Hybrid Domainer

Google will now alert you to duplicate content issues

Anyone who develops websites knows the  importance of fresh content.  Sometimes you may think content is fresh, but maybe someone wrote something for you and you did not check it with copyscape.

You could have both a plagiarism and duplicate content problem.  Search Engine land published an article today on how Google will now alert you to the problem.

Taken from the article:

Today, Google webmaster tools has launched a new message alert to let site owners know when a particular URL doesn’t appear because Google sees it as duplicate of a URL on a different domain. In the blog post announcing the feature and in an in-depth help topic, they provide details on how they identify duplicate clusters of content and choose a “canonical” version of that cluster to display in search results.

“When we discover a group of pages with duplicate content, Google uses algorithms to select one representative URL for that content. A group of pages may contain URLs from the same site or from different sites.”

Read the whole article at Searchengineland.com

What an auction battle, Booking.mobi goes for $8116

The expiring auction for Booking.mobi just ended on Go Daddy. The domain went for $8,116.

There were 16 bidders who made 178 bids.

The battle was between bidder 8 and bidder 15.

Bidder 15 entered at $2000, they went back and forth from $2,222 with bidder 8 to the finish. Bidder 15 won the name for $8,116.

The domain is 5 years old, with Go Daddy estimating no traffic.

Most active Go Daddy Auctions (15 or more bids) ending 10/31

	Domain Name	Current Price	Asking Price	Bids			Time Left
	yomail.com	$305	$12	45			8H 7M
	lifeinthefreshlane.com	$155	$12	29			8H 12M
	promode.org	$165	$12	21			8H 16M
	booking.mobi	$375	$10	49			8H 40M
	kazz.com	$865	$10	38			9H 19M
	s2dent.com	$1,855	$12	40			9H 24M
	igisoftware.com	$262	$12	22			9H 29M
	lockehs.org	$204	$12	21			9H 34M
	frognet.com	$255	$12	32			10H 3M
	daymoon.com	$160	$12	25			10H 32M

Is a no reserve auction the only answer ?

After the last TRAFFIC there was plenty of criticism of the auction.  Some said there were crap names in with premium names.  Others said the reserve prices on some of the top names were unrealistic. Some asked why they had to bring their own end users to bid.

For all those who complained, are they willing to put their best names up for auction with no reserve price ? It seems it is what everyone wants their fellow domainer to do.

So should a conference try an auction where every domain has no reserve ? Some say that would let the market decide.  But would it ? The market is more than 300 domainers at one conference.

I understand where Rick is coming from saying that sellers should do some pr work, and get those interested in their domains to come to TRAFFIC.  I understand the thinking but in reality not many if any are going to do that. They think by getting their name into the live auction that they hit the jackpot.  Those days of big bids and selling millions in domains at one of the conferences seems to have past.  The economy, the wholesale domainer market and lack of true end users are the most prominent reasons.

A no reserve auction would be an interesting auction, the auction would have 100 % sell through rate.  The attendees would know that every name they are interested in, will sell.  It leaves the door open to a lot of disappointment and would be a big risk. But maybe that's what this industry needs.

What is your opinion ?

 

Four figure sales at Go Daddy Auctions 10/24-10/28

MadWifi.org $1715, 6 bidders made 75 bids for this 7 year old domain. Go Daddy estimated traffic at 11,376 hits per month. Their valuation was $1146 for the domain.

Riverproject.org $1705, 9 bidders made 55 bids for this 12 year old domain. Go Daddy estimated no traffic.

HCGdiet.us $1005, 5 bidders made 29 bids for this 2 year old domain. Go Daddy estimated 184 hits per month. Their valuation was $126 for the domain.

Mantis-int.com $1,011, 3 bidders made 34 bids for this 3 year old domain. The non hyphenated version sold the same day for $555.

TheMatchmaker.com $2227, 9 bidders made 72 bids for this 14 year old domain. Go Daddy estimated 26 hits per month. Their valuation was $18 for the domain.

