According to whois records the domain name Dating.com which sold for $1.75 Million at DomainFEST 2010 has been purchased by Harlequin Holdings Limited.
Whois records show Moniker Escrow on 5/27/10 and as of 5/28/10 show a Jeff Gilroy of Harlequin Holdings Limited.
I tried doing a little digging using the email address provided (JepekMarketing.com) and using Harlequin Holdings Limited but I didn’t really come up with much added information about the new owners of the Dating.com domain name.
Dating.com sold May 13, 2010
The site currently resolves with the same page as before the domain name sold.
Another interesting thing I noticed while doing some research is a sales technique somebody is using for those looking for more information on the news of the Dating.com domain name selling. In return, a lot of the people searching happen to use the term dating.com domain in their search.
Using those terms, a domain seller is using Google Adwords and is offering a “dating” style domain name to grab the attention of those searchers and redirecting them to Sedo.
The domain seller is pushing 360Romance.com for sale and states the domain “is a premier int’l brand and location in-waiting.” Upon clicking on the ad, it brings you directly to the domains listing page on Sedo and shows a price of $13,700 £ ($19,950 USD). This is not the first time I have seen this tactic used but last time it was around Black Friday and the domain name was related to that. The Google Adwords campaign focused on certain keywords relating to let people know the specific domain name was for sale.
360Romance.com’s Sedo listing page shows 5 visitors to the listing page at time of posting.
I think this type of sales approach may work for domain names if you are able to focus your keywords to what your specific buyer is using keyword searches for and just may be worth a try.
If you have any information about Harlequin Holdings Limited, please feel free to post in the comment section if you wish to share.
