General Domain Information

For the past few years, Swetha Yenugula has regularly and frequently shared her .XYZ domain name sales. The value of her sales coupled with the velocity of her sales has led to some skepticism about the veracity of her sales. A bit of skepticism about domain name sales is healthy. It can drive people to investigate reported sales to weed out bad actors who may be inclined to report fake sales. The feedback Swetha has received has gone well beyond a healthy skepticism, and it is unfortunate.

To date, I have not seen any evidence to refute any of Swetha’s reported domain name sales. In fact, over the last few days, Swetha’s sales have been confirmed by multiple third parties.

On Sunday, NameBio’s Michael Sumner published an article about Swetha’s sales on Afternic. Swetha provided Michael with her Afternic login and password to allow Michael to verify her sales on the platform. This must have felt invasive. Every one of Swetha’s sales were verified by Michael. In fact, after reviewing her records, Michael wrote, “Thus I now feel 100% confident in all her reports, not just the Afternic ones.”

In addition to selling 7 figures worth of domain names on Afternic year to date, Swetha has also done a substantial volume of business on Dan.com. On Twitter, Swetha requested that Dan.com Founder Reza Sardeha vouch for her sales. After all, Swetha was likely one of the top sellers on the platform. Reza did just that:

It’s Thanksgiving week in the US this week. On Thursday, Americans will celebrate the holiday, but the travel and related celebrations usually begin before. If you’re in the middle of a negotiation or sending emails to buyers or sellers, you’ll probably receive out of office email replies. Thanksgiving week is not usually a great week for getting business done.

In addition to Thanksgiving, the World Cup started yesterday. The USMNT is playing its first game today, and my television will be tuned in to the match. The second USMNT match is on Friday, which is also Black Friday. People around the world will be tuning in to World Cup matches this week, and work will be on the back burner.

I saw a job posting on LinkedIn that might appeal to someone with domain name industry experience and expertise. Victoria’s Secret is looking to hire a Brand Protection Domain Manager. This position is eligible to be remote with periodic travel requirements. Victoria’s Secret is based in Ohio.

While there are no requirements for domain name experience, this role might be suitable for someone who is familiar with the domain name industry. Here’s an excerpt from the job posting that describes the job opportunity:

In 2018, I received an inquiry to buy a two word .com domain name that came through a form on an Embrace.com inquiry page. The name of the person who inquired sounded familiar to me, and a Google search of the unique spelling of his name showed me why.

This man was a legendary entrepreneur who founded more than a dozen companies. Some of these companies are still well-known brands that people in the US would recognize. From what I can gather, he had several successful exits, and he continued his entrepreneurial work for his entire life.

A domain portfolio sell through rate (STR) may be a vanity number that holds little importance to most people. The STR is the percentage of domain names that are sold, and it is usually calculated on an annual basis.

Someone who doesn’t rely on domain name sales for their income might have a very small STR, but someone who sells their domain name for a living might have a high STR. Depending the business needs, a good target STR can vary from person to person.

At the end of my son’s soccer game on Saturday, one of the parents came up to the Assistant Coach and asked about the company on his sweatshirt. The Assistant Coach works at the company, and the other parent knew a couple of his colleagues. After their conversation ended and we walked off the field, I asked him if his company uses a .XYZ domain name.

The Assistant Coach looked surprised that I would know this, chuckled a bit, and confirmed that his company was the brand with the .XYZ domain name. Mind you, this is not one of the more well-known .XYZ users, but I happened to know of it because of some research I did in advance of launching Embrace.xyz.