Have you used Flippa for buying or selling domain names?
I got a note from Flippa today reminding that their site isn’t just for buying and selling web sites. They have a number of domain auctions, too.
Two they highlighted were Better.com — currently at $75,000 — and Links.com — currently at $60,000.
The catch is that neither of these domains has hit their reserve. And Flippa doesn’t disclose a reserve range. So it could be that everyone is wasting their time bidding on domains that have a reserve of $1 million.
On the “flip” side, I like how auction participants can ask questions of the seller or just comment. It creates a much more open process. (Although I guess that’s similar to posting a domain for sale on a forum and then people asking questions.)
Does anyone have experience buying or selling domains on Flippa? How has it worked out?
Chris says
I sold a domain on Flippa before. Problem is that Flippa is frequented by people who understand revenue generating sites more than by people who understand the value of a standalone domain.
rob sequin says
Good question. I don’t get it. Tried to sell a few but 0 interest.
Loren says
I sold a domain through Flippa that generated a decent amount of PPC income monthly via a parked page. I got the multiple I was looking for and the transaction was smooth. My experience was good. I don’t know if you could count that as a domain only sale though since the domain had a steady revenue stream via a parked page.
Meyer says
“steady revenue stream via a parked page”
Excellent example of an oxymoron (contradictory terms).
🙂
S.W. says
In one of your previous posts, a commenter named Rich said that he had links.com listed on Flippa. At the time, I had noticed only better.com, but looks like fitness.com listed on there as well, the “bin” is set at $4million, iirc.
Better.com at 75K for a while now, it had early momentum, but no new bids have been posted in about a week or so. As of now, I’d probably pass on flippa as an alternative though if they start picking up some impressive sales, that might change.
Puranjay says
In my experience, you are much better off at the tried and tested marketplaces. Flippa is frequented by site sellers, not domainers. You could list Insurance.com up on that site and you will still get hounded by questions about how much the ‘site’ makes per month and traffic figures. They don’t get domains over there.
Peer says
The part i dont like is the auction extend process. If someone bids on the auction in the last 15 minutes the auction extends for 4 more hours. I haven’t visited or sold anything in a while there so i don’t know if still thats the case.
Seb says
Something I’ve wondered about for a while.
Ophelie says
Ophelie from Flippa here. Chris is generally right that most buyers on Flippa are looking for revenue-making websites, but we’re getting more and more domain buyers as well.
As far as pricing and reserves go, here’s a secret: sellers have the option to lower their reserve to match a pending bid. Some sellers will put a very high reserve at first, then lower it when bidding doesn’t match their initial expectation. In that regard, bidding on a domain or site you’re interested in is never a waste.
Rich says
Hi,
Thank you for your article on Flippa and for your mention of the current Links.com auction.
I am the seller of Links.com. In my opinion, no bid is a wasted bid if it is made in accordance with the description and discussion that accompanies the domain name auction. There are many ways for buyers and sellers to come together for the sale.
In regards to Flippa as a platform, I can say that the auction for Links.com is receiving an enormous amount of visibility and very good interested buyers when compared to other auction platforms. I am extremely pleased with the results so far. The auction may or many not lead to a sale at this time. Selling premium domain names does take motivated buyers and sellers who can reach agreement on price. But, should the auction not lead to a sale, I will definitely continue to use Flippa as a medium for attracting the motivated buyer that I am seeking.
Thank you again for your insightful comments.
donatas says
Hi,
I have used Flippa a few times before but with little or no success.
Flippa claims to have over 2500 people online at most times but they fake this since the script that gives this number is neither a standard stat script nor does it provide a list of the people online.
I have had 4 auctions listed, 3 of them featured on the front page but still none of the websites sold.
And, the joke of the matter is that I sell over 1500 domains and websites each year.
So, if I say Flippa is a waste of your time and hard earned money then I would probably be right.
Also, Flippa has been reported quite a few times on the web as a scam website.
They are reported to sell their own websites designed by themselves, pretending to be real sellers.
Just type “flippa scams” or “flippa complaints” and you will get scores of people complaining about being scammed.
At the end of this all I really wish is that people open their eyes about these cheats and they are arrested by the authorities for cheating people by faking website sales and deals on their website.
Scott says
Hi Donatas,
Can you share with me how you sell so many sites a year? I am a newbie and was looking at afternic, sedo and flippa etc. I am finding out that in order to post premium on afternic the person selling the domain name has to have their domain name registered with one of their partnering sites and not GoDaddy or HostGator. If someone was to transfer the domain they would have to wait another two months before they could sell it. Any recommendations on how to sell a domain name…This is taking just too long and I have some really good ones too.
Andrew (from Flippa) says
Hi donatas
I’m afraid your concerns are not based on reality.
Our currently-online stat is based on unique sessions in the last 5 minutes. This is the same logic used in most “standard stat scripts” (if we were going to fake it, would we really limit ourselves to 3,000?! ;-)). Happy to otherwise walk you through our analytics stats to show you how incredibly active the marketplace is.