AOZI.info $1200, Only 2 bidder here, they went back and forth and made 44 bids for this 1 year old domain.

Tomalogy.org $1985, 3 bidders made 49 bids for this 7 year old domain.

Homesecurityandautomation.com $1813, 8 bidders made 102 bids for this 8 year old domain. Go Daddy estimated 492 hits per month. Their valuation was $762 for the domain.

MonsoonSpice.com $1005, 8 bidders made 55 bids for this 4 year old domain.

These were all expiring auctions.

Free domain winner

For our one year anniversay we did a drawing for new followers on Twitter. The winner of the drawing was Bryan Smilk. @bryansmilk. 

Thank you to all who read the blog and follow us on Twitter. We will be doing one drawing a month for all followers for a free .com/net/.org domain.

 

Solo.com sold for $133,000

Just reported on Sedo.com is the sale of Solo.com for $133,000. The sale should move into # 31 on the Dn Journal top sales for 2011.

The domain was regged in 1994.

Whois shows Sedo escrow.

Another sale on Sedo today is GSMA.com for 22,000 Euros.

The domain was regged in 1995.

Whois shows Sedo transfer.

Google awarded patent on exact match domain, detecting commercial queries

Seo by the Sea posted about a patent awarded to Google for exact match domain.

A Google patent, originally filed in 2003, and granted today (with Matt Cutts as one of the listed inventors) describes this problem in more detail and provides some ways that Google could potentially act to lessen the value of keywords included in domain names by recognizing when queries are commercial in nature and using a different ranking algorithm for those queries that might lessen the value of domains with keywords in them.

The patent is:

Systems and methods for detecting commercial queries
Invented by Amit Singhal, Matt Cutts, and Jun Wu
Assigned to Google
US Patent 8,046,350
Granted October 25, 2011
Filed: September 24, 2003

Read the whole article at Seo By The Sea

 

Most active Go Daddy Auctions (15 or more bids) ending 10/28

	Domain Name	Current Price	Asking Price	Bids			Time Left
	cabinetpros.com	$530	$12	38			53S
	chillbrew.com	$185	$12	28			5M 53S
	0carfinance.com	$202	$12	17			44M 53S
	minecrfat.net	$125	$12	17			1H 25M
	facebookv.com	$130	$12	19			1H 25M
	monsoonspice.com	$255	$12	30			1H 33M
	zip-n-squeeze.com	$249	$10	16			1H 39M
	gozbo.com	$80	$12	15			1H 49M
	standing-firm.com	$580	$12	45			1H 59M
	velumgravity.com	$155	$12	16			2H 12M
	autogyro-rc.com	$244	$12	26			2H 20M
	fulldownloads.us	$605	$12	59			2H 27M
	promisedday.com	$184	$12	20			2H 54M
	quranrabbi.net	$110	$12	19			3H 9M
	wtfmetro.com	$205	$12	21			3H 11M
	tampa-used-cars.com	$525	$12	20			3H 33M
	used-cars-orlando.com	$270	$12	20			3H 41M
	arlingtongear.com	$130	$12	24			3H 58M
	5rings.com	$216	$12	26			4H 14M
	ukyankeecraftsdirectory.com	$262	$12	24			4H 42M
	greensmoothieforum.com	$110	$10	21			4H 48M

Photographer Peter Lik buys Lik.com for $65,000

Coming across as sold on Sedo today is Lik.com. The domain sold for $65,000.

The domain was registered in 1999.

Taken from Wikipedia:

Peter Lik is a self-taught Australian landscape photographer.^[1] While traveling in Alaska in 1984, Lik began to experiment with panoramic cameras. He is known for his limited editions and his work has been compared to that of legendary photographer Ansel Adams.^{[2][citation needed]} Lik is regarded as an adventurer as well as a photographer due to the risks he will take to get "the shot." ^[3]

Lik has had a website at www.peterlik.com.