If things proceed as planned we will be auctioning off geo-generic domains from this site. The first auction is tentatively scheduled for the last week of August but it could happen sooner or a little bit later. There are a few hurdles to clear but at this point it doesn’t look like they will be difficult ones.

There will be a different flavor to our auctions - that is because we have multiple objectives and these objectives will play a part where the bidders are concerned. Our objectives are or will be more fully explained in other areas of this site but we will touch on a few of them while explaining the factors that give our auction its “different flavor”.

First of all, our main interest is in developing an association of geo-generic dot com domain owners. We envision that the geo-generic domains in this association will necessarily be developed domains that are actually engaging in whatever business that the generic in the domain name would suggest.

To that end we are going to try to attract bidders whose goal would be to develop their new domain purchase, at least that is our first concern. Beyond that we also would hope that they would like to pursue an affiliation with our “Associated Geo-Generics” network but that concerns us less than that they develop their domain in such a fashion as to help to effect a situation where the person who arrives at a geo-generic dot com site finds a useful site that provides a timely solution to their circumstance.

Attracting end-user bidders should also provide the top sale price for a domain as well. Ideally we would get top dollar for the domain and the winning bidder would have been impressed enough by the arguments that we make in favor of association with us and the incentives that we offer them upon association that they will in fact become a member of our geo-generic dot com association.

We will be offering a number of incentives to both win a domain at auction and to join. For example we will be auctioning off fully developed sites that are very nearly turnkey operations. We are developing a number of software applications that will be very much state of the art for each individual generic. The winner of a domain like “SomecityAuctions.com” will be getting a domain with a functioning auction platform that requires only the entry of items to be a viable concern. The winner of “SomecityHomeSalescom” will find themself with a site set up and ready for the replacing of the examples with real listings.

These domains/sites will ideally have decent natural rankings in the various search engines, making the winning bidder even more able to begin a successful business on their new domain immediately. We are building these sites by integrating popular open-source applications so that a person who wins one of our domains at auction will not be tied to us for future support but we hope that they recognize the quality of our effort and that it might influence them to pursue association with us but certainly we have no strings attached to the sales nor will we be pressuring anybody to join.

We plan to begin by auctioning two or three domains per day, on weekdays. We have approximately 120 domains so at the rate of 3 a day that will last for 2 months. We will also be accepting domains from other people for auction, ideally most of the domains will be other people who wish to get a good price for their domain which as stated previously we think that end-users will be most likely to pay.

The quality of our domains will be consistent as well as we are aiming at a specific niche. We will only be auctioning “dot coms” - no “dot tv”, no “dot org” domains and unless a very special case there will be no hyphenated domain names. We will also not be selling (or associating) with less than stellar generics - no “YourcityCondosByTheBeach.com” type of geo-generics. Some cities may not have beaches and our mission is to instill in the consumer/surfer that if they go to any city and generic that there will be what they think should be there, which is a less than ideal example but we won’t be selling 3 and 4 word names unless special circumstances dictate.

Some examples of domains that we have that we think illustrate the general quality that we will be accepting and developing templates for are -

PuebloHomeSales.com

BeverlyHillsRobotics.com

NormanGolf.com

PineBluffLawyers.com

LubbockSearch.com

CanadaRobots.com

PortStLucieTickets.com

CalgaryMotorcycles.com

There are better or worse generics, more desirable or less desirable cities but the pattern should be evident and the premise clear - just the geo location and the unadorned generic. Research has led us to estimate that there might be as many as 150 “good” generics for every city or geographical area.

We will be using a variety of processes to ensure that the appropriate end-user for the domains that we auction will be aware of the auction. We will not be using spam tactics nor any tactic that might portray our service in a negative way. In order to accomplish our goal this means that there will be a somewhat lengthy period between accepting a domain name for auction and the actual auctioning of that domain. It may end up being as little as two weeks but we are thinking that a month is more conducive to attracting the right bidders which may well mean educating the interested ones over a period of time before the auction and allowing them time for that education to sink in.

There will be more details forthcoming leading up to the date of our initial auction.