Here is part 2 of a “live” domain metrics study I am doing in an effort to find metrics that will help “find good domains” or if there really is one! Here is part 1 if you missed it. Part 1 I looked at $10 1 bid domains at GoDaddy to see if I could find a rhyme or reason behind the backorders.
Today, I am looking at a smaller amount of recently reported domain name sales that took place at Sedo.com in the weekly report of domain sales that they release.
What is included? .com domains and gtld domains.
This study contains 130 domains. It’s a small amount, but that is the amount in the last report.. Using my ZipZing software here is the break down using my custom dictionary.
130 Reported Domain Sales at Sedo.com
6: 1 word domains (4 .com)
39: 2 word domains (33 .com)
8: 3 word domains (7 .com)
3: 2 word domains w/ hyphen (3 .com)
14: popular (2, 3, 4 letter/char and NN, NNN, NNNN) (9 .com)
61: Other (4 word domains, acronyms w/words, words & numbers combined, words not in my dictionary etc) (57 .com)
So I ran another DRT scan with these domain to see if I can discover a pattern?
Average domain length, 8.33. A good deal shorter than the average 13 characters from part 1.
Average creation date is 6/1/2005. This again is significantly different. 9 years old, compared to 4 years old.
Average search volume was 6,114 removing several of the really high search volumes. I’m not a fan of this metric. To understand this metric, 76 of the 130 had some search volume (according to DRT). 30 had in the hundreds search volume. 20 had in the thousand. 7 had in the 10’s of thousands. 2 had 100’s of thousands.
19 domains had “high” ad competition. 11 had “medium”.
100 of the domains had Google Search Volume Term Popularity. I like this metric, but didn’t include this in the first one. The problem? DRT’s data is always wrong, since it’s wrong… it’s not reliable! 70 domains had 100K results or higher. 28 had 1 million or higher.
I think the search volume is simply related to the keywords and the popularity of the “term”. Yes search volume is important, but it also relates to common terms.
Overview of this study?
Domains selling on Sedo (some end user, some investors) are shorter than the domains being backordered at GoDaddy. 8.3 compared to 13.
The domain names are “older” than those being backordered at GoDaddy. 2005 compared to 2010.
Ad competition with Sedo domains were 30 of the 130 having medium or high. 50 of the 3531 backordered domains to compare. That is a pretty big increase!
1 word, 2 word remain popular, as do the “popular” terms using my software. I think these remain in line, but heavily drop off with 3 word domains compared to the 8 sold, compared to the 541 backordered.
Overall
Shorter and older wins the Sedo sales compared to the GoDaddy Backordered $10 / 1 bid test! Ad competition played a role.
There’s hardly any value as far as the domain’s age is concerned.
Why? Because even if there are some SEO benefits, they are virtually NILL, considering that there’s no continuity of the registration/registrant. Google knows it…
I agree and disagree about the domain age, but that is just me. I agree because for the most part, it doesn’t have “value”. On the other hand, and part of the reason for me doing the study… is to find if there is a metric “to find good domains”. Most of the best domains, are also the oldest, so in terms of domain age, it’s a vital tool in searching domains. From an SEO value, an aged domain that has been continuously registered will get indexed faster, by more SE’s than a newly created domain. I have tested that in the past.
Hi Jamie,
Thanks a lot for your posts.
So you still use DRT? Do you get any upgrades or the version you use is 5 years old? I don’t own one and thought that there were no points to invest in it anymore.
Any plans to have a post or two on tools you use? That would be super.
Thanks in advance.
Mark
No problem Mark! I rarely use DRT, but since I still have it on my computer, I use it from time to time. Mainly testing. It’s slow to scan large lists and I’m sure it’s out of date… not because of DRT that I’m aware of, the desktop I use became problematic since day 1. I can do a tools post one of these days. I actually was just searching for an old tool that I used but can’t find it.. may have to go hunting in the basement for my old computer. 🙂