Our stats also show that over 60% of sites listed sell – we believe this to be the best in the industry by way of clearance rates. I’d suggest yours are not selling for other reasons – again, drop me a line and I’m happy to provide you with a few pointers. We otherwise have a new Pro Sellers Guide coming out in the next few weeks – will be worth a read.
I’ve also read the reports about us selling our own sites to get our seller numbers up. This is a perfidious theory that is both not based on fact and incredibly illogical – there are more than enough sellers on Flippa today (a number of whom have been active on this comment thread) without us trying to compete with them. Furthermore, we have a strong development team beavering away on making the marketplace even better – why would we distract these guys by also trying to build/sell websites and then hacking our user profiles to look like different people?
Happy to discuss this further – just lets please keep it based on facts.
donatas says
Hi Andrew (from Flippa),
Would it be possible to list all the members online today? (mask the IDs and upload a list here)
Also, can you please provide some (if not all) details about these 60% sales that have happened through Flippa in the last 3 months.
From what we have seen there have been something like 6% sales in the last 3 months. Most auctions need to be relisted because they did not sell.
If this is so unreal to you then some facts and concrete proof to justify the above would be much appreciated.
If you cannot do the above please don’t bother explaining or justifying for your auction site.
Andrew (from Flippa) says
Hello again donatas.
In addition to the privacy issues, I’m not sure the author of this post or any of the readers of the comments are keen to see a list of thousands of IDs posted here. My offer stands in that I’m happy to do a analytics screenshare with you to allay any concerns you still have.
I’d love to hear how you calculated your 6% clearance rate. Our 60% clearance rate excludes any sales that were disputed by either the buyer or the seller (ie the sale did not go ahead). It’s why you see our sales figures move around sometimes. Need more proof? Go to our Ending Soon page (https://flippa.com/ending-soon) and check out what proportion of these are above reserve. At the time of writing this, we’re looking at a clearance rate of 66%. A win for sellers. A win for buyers. Not so great for the naysayers ….
donatas says
Hi Andrew,
Sounds like you have a answer for everything.
I wonder why do so many people complain about Flippa then.
I just did a search on Sedo, Afternic and Godaddy Auctions and none of them have the kind of “scammy” complaints against them like you guys have.
Also, I would be pleased to guide Flippa on how to lift up their “sorry” clearance rate.
Could you please share with us what portion of sales end in disputes, as that seems to be such an important factor.
People have posted that they have received poor support from Flippa whenever they were contacted.
Even when my sale ended with a buyer not paying I was neither issued a refund nor was there any investigation into the member’s ID.
When I posted a thread about this on a complaint website then I received a dozen odd comments of people who went through the same thing.
Just type “flippa scams” and “flippa complaints” on Google. I am sure the others here might not understand what is going on without doing their homework.
The fact is that websites and domains don’t sell on Flippa.
The few that do sell are sold below the asking price.
donatas says
Hi Andrew,
Another thing we noticed is that out of the sites that sell most of them have faked their earnings proof.
When such cases are reported by the “innocent” buyer then (once again) Flippa claims they cannot monitor or provide assistance to them.
Wonder why?
Andrew (from Flippa) says
Hi donatas.
The only time we do not give sellers a free relist and upgrade credits after a successful sale is if they have been fraudulent in their dealings with a buyer. If this was not the case for you, then kick off a dispute from your post-sale page on your auction. It will get resolved swiftly.
If you’re still arguing that websites/domains don’t sell on Flippa as a fact despite all evidence to the contrary, then I’ll humbly submit that our conversation has run its course. Best wishes.
james says
Hi Flippa,
Would you mind being more open about the hundreds and thousands of complaints against you guys.
Looks like you guys are convicts escaped from an internet prison and freely controlling your auction site and manipulating it all.
Matt says
Spent the good part of the last hour reading up on some of the “many” scams and complaints against Flippa and the “sly” founder Matt.
Was intrigued by how these 2 guys from Australia have managed to evade investigation and arrest for these scams that they are running.
I was particularly interested in 1 complaint in which the flippa member had requested Matt to post a few photos of their office location and interiors in Australia.
Not only did Matt and his “cheating” partner ignore this complaint totally but they still haven’t posted ant photos of their staff members at work in their “plush” office down under.
I am taking the initiative to report flippa and Matt to a higher authority now since obviously the guys they are dealing with thus far are not able to do so.
Andrew (from Flippa) says
Hi James & Matt.
We don’t spend a lot of our time trying to address unqualified complaints from around the web (much like NASA doesn’t spend a lot of time trying to win over people who think the moon landing never happened).
Happy to make an exception here despite all this information being incredibly easy to find online (big thanks to Andrew Allemann for letting us take over his post like this!).
Run a search for “Flippa” on LinkedIn and you’ll get a pretty good view of us and our staff. No secrets there. We’re based at 48 Cambridge Street in Melbourne, Australia. Check us out on Google streetview if you like. Not at all plush but drop by for a coffee or beer if you’re ever in the area (a stack of buyers/sellers already have).
