For Sale Why the .CA will always struggle

[msn]

I may not make any friends with what I am about to say but here goes. For the longest time now I have watched several two and even one word dot ca domains be offered for rock bottom, tank of gas prices. Over and over again, day in and day out. There is nothing wrong with this I said to myself, after all the top quality one word generics still obain good money, why should I care about the rest?

Well I do care, the math is simple, only so many 5 and perhaps 6 figure dot ca names exist. With so many of those held tight by a small group of investors its daunting to say the least to obtain one. How can one continue to make a REAL living in dot ca if he can only obtain $XXX or LESS for something the dot com see's 10's to even 100's of thousands for?

That lead me to contemplate what factors are affecting the market ( mainly reseller ). What is hurting this space and what can we do to fight back. Here is where I lose friends, stop the fire sales, blowouts, $50 flips and whoring out hundreds of names a month for less than a night out for dinner. That's pretty much it, straight forward, stop flooding the market and demand better prices. You may say we only want what the market will bear and that's just what they are worth, BS. You create the market, you set the prices and you ultimately are killing yourself.

I want to throw up everytime I see a nice two word. ca, for $100, I think is this guy really happy with a $75 profit and his continual offering at these prices and flooding the forum with them is a negative force.

In my opinion I would start to regulate the .ca sales forum. One thread per week per user. Limit the number of names allowed to list at one to a handful at MOST, maybe less. Create a sub dot ca sales forum where $1K+ names are posted, start to draw a line.

As long as the dot ca sales forum contuinues as it does, no one will make a real living except for a handful. And at the cost of the guy who is happy with $50-$75. Remember, you set the market, its YOUR reseller market.

Finally a good discussion.

The first issue is anyone can search this forum, so end-users get the impression prices are low. Most "dealer" fora are closed shops which cannot be read by just anyone - ever see a discussion board of car dealers talking about the wholesale cost of the cars? Likely not.

Second, there is no code of practice. If you buy a house, you usually use a realtor, who is licensed and had to take some sort of course and exam to get set up as a broker.

Third, no one seems to want to cooperate. There are enough parked domains here - collectively speaking - to drive excellent revenue share from parking partners, but everyone wants to go for their own little deal at low volumes.

Lastly, being "large" customers of CIRA, we are well placed to put our own people on the board and drive marketing for .ca instead of the other money-wasting ideas they come up with now. Oh, and with some of the highest registry costs in the country level domains of G8 countries, we could push the wholesale cost from $8.50 to around $4.85 or so.

We are in the process of setting up an actual proper brokerage - not a "sales list" but a real, honest-to-goodness operation. List your domain registration, place our "tag" on your site, and allow us to approach end-users. We do direct mail, fax, e-mail and outbound calls to find prospective end-users, and to date have not generally offered it to other .ca holders until now because, frankly, most of the folks here are cheap and do not appreciate the effort.

Otherwise, stick to Sedo and go down that path.

 

[Anthony Ng]

In my opinion I would start to regulate the .ca sales forum. One thread per week per user. Limit the number of names allowed to list at one to a handful at MOST, maybe less. Create a sub dot ca sales forum where $1K+ names are posted, start to draw a line.

As long as the dot ca sales forum contuinues as it does, no one will make a real living except for a handful. And at the cost of the guy who is happy with $50-$75. Remember, you set the market, its YOUR reseller market.

Allow my bluntness, but this IS an effort to control the market, albeit its being futile.

More importantly, regulating the .CA sales section of DNForum only drives sellers AND BUYERS away, because after all, we are just part of a larger, free market out there.

 

[TheLegendaryJP]

Allow my bluntness, but this IS an effort to control the market, albeit its being futile.

More importantly, regulating the .CA sales section of DNForum only drives sellers AND BUYERS away, because after all, we are just part of a larger, free market out there.

Whats futile is the future value of .ca at this rate and in this forum.

 

[hugegrowth]

Don't forget how good the .ca market was doing last year, before the economy went down. I think domains have held up pretty well the last few months, and will do even better once people have more confidence in the economy. Our relatively small population and restrictions on ownership have more effect on resale prices than what anyone does in this forum. Over time the supply of good .ca domains will get smaller because they'll be put to use by end users and developers, and that will drive up prices. But it will be a gradual thing. Since I got back into 'serious' .ca buying in 2005, every year has gotten better in terms of interest in .ca domains, selling prices, and use of the extension in media/business.

