- Impact
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I was up for very unpleasant surprise today.
The names that I, for example, have priced for $2499 are showing as $2724.11 at Godaddy. Apparently, this change might be experimental for now as it is not showing the same for all, but it will have very adverse effect on all domain investment community. And it is grossly unfair too.
GD announced with lots of fanfare that it is reducing the Afternic commission from 20% to 15% to justify raising Dan commission from 9% to 15%. Apparently, there have been plans to recoup that and more, as 5% on the gross is more than 5% on the original price.
So what will be the impact on all of us? If GD does go ahead with it (and for the period and scope of the experiment) we will lose at least 5% of our sales if the price elasticity is straight line. But, we all know that it is not and there are psychological thresholds. E.g. 2499 to 2724, from my experience, will result in 10-20% loss for two reasons: a) again, it crosses 2500$ limit; b) the "magic" endings like 00, 99, 88, 50 are ruined for someing like 24.11 ending. GD itself in its blog had published an experiment involving namefind names that showed 8% increase in sales from going to 2499 from 2500, so this changes are meaningful.
See also the attached slide by Darpan (SH founder) showing how important those thresholds can be. Crossing $5k barrier, e.g., can result in 35% loss in sales numbers.
Now couple this with the upcoming 7%-10% increase in .com pricing, and loss of 10%-20% in sales so that GD can make extra 5% can be devastating to all of us.
If GD does go ahead with this, we should all look for an alternative to both Afternic and Godaddy, as they will eventually squeeze us all out of the business. If Godaddy does implement this, I will look into moving my 34000 .com domains out of Godaddy and will stop using Afternic landers.
This is just getting ridiculous. Godaddy, decide already, if we are your partners in the business or the competition.
The names that I, for example, have priced for $2499 are showing as $2724.11 at Godaddy. Apparently, this change might be experimental for now as it is not showing the same for all, but it will have very adverse effect on all domain investment community. And it is grossly unfair too.
GD announced with lots of fanfare that it is reducing the Afternic commission from 20% to 15% to justify raising Dan commission from 9% to 15%. Apparently, there have been plans to recoup that and more, as 5% on the gross is more than 5% on the original price.
So what will be the impact on all of us? If GD does go ahead with it (and for the period and scope of the experiment) we will lose at least 5% of our sales if the price elasticity is straight line. But, we all know that it is not and there are psychological thresholds. E.g. 2499 to 2724, from my experience, will result in 10-20% loss for two reasons: a) again, it crosses 2500$ limit; b) the "magic" endings like 00, 99, 88, 50 are ruined for someing like 24.11 ending. GD itself in its blog had published an experiment involving namefind names that showed 8% increase in sales from going to 2499 from 2500, so this changes are meaningful.
See also the attached slide by Darpan (SH founder) showing how important those thresholds can be. Crossing $5k barrier, e.g., can result in 35% loss in sales numbers.
Now couple this with the upcoming 7%-10% increase in .com pricing, and loss of 10%-20% in sales so that GD can make extra 5% can be devastating to all of us.
If GD does go ahead with this, we should all look for an alternative to both Afternic and Godaddy, as they will eventually squeeze us all out of the business. If Godaddy does implement this, I will look into moving my 34000 .com domains out of Godaddy and will stop using Afternic landers.
This is just getting ridiculous. Godaddy, decide already, if we are your partners in the business or the competition.
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