The Multi-Million Domain Auction That No One Knew About – Part 4

A day or 2 before the bidding starts, a wrench is thrown in. It is told to us that google has blocked their top revenue name. It is being switched to yahoo but we may not here revenue figures before the bidding starts. While we were not buying based on revenue, it was a material number and had to be considered. One thing I forgot to mention. When we originally bid in part 1, we had no revenue figures. The only party to have the figures was one of the other bidders that had been managing the domains.
The auction starts with our bid as the starting bid. There is a few million on the table. Bid increases have to be a minimum of 100k. One party tops us and we come right back. The third party drops out quickly. So now 2 parties remain. I have an idea of who the remaining party is and my gut tells me there is no way to beat him. I’ll explain why later. The other party has requested minimum bids to be reduced now to $25,000 from $100,000. This could be read 2 ways. Either they are near their maximum or they want to win and tell feel we are near ours and they would only have to go up 25k on their last bid instead of 100k. As it turns out neither of us was close to being done.

The board then asks that they want a final bid from each party. We don’t like this as we feel that it could favor the other party and demand that the current rules apply. It turns out the other party was also insistent that the bidding continue. The board relents and lets the bidding stay the same way.

The bids go back and forth by telephone. At first 25k bids are going back and forth. Then slightly higher. We have topped another million dollar mark and the bids kept coming. When we go up a 100k they go up 25k more. When we go up 500k more, they go up 25k more. We are now in the mid to upper 7 figures. The domains are worth considerably more in my opinion but since the toys.com auction has still not finished its process, it starts to weigh in the decision.

Then the next hurdle is put before us. The rules of the game get changed and there is no way to stop it. The other party guarantees that if he wins he will submit all funds by close of business the next day. The board tells us that this is what they are going to do. This most likely a tactic by the other party to get us out of the game. However, that would not be the case just yet. I call for a hail Mary. I quickly call partners to see what the max cash we can get together in 24hours and decide that is the number we have to do. I have no choice. Even if we don’t get this I want to make sure I squeeze as much blood as I can out of this. Its their court and ball and we have to play by their rules. We keep going up by 500k. Each time, the other party counters 25k more. We make our last bid.

Come back tomorrow for the last part in this series.