I Will Be Moving Away From DAN.com (12.Viewing)

DomainRecap · May 26, 2023

Just had two more deals fall through on Dan, and I am convinced that these fake "buyers" are just using Dan to harvest personal information, either as a way to steal domains or just for the usual fraudulent reasons.

This is why I don't use my home address on Dan, but even so, it's pretty blatant what's really going on. Dan requires absolutely no authorization or even an account to start making all kinds of fake offers, then once the buyers accept, up pops an invoice with your name and address on it.

And now that they've taken away the ability to see the buyer IP (to see how badly they're lying before accepting or ignoring the offer) it's just not worth it.

Screw this noise, and I think I'll be switching over to Afternic where there are at least some controls and broker levels there to limit fraud. If that doesn't work, then it's time to create my own site to take offers on, as this BS is just not worth it anymore.

MapleDots · May 26, 2023

And maybe that's exactly why they have it like that.

Desired effect.... domainer moves to Afternic

DomainRecap · May 26, 2023

I think that may be why Dan keeps dropping important features (like IP address and sellers no longer being able to view invoices until paid) but a lot of this bad stuff was there on Day 1.

It was just mitigated by the good stuff, which is rapidly being dropped.

A know a lot of you guys use Bodis landers - anyone have any advice on that platform?

MapleDots · May 26, 2023

DomainRecap said:
A know a lot of you guys use Bodis landers - anyone have any advice on that platform?

@rlm &

@BODIS are two great choices to answer that

I love the way the Bodis landers look

WOW Bodis!!

rlm · May 26, 2023

I too just finally got off my ass and removed the dan.com nameservers from the small test I was doing there (maybe 500+ domains?). Although there is much to like about Dan, there are a few cons:

Cons:

paying commissions on my own leads when using their landers
lack of transparency about the buyers
payment plans are a significant part of my business, and the additional $15 bank fees for the incoming bank wire, plus the commission, is just too significant on a smaller monthly payment amount.
they won't consolidate or hold payments to a user defined threshold, so the insist on a separate bank wire for every transaction, even small monthly payments.

And regarding Bodis, to be honest, I'm not a fan of their landers either, but I've been testing/comparing it to my own landers, also on a subset of my domains.

Pros:

simple/easy
commission free escrow.com integration
make-offer or buy-now options
make-offer email notifications do include buyer IP address

Cons:

basic escrow.com integration doesn't include ability for $CAD transactions
no customer validation before initiating a transaction, I have an account FULL of cancelled transactions
lack of transparency about buyer in those buy-now transactions, all you see is an email address
I've never had a single bodis lander buy-now transaction go through. Not one.
not much control of landing page, you can add text to a make-offer page, but not a buy-now page

The bodis escrow.com integration is nice, in theory, but Escrow.com adds its own layer of complexity to novice buyers which probably doesn't help. Their new account verification is difficult and people give up.

In all honesty, I do much better with my own landing pages and simple contact form, where I can see and control everything, no limitations.

My plan is to build my own sales platform, I've been saying that for years, I might actually do it this summer...

DomainRecap · May 26, 2023

rlm said:
My plan is to build my own sales platform, I've been saying that for years, I might actually do it this summer...

Thank you for all that info, and this last part is where I'm at as well. It seems that these companies like Dan et al are literally pushing their customers to create their own solutions. Bizarre.

rlm · May 26, 2023