NEW YORK, NY – I took the time to watch another Domain Sherpa show today – this one called “Domain Handcapping” since it was related to the upcoming NamesCon show next week from January 26, to January 30, 2019 – including “the main event” – the live auction which is held once a year.
I’m very much looking forward to attending this year and I will certainly sit in on it and maybe even purchase something, so I wanted to hear what Monte Cahn and Drew Rosener had to say about the individual names that will be up for sale as well as get a feel for the buzz that will surround the event. Cahn mentioned that he single-handedly reviewed over 100,000 domain names sent in this year, and that names are still being reviewed.
This show was certainly a worthwhile listen if you plan to be involved in the auction in anyway. There is a lot of take away information here no matter what your position is. For instance, if you are a seller, you want to hear what these two veterans think about the names and what a lot of your buyers might be hearing. If you are a buyer, again, you want to hear about what is said about some of these names which are picked so you know what you might want to spend. And even if you are just a spectator, their comments and experience can help educate you to what you’ll be in for at this years event, even if you are only participating online.
I felt it was particularly interesting at about the 10 minute mark, where in Monte’s opinion, he believes there are more good generic domain names in this year’s auction than ever before; that people who have been holding onto names since the early 90s are now selling their names, and that there are even some people putting entire portfolios up for sale – names that have never been up for sale before.
“I’ve got names from [this one], I’ve got names from [that one], names from [this one]; I mean, guys that have been holding onto their names since the mid and early 90s have now put them up for sale.”
And then host Tess Diaz comes in with the pivotal golden question (it must have felt unavoidable):
“And why is that then, that so many investors who have been holding so long are willing to let go now, is that a reflection of something particular happening in the market today?”
I’ll let you watch the entire skit (from about the 8:00 to 14:40 minute mark) so that you can listen-in to Monty and Drew explain why, in their opinion, they feel some of the major players and big sellers out there are beginning to let go of their names. Even a domain names registrar or registry will be selling off DomainNames.com.
My gut tells me that neither of these two veterans really said all, and I mean all, of what they really would have liked to say in this skit, but they do mention some good potential possibilities for some people. I’ll tell you one thing though, at least in my opinion, I don’t think it has anything to do with ‘leaving something for the next generation of users to play with’.
The majority of the video provides a lot of great insight on specific names up for sale, and if you will be bidding, you might even be on the fence with how good you feel about all of this valuable information and insight being readily available to other bidders as they will probably wind up bidding against you. However, the insight and opinion you will gain by listening in will likely help you score on the many great deals to be acquired here in this auction.
You’ll also get some good laughs out of this particular show as it happens to bend the envelope between PG and PG-13 for both some of the domain names up for discussion and certainly the commentary on their use and values, so you’ll want to keep the volume a little lower than usual. And by the way, for those that do not listen-in or watch, the title of this article came straight from the video at 8:51; enjoy the show.
A previous version of this article stated the amount of names reviewed was 10,000, but it was 100,000
About The Author: John Colascione is Chief Executive Officer of Internet Advertising Inc. He specializes in Website Monetization, authored a ‘how to’ book called ‘‘Mastering Your Website’, and is a key player in several Internet related businesses through his search engine strategy company Searchen Networks®
Leave a Reply