Domain Industry News

ICA Now Offering Less Expensive Individual Memberships

Participation in the Internet Commerce Association should be accessible and affordable to all who have an interest in joining.   The ICA is a member-led organization that advocates on behalf of the domain industry.   The greater the participation and involvement of members of the domain industry in the ICA, the more effective we can be.

With the aim of making the ICA more accessible to all members of the domain industry, during the “ICA Live” session at NamesCon the ICA announced a new membership level for Individual Members.   The Individual Membership level is $50 per month or $600 per year.   Those who wish to join as Individual Members can do so now  on the Join page of the ICA website  through either an annual or monthly PayPal subscription.

Individual members are full members of the ICA, receiving the same

Dietmar Stefitz Shares Domaining Europe Updates

Domaining Europe will be held May 29-31, 2016 in The Hague, Netherlands.  The conference will be held at the Grand Hotel Amrâth Kurhaus, and I am thinking about making the trip to Europe to attend this year’s conference.

According to the conference website, this will be  the 8th Domaining Europe conference. Tickets are available for sale via EventBright, and the cost is  â‚¬623.02.

Conference organizer Dietmar Stefitz shared some updates about Domaining Europe that I want to share with you.

DomainSponsor and Rook Media Payment Schedule Changes

I want to share an email that was just sent to me by my Domain Sponsor account manager, Stephanie Starkman. The company is making some changes to its payment schedule and wire transfer threshold, and the changes may impact some of the company’s clients.

If you have any questions about the announcement, reach out to your Domain Sponsor / Rook Media account manager for more information:

BuyDomains is Seeking to Buy Domain Portfolios

Besides the new gTLD domain names and the Chinese domain name market, a major topic of discussion at NamesCon was domain portfolio sales. I have heard about large  domain name portfolio acquisitions recently, and I think some people who manage large domain portfolios see the value in making a portfolio deal.

While chatting with Karen Dixon about the great targeted advertising campaign being run by BuyDomains, I asked her if her company is actively looking to acquire domain name portfolios. Buy Domains targets what I would consider end user domain buyers, and making large portfolio acquisitions at the right price can be mutually beneficial for the company and domain sellers.

In terms of domain name acquisitions, Karen let me know the company has focused primarily on buying domain names on the drop and via auction. This strategy may change a bit this year, as the company intends to acquire portfolios of domain names that the company could resell to its clients. “We will continue with these efforts in 2016 but want to add the highest quality names possible to our 1MM+ portfolio,” Karen told me. “We are currently entertaining

Matt Barrie Shares Domain Industry Trend Data

I left NamesCon a bit earlier than usual due to a less than ideal flight schedule to Boston. Unfortunately, that means I missed several panels, including Matt Barrie’s keynote. Because of Matt’s role as President of Escrow.com, he was able to share some valuable domain industry trend data in his keynote presentation.

Because of Escrow.com’s position in the domain industry, I think the company is privy to quite a bit of data that others may not have the luxury of seeing. Jackson Ellsgood, the new General Manager at Escrow.com, shared some of the data from Matt’s keynote, and I am happy to share it with you as well.

Because of the confidential nature of the business, the data is more of a general overview of the domain resale market than a detailed look at individual sales data. Here are some of the more interesting data points from Matt Barrie’s keynote presentation:

SnapNames Launches New Website

If you’re a SnapNames customer, you likely just received an email from the company announcing a new website. I have published the full email below. At this point, most of the changes are cosmetic, but there have been some functionality upgrades as well.

The changes and updates to the website that were highlighted in the email include the following:

  • Streamlined drop-down navigation menu
  • Easy 1-click access to your account information, financial center, and auction history
  • Advanced Search / Basic Search toggling
  • Automatic refresh of bids in auctions
  • Expanded content and information about aftermarket domains and services we offer

The company intends to

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