The “2 guys from Australia” that founded Flippa are Matt Mickiewicz (actually from Canada. Part of Inc.com’s 2011 top 30 Entrepreneurs under 30 – http://www.inc.com/30under30/2011/index.html) and Mark Harbottle (Winner of the BRW 2012 Entrepreneur of the Year – http://www.brw.com.au/p/sections/opinion/mark_harbottle_named_brw_entrepreneur_GHck4CdPYZCAdUADTp19iL). They also founded 99designs which received $35M in funding last year from Accel Partners (http://techcrunch.com/2011/04/28/accel-invests-35m-in-99designs-after-years-of-trying/) – the same guys that funded Facebook. Not the sorts of successes you would expect of “convicts”.
All of this is in plain view on our about page: https://flippa.com/about
I’d humbly suggest that maybe its worth taking a few moments to think before so easily believing every story from the darker corners of the internet …
james says
Could not find the photos but I am satisfied for now that at least you are being more open with us.
Clinton says
Let me state at the outset that I’m not Flippa’s biggest fan. My site at experienced-people.net is the #1 forum for discussion around the buying and selling of websites and probably has more threads critical of Flippa than any other online location.
But there’s no question that the company is a proper business, has physical offices (shared with Sitepoint.com, another business started by the same founders) in Melbourne and over two years of trading history. With respect their stats – given their Alexa ranking (however imperfect) of under 1000 – it’s likely Flippa gets large volumes of traffic so the 2,500 figure is not impossible.
I agree with donatas that many sites selling in Flippa have earnings faked or misrepresented in some way, shape or form. For example, sellers fail to account for management time and fail to deduct the cost of that time from their claimed profits. However, I’ve often argued that it isn’t the job of the marketplace to verify anything (earnings or even, for that matter, the claimed traffic). It’s for the buyer to verify these things and conduct a proper due diligence prior to forking over his cash.
If a Google search throws up several results for “Flippa scam”, those pages may be referring to scams perpetrated by sellers using the Flippa platform and not scams by Flippa itself.
Alex says
You have to be prepared to spend quite a bit more than their listing fee of $29 if you actually want people to see your domain. What’s not great about the site these days is that if that’s ‘all’ you spend – your domain will quickly get buried. But if you spend another $50 on featured – a couple of times – then you could find a buyer (for the amount you want). I think that’s unfair and they could find a better way to expose the $29 ‘only’ listings more…but it’s a legit site, nonetheless.
Chris says
I think Flippa rocks! I just listed my website and already have a few bids going. Take a look: https://flippa.com/2817873-established-social-media-graphic-design-business-profitable-w-tons-of-extras
jazzian says
Listed my domain csshash.com 2 days ago at Flippa but still got no bid!
I think that domain name is easy to remember and cool. Having only 7 characters. But I wonder why no buyer is there to even comment: https://flippa.com/2819971-css-hash
Any other good and fast platforms for selling domains?
Jason Thompson says
Jazzian,
Your domain probably didn’t receive any bids because the minimum price you set was $700. That’s a little high for a name like csshash.com.
Flippa works, but you need to promote your listings on and off the site. There is no magic formula unfortunately. The pest run auctions are the ones which are promoted to as many prospective buyers as possible.
Paul Steven says
I am testing the water with my first Flippa.com listing for a 4 letter dot com (i.e vwoz.com)
https://flippa.com/2917757-premium-4-characters-6-years-old-domain-name
I will report how things pan out.
Timo says
I bought 3 websites on flippa in 2011 and I was scammed twice. On the first occasion the seller had encoded the PHP source with Zend, so I was unable to remove his advertisements from the site. Flippa’s support did not seem to understand the problem, and it is reasonable to say that they were of no help. On the second occasion, the seller offered great bonuses to go with the BIN price. I bought at the BIN price, no bonuses were ever seen. Once more, Flippa washed their hands of the issue. On each occasion I pointed this out clearly to Flippa, who advised me to contact PayPal for a refund. PayPal then informed me in writing that refunds cannot be claimed on website purchases. I advised Flippa of this, who never replied to me. However, Flippa continued to advise purchasers on their own website that they are protected when purchasing via PayPal. That is a false claim, and they know it.
Flippa is probably safe for buying and selling domains, and good if you are a website seller, but beware if you are a website buyer.
BTW: I have copies of all the communication as proof.
Alex says
Flippa suspends their sellers, the very ones which bring them money (through commission) to function, to exist, without any real reason, they shoot first and ask questions later (suspend first and totally ruin a seller’s reputation, and then ask him to verify his identity) … and says things like:
We make no apologies for taking action to protect the integrity of our marketplace that we kindly allow you to use.
WE KINDLY ALLOW YOU TO USE ….
I think they forget who brought them there … it is us, the sellers, through our 10% commissions, our paid featured listings and through our hard tedious work and sweat …
We’re the ones kind enough to invest so much time and effort in selling something on Flippa, not the other way around ….
And at the end telling me that if I address their concerns, “we will consider reinstating your account.” ..
“we will consider” !!!