Category: News

It’s not every day you see great domains expire.  But it does seem like it’s happening more and more often, with the latest domain UPC.com which expired on March 1, 2010 heading to auction on NameJet. 

Unit Parts Company (UPC), originally registered the name in 1995 and 10 years later, Unit Parts Company and its assets was acquired by Remy International.  Unit Parts was a major supplier to the automotive aftermarket and had net sales of approximately $150 million in 2004 before selling to Remy in 2005.

Do you think UPC.com is a valuable name? 
 
Apparently, Remy International didn’t think so and didn’t think enough of the name to renew it.  While that might not obviously be the reason, anything is possible when it comes to end users of domain names. 

The keyword UPC has an Exact Global Monthly Search Volume of 823,000. It’s Valuate.com appraisal sits at $442,000.  UPC also stands for Universal Product Code, a barcode system that is used throughout the United States and Canada for tracking items in stores.

At the time of this story, UPC.com has over 100 bids with a current high pre-bid of $8,000 (the highest pre-bid of any name on NameJet right now).  The name heads to auction on April 5, 2010.

Aron Meystedt and XF.com made news in 2009, when Symbolics.com which belonged to a computer manufacturer, changed owners. 

In 25 years of being registered, the domain never expired and it has never changed owners. 

That is, until late 2009 when the acquisition by XF investments made news all over the internet and in the mainstream media.

If you visit Sybmolics.com today, a countdown clock appears at the top of web site.  The latest blog entry was written on March 1st, 2010 and discusses one of Aron’s other ventures TrafficEstimate.com which was relaunched.

What’s in store for the Anniversary?
 
Whatever is in store for Symbolics.com in less than a day, Aron has promised a Big 25th Anniversary. 

News has been trickling out by a variety of news sources celebrating the 25 year anniversary, but not much news has been put out by Aron in the last couple weeks. If you’re anxiously awaiting the anniversary, you have have less than 24 hours to go.

TWENTY-FIVE YEARS AGO TODAY, the Internet opened the door to business, and the world changed. Previously reserved for its academic and government users, the national computer network issued the first commercial domain name, symbolics.com, to a now-defunct computer company

….Barrons

Monday will see the 25th anniversary of the registration of the domain name Symbolics.com. Granted, it’s not particularly catchy, and to this day it’s renowned for nothing other than being the first. But it unwittingly became the eldest brother of a phenomenon that profoundly changed the world.

It’s not clear exactly what prompted a Massachussetts software company to contact the US Department of Defence – which was, at that time, responsible for administering the internet – and ask for it.

It certainly couldn’t have had any idea of the revolution that was to come – indeed, the world wide web was still more than five years away, and the internet was merely a network of computers used primarily for research purposes.

But Symbolics.com predated every other domain that we now type every day to shop, communicate, learn, entertain ourselves – even find partners

…NZ Herald News

Years ago, I asked Marc Andreessen, creator of the first web browser, what surprised him most about the dot-com forces he helped unleash. “eBay,” he said without hesitation. “Who knew there was that much crap in people’s garages to sell?”

Personally, I’m a little more amazed at a site like Belch.com, “the largest collection of digitally recorded belches on the Net.” But maybe that’s just me.

It’s pretty mind-blowing that the dot-com domain is 25 years old. On March 15, 1985, a Cambridge, Mass., computer maker called Symbolics registered symbolics.com: the very first dot-com site. (That company, in its original form, died in the mid-1990s, and symbolics.com is now an odd blog about web sites.)

 …DailyFinance

The SnapNames Entertainment & Sports auction which is in progress and started on March 9, has over 500 domains up for auction, but very few bidders.

Are the names priced too high or is it just plain lack of interest among buyers?  Just 7 domains have bids out of more than 500 names and the total amount bid so far is just over $4,000.

Why the lack of interest?

The auction that includes names like ScreenSavers.com and Troops.com has placed high reserves on the domains. Interested in the domain: TVBroadcasts.com? It’ll cost you at least $25,000 to meet the reserve set by the seller. In fact, the auction which has tons of sports domains to choose from like ProFootball.com, BasketballPlayers.com and more – has drawn bids mostly to its 4-character domains listed for sale: nowz.com, npia.com, and nyam.com.

The problem seems to not be a lack of interest to SnapNames.com, but a lack of interest for domains with high reserves.  The website gets well over 60,000 unique visitors per month and its names are plastered all over the internet especially among domain blogs through their affiliate program.  We would venture to say that many of these domains listed in their March Showcase auction could probably do better if the reserves were lowered.

Whether buyers have a fear of spending or whether sellers have a fear of selling – this is one auction that doesn’t appear to be faring too well.

Finding domain names on the aftermarket, especially on auction sites can seem daunting but it doesn’t have to be. 

There are a number of pay-services that can help you find better domains and provide statistics alongside them.  But have you considered using the Search or Advanced Search features on websites like SnapNames and NameJet? They’re easy and free to use and you’ll be surprised by what you can find that others have not. 

While the aftermarket search tools don’t provide much in the way of stats, it doesn’t take years of experience to spot a good domain.

If you prefer to pay for services instead of finding the information on your own, that’s one way and it can certainly be timesaving – but the technique many follow is to simply use the site’s search engine in a variety of ways.  For example, watch what others are bidding on, then search for similar names that are expiring that have 0 or few bidders.

Get Acquainted with NameJet’s Improved Advanced Search Engine
 
Far from being an advanced search engine, NameJet’s search feature has come along way in the past year.  You can start finding names without having to pour through the drop lists using keywords that interest you.  Have you seen some of the names that people bid on?

Take a look at RankMyDoctor.com and RankMyHospital.com on NameJet right now.  Both names are in PreRelease and head to auction on April 16th, 2010.  Both names have over 40 bidders each.  Neither domains have pagerank nor traffic, but both names have seemed to grab the interest of buyers – dozens of them.  These names don’t interest us at all, but it’s an interesting example of what you can find on NameJet if you’re looking for similar names – or if you can’t afford to buy RankMyDoctor.com once it heads to auction.

Take a look.

A simple search on the keyword phrase “rankmy” will show you there are several domain names starting with the keyword “rankmy” on NameJet that have 0 bidders and all go to auction the same day as RankMyDoctor.com.

RankMyPhysician.com
RankMyNursingHome.com
RankMyChiropractor.com
RankMyInsuranceCompany.com
RankMyWord.com
RankMyWall.com

All of the names with the exception of RankMyWall.com and RankMyDoctor.com hold an appraisal value according to Valuate.com – with RankMyWall.com appraising at $45 and RankMyDoctor.com appraising at $35.  The rest of the names in the list (including RankMyHospital.com) all appraise at $0.  Maybe these names are catchy or someone has plans in mind, but with as many bidders as they have, they will probably auction off at an overvalued price.

Using the site’s own search tool is easy and free and quick.  Search on keywords without bids that interest you.  We regularly search on keywords like “Military” and watch the name up until minutes before its backorder due date, then snap it up for less than $100 since no other bidders got involved and we didn’t place a  bid prematurely.

The keyword “social” also appears to be on the drop and attracting bidders.  A simple search at NameJet shows results like Socialtips.com with 0 bidders and SocialMedias.com with just 2 bidders.  SocialMediaJobs.net is also listed with 0 bidders.  These names aren’t necessarily great or even good, but the point is, once in awhile you’ll discover names that are great or good that no one else has uncovered.

If you’ve got the time, hunting for a domain name on the aftermarket, can be easy and fun, especially if you’ve already got keywords in mind.