I heard a lot about brandables since deciding to plunge into domaining.
I used to be and still am a copywriter, SEO, PPC guy, content marketer, growth hacker, hustler and entrepreneur.
Here is my perspective.
I believe brandables have and will have a great future. After all in real world people need brand and business names all the time. In fact, it is an economic and business necessity. That's why we have the big, highly influential, multi-billion dollar advertising industry that literally bankrolls these things we call the media and the internet.
And what this industry does - create names, mnemonics, brand properties and other such intangible assets which are actually are huge part of a company's valuation.
These intangibles are actually wealth and job creators.
And since, domain names are becoming harder to get directly from registrars, there is a growing & addressable need the brandable domain name marketplaces can tap into.
How effectively and efficiently depends on the imagination and execution of market growth and development plans of each players.
The issue isn't demand or supply - it is distribution, lack of business mission clarity, customer support, platform integration and such.
The industry could and can become a supplementary service provider to the ad & branding industry. And at the same time have to undertake customer development & acquisition campaigns to bring and motivate both sellers and end users.
I think the brandable industry (if I can call it that) is still nascent but the long road to success would depend on the visions and values of the current major players and coming new upstarts.
My other 2 cents
From a seller perspective, sales could also be a reflection of poor quality.
Imagine a seller on Amazon, if he sells good quality products at the right price, he will sell. If on the other hand, he offers poor quality and charges a bit too much for such shoddiness and monstrosity, obviously we would not make sells in the near and long term.
There has to be self-correction from both the seller and platform's sides and also with regard to quality of product, price, service etc. generally in the industry.
I see this phase as Domaining 2.0 (or maybe 3.0).
We are entering a new age. It will be more interesting and profitable in the future than it was before.
The old days will never come back.
But I believe the best days are yet to come.