 

[Wzhxvy]

Interesting thread and discussion. My opinion is that the behaviour we see in the forum drives reseller pricing down....so if you are into selling into resellers then yes...it will be a long time before prices go up and it is futile at least short to mid term. However, I disagree that this affects sales to end users. Its not like we are selling widgets...each of us has a unique product and can seek the value we want from our property. For example, do I care that some sell their 3 letter .cas for $100 bucks here or offer them at $1300 elsewhere...no because my 3 lll go for 25K or more.

 

[Ang]

I think the key issue here is patience. Of course we are all trying to run a successful business and want to obtain the highest return on investment possible. And yes I agree, right now there are not too many big .ca sales happening. Yes there are a lot of bargains to be had right now in the .ca reseller market.

1. Pre-"recession" .ca sales were growing - we are still in an unstable economic environment which is causing some issues for our market. Sellers need money, buyers don't have money to throw away - simple as that. People in general are still being conservative with their spending and looking to obtain as much money as possible as quickly as possible.

2. It's off season - summer is always a slow time of year for us, we all know this, there is nothing that can change this.

3. Limiting the options of a seller is a poor way to improve business. Every business owner chooses to operate differently. Whether you choose to hand reg and flip for a 200% profit or a 200000% profit is your choice. If you want to resell names go for it, you want to develop them sure why not, you want to sit and wait for big sales that's fine too. How is controlling how much money a person can make a way to improve sales? If you don't allow someone to gain capital by selling a few names at lower prices than you are hoping to see then how is that seller ever going to amass enough capital to pay the big bucks you are after for that "premium" name.

Bottom line is you need patience if you want to accomplish large sales right now, the timing just isn't right.

Just my opinion on this all, not looking to start anything. Honestly I usually stay away from large discussion threads to avoid debates but this one is quite interesting as I am quite involved in the .ca market.

 

[TheLegendaryJP]

Very good reply sideline

 

[Belzibut]

I think the solution is quite simple, Cira needs to advertise the .ca as the extension of choice for Canadian with all the benefits and advantages on tv. If they don't have enough money, they should raise the price. The number one reply from companies I try to sell my domains to is that we're not prepare to pay that much for a .ca as if it was a lower quality extension.

Cira has done zero marketing in the papers or tv about the .ca. That's where the problem is. As long as Canadian believe that it's better to get blahblah-upyoursCanada.com it won't change much.

D.

 

[Poker]

As with any market, when there is value be a buyer, when there is excessive speculation be a seller. Has served me well in stocks, options, futures etc...blah, blah, blah

 

[DropWizard.com]

great thread and I couldn't agree more JP.

As far as limiting the sales or prices here however I think you're trying to herd cats :lol:

I personally think that the move to privacy affected the sales of ca's more than the economy.

 

[Wzhxvy]

Why do you think the move to privacy hurt .ca DropWizard ?

 

[stewie]

just take the privacy off... you have an option

 

[TheLegendaryJP]

edit

 

[Wzhxvy]

Yes I have noticed JP, now back on topic Insert smiley

I am just curious why DropWizard thinks the privacy has affected the market....

 

[TheLegendaryJP]

Yes I have noticed JP, now back on topic

I am just curious why DropWizard thinks the privacy has affected the market....

Cannot contact the owner maybe?

Not sure, I do know here is a way around that to a degree


btw thank you for noticing my painful week here on dnf.

 

[Wzhxvy]

We dont want you to take a lose JP, we are protecting you from yourself

 

[TheLegendaryJP]

We dont want you to take a lose JP, we are protecting you from yourself

:lol: This made me smile...but not for long I am crying again. May have to include my dog in the sales...after reading this back it occured to me, I dotn even have a dog.

 

[Wzhxvy]

I actually am surprised that no one has picked up 2u.ca JP...thats a gem and you are selling it for a bargain.

 

[TheLegendaryJP]

edit

 

[theinvestor]

JP,

Why you in a rush to sell ?