SnapNames Introduces Fresh Monthly Auctions
SnapNames gets monthly auctions and a makeover.
SnapNames is starting a series of monthly themed auctions next week, and its interface is getting a timely update to handle these auctions and future extended live auctions.
The fresh monthly auctions will augment SnapNames’ expired domain auctions and sister firm Moniker’s live domain auctions. Monthly auctions will begin on the second Tuesday of each month and end the second Thursday. (The first auction, starting July 16, will be longer.)
To accommodate the fresh auctions and respond to issues with previous extended auctions, SnapNames has released fresh bidding interfaces. As someone who has been critical of the SnapNames interface in the past, these changes are welcome. SnapNames Senior Product Manager Craig Calder and Director of Product Marketing Michele Van Tilborg gave me an overview of the system a few days back.
The fresh interface means there will now be separate interfaces for expired domains, monthly auctions, and extended auctions. “People want to bid differently in different types of auctions,” stated Van Tilborg.
For the fresh monthly auctions, bidders can view and sort the domains as stated by price, number of bids, closing time, etc. There will also be reserve auctions, each with a published reserve range. Most importantly, bidding on domain names will no longer require “adding them to cart” and checking out, a process that was built for backordering domains but applied to auctions.
A similar interface will be used for Extended (silent) auctions, but they will not include reserves. The home page at SnapNames.com will also change to focus on the fresh monthly auctions.
