took one of my high-valued domain names before redemption period expired.

It's been known for years they are a rogue registrar.

No, I don't agree with you. Epik is far better than GoDaddy in many ways. GoDaddy is a problem of plenty. A customer is an alien there. Just because it is a very big company does not mean that their services are also good. They have their own limitations but don't really care to address them.
You cannot judge a company with single incident. I love Epik's instant Customer Services. Even the CEO is easily accessible. Please do due diligence before slapping a bad adjective. Thank you.

 

[Steven McEvoy]

I hope you are joking when you say you favour Epik over Godaddy.

Granted Godaddy is crap, Epik is a diarrhea burst.

They literally took one of my high-valued domain names before redemption period expired.

It's been known for years they are a rogue registrar.

LeArN HoW tO rEnEw DoMaInS

 

[alcy]

LeArN HoW tO rEnEw DoMaInS

give him break he newbee and his doge ate his homework heh

 

[hemirate]

It seems not only you are not able to write but also to read. Have a good day

 

[poweredbyme]

It's just another day for me to hear that one professional, institutional company swallows another unprofessional one which acts like a one man company. In my offline career I monitored or managed company acquisition processes as a small part of my daily routine. The biggest reason is often difference between companies in level of professionalism. What's that actually?

What most people know it wrong is that an institutional company doesn't have to be a giant. The opposite is more correct, a small professional company or even an individual in suitable external conditions will likely become giant in just a decade or two. Being an institutional company means being consistent with its own rules, behaving everyone in the exact same way in same situations. That has nothing do with how big or small you are. That's just a choice on whether you have principles, red lines, backbone or not.

The lesson: Next time rely only on professional, institutional companies and don't be obsessed too much with the price you will pay. Price should never be only one criteria, (i.e. 9% vs 20%)

Unprofessional companies may behave different to different persons and also in different situations, in different days, by different staff, ceo, etc. Institutional companies have their own consistent, strong identities which stay relatively unchanged for decades. You can't trust unprofessional companies, as well as individuals who don't have consistent, foreseeable identity. Typical nonprofessionals change their own rules frequently, stop their operation or sell their companies suddenly which you rely on for your own business. Professionals don't come to you with serious unpleasant surprises for decades. They change at an unnoticeable speed. Your business with them almost always work in the way you expect to happen. That's where their invisible power is hidden.

 

[loredan]

I've been with Undeveloped since their early days and wanted so bad to see them succeed and become a real competitor of GD and Sedo. If Dan would have launched their registrar side of business, they might have put a serious dent in GoDaddy's earnings coming from domainers. Instead Reza took the easy path, money is money. The past showed that everything GoDaddy touched, turned to crap and this would be no different story, unfortunately...

 

[TribeMagnet]

Dan is acquisition #29 for GoDaddy. I'm moving my assets as soon as I have time. With Afternic, Dan, and
Uniregistry off the list I'm left weighing the pros and cons of Epik, Sedo, and a handful of also-rans.

 

[alcy]

I still don't get it.. is there like official gd dan link or info saying what will happen to Dan... changes.. etc