The USPTO (United States Patent and Trademark Office) has issued two patents to Godaddy for appraising domain names using comparative data and a domain appraisal algorithm.
The domain name related patents essentially cover a process of "spinning" to create domain name permutations (variations) as well as the method to automatically generate an appraisal. It's pretty interesting stuff for domainers - particularly those selling in the GoDaddy aftermarket.
So what's Godaddy got up its digital sleeve? Who knows, but by the sounds of it, it's likely aspirations to a better position in the domain after market. We're looking at you Flippa. Below is a summary/excerpt of the domain valuation patent:
The appraisal may be accomplished by breaking the valuation of the domain into five logical groupings, possibly including evaluation of "5 P's" related to the domain name. Evaluation of "precision" may include the number of distinct keywords found, the length of the name and the number of keywords found in the dictionary. Evaluation of "popularity" may include various search engine search result metrics and tracking of words searched per month. Evaluation of "presence" may include the age of the domain, and the rank of the web site according to web ranking services or software. Evaluation of "pattern" may include the number of premium characters, the part of speech (such as noun, plural noun, verb, adjective, etc., possibly considering if the domain is a one word domain), the relationship of vowels and consonants etc. (possibly considering if the domain is a 4-5 character word). Evaluation of Pay-Per-Click, or PPC, may include the maximum number of pay-per-click bids from various advertising tracking services or software, and the number of ads returned within search engine searches. A dynamic multiplier based on registration statistics for each of several top level domains (TLDs) may then be applied to the domain evaluation. This multiplier may be used to give a very accurate measure of domain scarcity to let a user or evaluator know how rare a domain name is.