When a domain name is listed for sale on Afternic, there are many ways a prospective buyer can become a “Lead.” A lead is a prospective buyer of a domain name who, instead of buying the domain name immediately via BIN options, has engaged with an GoDaddy or Afternic broker.
Sometimes a lead is a person who wants to buy a domain name, and other times, it is someone who is confused and ends up calling GoDaddy or submitting an inquiry form in confusion.
For many years, Afternic and GoDaddy did not share much information about leads. As far as I am aware, one of my domain names could have strong interest from buyers, but if nobody submitted an offer at or above the minimum offer amount, I would not have been notified.
More recently, Afternic introduced the “Lead Center” control panel, which provided information about leads and the status of negotiations. It also offered a streamlined way for sellers to communicate with brokers.
In the Afternic Lead Center control panel, there is a column for “Status” to keep the domain owner informed of the current status of a negotiation. There are several terms that can be used in this column, including Sold, Qualifying, Confused, Negotiation, Stalled, and Unknown. Over the last year or so, I have come to learn what each status means, but they aren’t totally clear, and I don’t see these terms defined anywhere.
Yesterday in response to a question on X, Afternic shared what each status means (except for Unknown) to give a better understand to customers:
We’re happy to share some information here!
Stalled: this status essentially means that the lead is inactive due to a number of reasons, including declined offers, no engagement, or low budget. In most cases, brokers continue to reach out to these potential buyers over time.…
— Afternic (@afternic) October 17, 2024
I am pretty sure the Unknown status is for leads created prior to the Lead Center. Because Afternic has not been able to make contact with the prospective buyer to understand the status, it is listed as “Unknown.”
If you see another status term and are curious about what it means, feel free to ask in the comment section.
Btw, “On Hold” doesn’t always mean sale will happen. Afternic just puts domains on hold even when buyer is not serious. Many time domains stay there for a long time as Afternic forgets to remove the hold and your BIN lander doesn’t show up in the mean time while domain is “On Hold”. I had in the recent past contacted my account manager to remove the hold if buyer isn’t serious so that BIN lander is displayed.
I’m tired of Godaddy and Afternic.
Not if you also have the estimated sale price of Godaddy in Afternic in your BIN, I have them and they don’t let me change better price appraisals from experts.
I have a three-letter premium domain with .TODAY valued at $90,000, I put it in Landing page BIN and Lease, look after logging out of the account in Afternic, go to Domaintools and Godaddy appeared with Landing page , it was BIN $1499 estimated appraisal
I contacted Afternic Service, good response and solution but when the moment of truth arrives in Afternic it is Godaddy who has the control.
Solution look for another Marketplace to sell without the terrible Godaddy appraisals.
An other “spot” to the tiger… The “tiger” is… GD! King of Unfair Business Practice.”