Sedo Stats Down after DDoS Attack

Domain owners using Sedo for parking have probably seen a dip in their numbers.  Sedo sent an email today referring to a "malicious D-DDOS attack" (distributed denial of service attack) last week.  They have had some monetization problems since making changes to the site to prevent such attacks.  In their words:

Last Friday, we informed you of a malicious D-DOS attack resulting in a variety of technical consequences. Most of these issues were resolved within a few hours. However, based on your good feedback and internal analysis, it has become obvious that we have not been monetizing optimally since that day, therefore showing lower revenues in your account than were shown before March 9. This is mainly caused by the feed used for the related links.

Please be assured that we will be compensating you for the parking decrease, should you be affected by it. Details will follow as soon as possible.

 (I don't seem to have received the first email that they refer to.)  Keep an eye on your Sedo earnings.  They are one of the services that has still paid reasonably well in this difficult climate - so we don't recommend moving away from them at this time.

Tim Schumacher Steps Down at Sedo

Sedo announced this week that co-founder and CEO Tim Schumacher is stepping down at the end of January. Schumacher was one of four co-founders of Sedo in 2001.  He is resigning for personal reasons. 40-year-old Tobias Flaitz becomes the CEO and a board member on February 1, 2012. Flaitz comes to Sedo from Hubert Burda Media where he has been in management since 2007.  Schumacher is still a young man at age 35.  He was named “Entrepreneur of the Year” by Ernst & Young Germany in 2007.

Sedo has consistently been one of the top domain name marketplaces and monetization platforms.  They still outperform most parking companies. 

Tim emailed Andrew Allemann of DNW.com about his future plans:

I have been actively involved as a Business Angel for quite a while, and I might increase investments there and/or dive in deeper into one of my startups, once I have found ‘the next big thing. 

Sedo Revises Parking Interface

Domain powerhouse Sedo announced today that they have revamped their parking interface based in part on feedback they received from users.  This change was long overdue, and the new interface is clean and easy to use.    Sedo summarized the changes this way:

The Domain Management Tool has also been updated in order to allow customers to review both parking and selling settings on a single page. This makes it easier to set optimization preferences for any parked domains as soon as it is added to a user’s account.

“Our main focus during this revamp was offering our clients the most user-friendly interface possible, including new and invaluable parking tools, and a top-performing parking section with much faster load times,” said Lissi Mack-de Boer, CSO of Sedo.

Just one part of the improvements is the introduction of an advanced reporting system with additional filters and customizable reports. Domain parking statistics can be displayed in a number of ways, and custom searches can be saved and easily accessed in the “Parking Reports” section. For clients who already park their domains with Sedo, we recommend that they log into their accounts and find out more about Optimization History, Searched Keywords, Custom Quick Views and our other new tools available under “Parking Reports”.

It's nice to see Sedo putting some time and effort into it's parking interface.  The graph in the picture shows my RPM for the last 12 months.  Things are looking up for me and my parked domains at Sedo, and domain sales have picked up as well.  

Sedo Raises its Fees

Domain powerhouse Sedo announced a fee increase on domain sales in a July 1 email.  Their new rates take effect August 1.  The new fee schedule brings their fees more in line with Afternic - their main U.S. competitor. Instead of a flat 10% fee for their services (with a higher fee for optional broader promotion) 

Sedo describes their new fees this way:

Sale Type	Commission
Buy Now sale originating on Sedo's Domain Marketplace in which the domain is also parked3 with Sedo	10% of sale price  (no minimum fee)
Sale originating on Sedo's Domain Marketplace	15% of sale price (minimum fee applies)
Sale originating on the SedoMLS® Promotion Network	20% of sale price (minimum fee applies)

Afternic describes their fee schedule this way:

DLS Premium Promotion Sales Fee	20%, $120 minimum
DLS Network Promotion Sales Fee	15%, $120 minimum

One obvious advantage with Sedo is that you can save 5% by also parking your domains there.  This is a significant savings and may be worth considering if you have a business that parks and sells domains.

We're No Longer Recommending Bing-based Services

Earlier this month I dropped my recommendation of Bing-monetized parking companies Parked and SmartName. Income has just not rebounded Since Bing took over monetization of these services from Yahoo. As of this month I recommend the Google-based services DomainSponsor, NameDrive, and Sedo/SedoPro.   

Income has been dropping at Google services too - but it's been a slow, steady decline.  Income at the Bing-based services fell off a cliff.  I know that people at these services are scurrying to work on ways to increase income. Another Bing-based service, TrafficZ, announced a new diversified platform that they expect to implement in the future.  

What should domain owners do?  Carefully evaluate what has been happening with your domain portfolio. Compare domains from month-to-month, but also from year-to-year.  Some domains are likely doing a little better at Bing, so you shouldn't move everything to a Google-based service.   In addition to their Bing "ad feed" SmartName has a "Shops" feature that builds ecommerce shops monetized through Shopping.com.  If you have product domains, consider switching to this type of landing page.  WhyPark has a similar feature, although other features at their service are Bing-based.

If you still want to keep some domains at a Bing-based service, I'd recommend Parked as the one to stick with. Their leadership has consistently demonstrated honest, ethical dealing with domain owners when some other services have changed the rules with no advanced notice.  Donny Simonton is creative and accessible and I'm sure he is scrambling to find a way to move Parked back to the top.