You’ve seen my post about fundraising for the Ronald McDonald House of New York City, and I want to hold a special “auction” of sorts, with the proceeds being donated to this effort.
I am offering 2 hours of private domain consulting services to the highest bidder. I no longer offer private domain consulting as part of my business, but I am going to make an exception to help reach our goal of raising $5,000 for “Team Ronald.”
Domain consulting services will be offered over the phone or via Skype if you’re outside of the US. If you happen to be in New York City or are able to get to NYC, we can meet in person over coffee or drinks.
We can discuss your domain strategy, I can help evaluate the domain names you and your company own, I can give you some advice on buying or selling domain names, or we can simply talk about domain names for a couple of hours. I may not be the most successful domain expert, but I’ve been doing it full time for a few years.
I will leave this offer open for 72 hours. The highest bid in the comment section at the end of 72 hours, which will be 2:30 Eastern Time on March 17, 2011, will be named the winner. If your bid comes in after the deadline, it won’t count, so please don’t try and wait for the last minute in the event my blog goes down for some reason. I do reserve the right to extend the deadline if the blog does go down for an extended period of time.
Bid increments will be $25, not including final minute bidding if there is any. That means if the high bid is $400 at 2:29 and someone posts a $500 offer and someone else posts a $501 offer at 2:30, the higher offer will win. Any disputes will be settled by me 🙂
Your tax deductible donation to the Ronald McDonald House can be made after you’ve received the two hours of domain consulting (as long as it’s done before April 15). Thank you in advance for your bids, and I look forward to working with someone on this.
BTW, if anyone who donated already would like to turn their donation into a bid (and possibly add to it), they are invited to do so.
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UPDATE: Winning bid was $700
I’ll bid $100 and plan to use the time trying to sell him a terrible name for $200. Just 2 hours straight of different, hard ball sales tactics.
Real bid though… I’ll start the bidding with a fresh $100 contribution.
I bid $150.
I bid $150 and kudos to Elliot for really getting creative to raise the money.
@ Sam
Thanks for your offer, but Mark already posted a $150 offer 🙂
I’ll go $200.
How much just to have lunch?
🙂
I will go $250
I happily bid $275.
I’ll bid $350
I will bid $375
@ Sam
Thanks! You’re in the lead right now.
Hmmmm a better deal would be an offer for you to do all the work up to a certain point for brokering someone’s domain for no commission. You seem to have a special skill at getting domains sold when you want to.
$400 from me
@ jp
I appreciate your input – maybe next time… I would be happy to discuss my personal negotiation strategy with the winning bidder and potentially help out with a specific domain name if asked.
@ Dan
Thanks for the bid!
I bid $450
I bid $550
Elliot, would you be amenable to msn messenger for the chat, too? If I did have the winning bid, I’d like a transcript of our conversation so I could refer back to it (I have a terrible memory lol!)
@ James
I don’t have MSN Messenger, but I would be happy to do it over AIM chat and/or email.
@ Larry
Thanks for the bid!
Elliot@
if i may suggest ! It’s not really ordodox, but with everybody’s permision(Larry,James,Sam,Dan and Vincent )Elliot could give the consultation to every body for the fees where they stoped.Maybe it would be fair but if they dont mind and they dont object,you could get more donations.This way every body wins especially Ronald McDonald House.
Larry$550
Sam$450
Dan$400
Vincent$350
Mark$275
Rowe$200
TOTAL$2,225
I know it would not be an auction, but for this nobile event thouse six people should not mine
It was just a thought…
@ Rich
It’s a good idea, but I don’t think it would be fair for the person who wins to get the same consulting as the low bidder.
I want to make the most money possible for the Ronald McDonald House though, so I will speak with the winning bidder at the end to discuss potential ideas to help RMH while being fair.
I am happy to give my time to help an org like RMH.
Well I can think of many reasons why that isn’t a good idea including what Elliot mentioned. But actually Rich, um “RICH” where is your bid?
@ Larry
🙂
BTW, there are other concerns as Larry also mentioned, so I am going to say that really isn’t an option and going to stick with the original plan.
Make it a dutch auction. Everyone 5 or 6 bidders and higher get the consultation at the lowest of 5 or 6 bids.
Right now it’s $275 x 5 = $1375 so RMH gets more money
or
200 x 6 = $1200 slightly less right now unless another bid comes in 😉
and the high bidders get to pay the same lower price that number 6 gets.
@ Vincent
I appreciate the idea and concept, but changing the rules now wouldn’t be fair.
1 hour to go… high bid is $550.
$555
@ James
I appreciate your bid, but minimum bid increments are $25, so the next bid would have to be $575.
Ah,
Apologies. $575.
@ James
Thank you! High bid is now $575.
Reminder: Last minute/second bids may not be $25 increments. For instance, if someone bids $600 and someone else bids $610 at the last minute, the higher bid will get it. If 2 bids for the same amount are received at the last seconds, the first one to post will get it.
700
@ Dan
Wow… Thank you! You are the winning bidder.
Ah well, too late… Well done Dan