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Could Flippa be a better domain name marketplace than SnapNames & Sedo? One auction tells more

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The domain name Offended.com just sold minutes ago for $19,500 at Flippa.  Offended.com sold at SnapNames almost a year ago in January 2010 for $9,075.00  but as sales records show, the name never changed hands.

After checking the registrant record, I noticed the domain name had been put up for auction by Andrei Polgar, a familiar face in the online domain community.  Andrei launched AuctionPus earlier this year, a domain auction site that promised no more crappy domains for sale.  But despite its mission, many could argue that the reason AuctionPus, Bido, and other auction sites haven’t taken off is because of low-quality, overpriced domains

Andrei also started DomainDiscussions, an online discussion board for members to discuss domain names.

Andrei (who writes at DomainingTips) might be remembered best among domain bloggers for an auction he ran last January, where he put up several of his names for sale (including offended.com) in a auction hosted by SnapNames that netted him $66,295.   Necklace.net was the best seller in the bunch, selling for $25,000.  Andrei had originally marketed the SnapNames auction in effort to raise six-figures for his domain related projects which included AuctionPus and DomainDiscussions.  

But despite developing and running his own auction site which is still online, Andrei went with a safer bet and put Offended.com up for auction at Flippa (which had nearly $300,000 in sales in the last 7 days alone). 

The domain name, which has been parked and listed for sale at Sedo, one of the world’s largest and most successful marketplaces for domain names, has had 0 offers since its listing.

What pitch did Andrei give buyers on Flippa?

The auction on Flippa had received 30 bids as I was writing this story, and had reached its reserve price with a $13,000 high bid.  But right before publishing the story, the name sold for its Buy-it-Now price of $19,500.  Take a look at the original screen shot below that I was going to use to headline the post.

flippa auction

So what’s the pitch Andrei gave buyers on Flippa?  Because, the formula seems to have worked, although until the transaction completes, it might just be another flop like the listing on SnapNames in January. 

Take a look at the pitch Andrei used over at Flippa:

I follow flippa on a regular basis and this is by far the best domain which has ever been auctioned on this platform:

1) Registered back in 1998

2) Currently parked and receiving thousands of unique type-in visits

3) 5154 uniques in 2010 so far (again, this is type-in traffic, the domain is not even developed)

4) 769 uniques last month (again, this is type-in traffic, the domain is not even developed)

5) The first page has been archived back in 2001 according to the Wayback Machine and this, along with the age of the domain (it has been registered since 1998), will give you a huge SEO edge over the competition

I have attached two traffic screenshots from the parking company, one for 2010 so far and the other one for October. If the winner is an established member of this community, we can handle the sale without an escrow service. If the winner is a member who doesn’t have a lot of history on Flippa, we will use Sedo.com or EscrowDNS.com as an escrow service and the escrow fees will be split.

What sets apart Flippa?

What sets apart the domain listing of Offended.com on Flippa versus SnapNames and Sedo, is more difficult to know, but one auction certainly isn’t an indicator that Flippa will be taking over Sedo or SnapNames as auction sites anytime soon. But for Andrei Polgar, listing the domain over Flippa, could be a nice pay day.  And if the deal closes, it looks like the SnapNames auction that never closed worked in Andrei’s favor.

Have you put up for domain names for auction at Flippa? How did they do?