Sounds like a serious conflict of interest issue!

I’ll admit the email expiration notifications are reliable and often: 90 days, 60 days, 30 days, 10 days, 5 days, 3 days, day before, same day, the day after, and two days after. They also send the same email to my alternate email address. A couple of times I renewed the domain two days after it expired with no problem. I’ll also admit that I have never experienced them mysteriously registering domains after I’ve searched for them. Most of them are still available.

HOWEVER…. My gut feeling, especially after watching his videos, is that he’s a shady bastard. I think he will absolutely without a doubt start up some other version of Standard Tactics and this time keep it totally under wraps. The only reason I don’t move my domains somewhere else is because I’ve heard that Godaddy is like the roach motel (or is it Hotel California?). I don’t want to mess with that. I just point the DNS elsewhere and leave it at that. BTW: one way to tell if you’re dealing with a Godaddy affiliate (besides having the same exact site with a different color scheme and a different name) is to mouse over the links and look for gdshop or secureserver.

If it is a good domain name, then they will tell the other executive account reps about it so when it gets to the auction those reps can have their customers bid on it.

Why would someone do that? Well, the executive account reps are compensated when their accounts bid and win TDNAM domains. Rod Browning is compensated when TDNAM brings in big numbers. And Adam Not-Honest Dicker gets compensated when TDNAM does well.

For example, an expired domain recently was at TDNAM for a large amount of money and an executive account customer was about to finalize the sale. It was common knowledge the the original owner would not be happy that this name was almost gone, gone, gone.

Fortunately, the original registrant, who still had a day left in the redemption period, called his executive account rep and was able to pay an $80 redemption fee and retrieve the domain. Read that sentence again . . . the customer called the executive account rep. Why didn’t Marcus, Rod, and any of the other reps contact this guy. It was heady gossip for a day or two — everyone knew what was happening.

“I am not a babysitter” is a common phrase around that department. I guess if it’s in your best interest to allow domains to “accidentally” expire, then I can understand why you may not care if you piss off your customer and forget to renew his domains OR decide not to call him at crucial times.

So, you see if a valuable domain goes to auction, everyone wins far more than the $7.49 renewal fee.

TDNAM, the first rep gets kudos, the new rep get compensated, and the new owner gets a great name.

Can you say insider information?

Go Daddy’s aftermarket department is full of self-serving thieves.

Bob Parsons is probably the most self-centered, egotistical guy around. He does nothing but seek publicity and money.

Bob Parsons IS THE GoDaddy Group!

Everything he said on the interview was a lie. I know for a fact that Standard Tactics was NOT created for research and made FAR MORE money than $40,000 a year.

1) No issues registering/keeping the name
2) Lowest possible cost

GoDaddy is, in my experience, really good about repeated renewal notifications, using email, postal mail, and even phone to let you know time is running out. For, what, $7/year from me per domain?

Really easy domain management tools, and a humans-free process to consolidate renewal dates.

I’m not sure who out there does a better job as a REGISTRY, aside from perhaps a few who simply do less upselling/offer fewer options.

If there’s a cheaper, more reliable solution, though, just let me know!

Their user interface ROCKS!