Get Removed from Email Lists ASAP!

Elliot Silver
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7

I have a number of domain names that have email addresses which receive incoming email. For many of these email addresses, I forward the incoming email to one account where I can read news submissions and other information that is sent for publication on my website.

One of these email accounts receives a lot of junk email from annoying “the sky is falling” organizations that waste my time and irritate me. Because I receive them on another email account, my “unsubscribe” emails went unheeded. It seemed that when I would filter those email accounts, they would use different senders from within the same organization. This had gone on for around a year – maybe more.

I found that the US Government has a spam email hotline where you can report spammers. The email address is “spam@uce.gov.” Yesterday, I received emails from two different and unrelated organizations, and instead of deleting them, I forwarded it to spam@uce.gov and carbon copied the senders. I wrote, “I’ve tried to get my email address removed from this spam list many times to no avail, so I am reporting it to the US Government’s spam hotline.”

Lo and behold, this morning I received emails from both organizations informing me that my email address (the one that was on their records) had been removed from their mailing lists. I don’t know if the spam hotline did anything or if the threat of the US government is what did it, but whatever it was, I am no longer on those mailing lists. If you get spammed by people who are unrelenting, just copy them on your report to Spam@uce.gov.

When It’s Critical To Own Your Product Domain Name

Elliot Silver
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6

Some companies argue that as long as they own their brand domain name, it’s much less important to own their product domain name(s). They may believe this because they carry many products, and it’s easier to manage one domain name and website than a group of them. In my opinion, when a company’s product is more well known than its manufacturer, it’s critical for them to own the product domain name, as that’s what consumers will obviously be looking to find when searching Google or typing in the domain name.

Case in point. I read an article in the Boston Globe yesterday about a new cleaning product called “Spaghetti Scrubs.” This cleaning product is apparently less abrasive than steel Brillo pads, and it molds to whatever pot or item you are cleaning. The idea is that it takes less effort to clean your pots and pans than if you were using a sponge, and it can cause less damage to your pots and pans.

The article mentioned that Spaghetti Scrubs were invented by a Japanese designer, and it named a couple of stores where it’s available to purchase. However, the key takeaway for me is the brand name’s domain name, SpaghettiScrubs.com, is unregistered. From direct navigation and SEO standpoints, this is a mistake. There really is no reason why the manufacturer shouldn’t spend the $10 to buy the domain name. Even a simple forward to the Crate & Barrel website would be better than nothing.

GeoDomain Development Idea

Elliot Silver
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17

I know a lot of people who own city keyword .com domain names, and I own several of them as well. I want to share a development idea I have, as I have found most of the longer tail geodomain names I own (most are attorney or lawyer names) don’t get much type in traffic and make very little revenue as a result. I haven’t put this idea into practice yet but want to share it with those who might wish to do so.

Using a modified classifieds theme or a directory package, create empty directories that cost anywhere from $9 – 99/year to sign up. The advertiser will receive a full page within the website to promote his business, and the company will be listed on the primary page. It will be very similar to Frank Schilling’s MontrealRestaurants.com. Payment will need to be made via Paypal and should be an annual subscription for easy re-billing.

The idea is that once you create and customize your platform for a few hundred dollars (unless you are able to do the work on your own), you can then version it out to your other similar domain names to lower your development cost per domain name. Contrary to what some people might say, I do happen to think a site like this should look good so potential advertisers are more interested in advertising. I received many more comments about DogWalker.com’s look and style rather than its searchability and functionality.

By doing this, it will help generate revenue, once you’ve done enough SEO work to get it ranked in Google. As a comparison, DogWalker.com ranked #1 in Google for the term “dog walker” within 2 months of launching it, and it had been a Godaddy landing page for a while, so the SEO aspect isn’t as difficult as it might seem.

Like I said before, I haven’t done this yet so I can’t give any feedback about the likelihood for success. I tried to sell HattiesburgAttorney.com, LynnAttorney.com, BozemanAttorney.com, and a few others similar names without much luck, so I will probably try this model out on these names before the end of the year. If it fails to yield any signups, I imagine getting these names ranking in Google for their keywords will at the very least increase their saleability and value.

Feel free to share your experiences with this.

Quick Tip to Buying Good, Saleable Domain Names in the Aftermarket

Elliot Silver
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8

One thing I look for when buying a domain name is to see how many companies use that exact term as a part of their domain name. If companies are using more specific domain names for their websites, the generic term will usually be highly valuable to at least one company that wants to be THE exact match .com. With this exact match name, you can usually command top dollar.

For example, there are a lot of law firms that use the term “DefenseLawyer.com” in their domain name. You have everything from descriptive names like CriminalDefenseLawyer.com to geographical like NewYorkDefenseLawyer.com and everything else in between. Owning the primary generic term would presumably be of interest to many of those companies. This is generally the case with most exact match .com domain names.

By doing a Google search for the exact match .com name, you will see all of those developed websites that use that term in their domain name. There is your first round list of end user prospects when you look to sell the domain name. You can also search for that exact term without the domain name, such as “defense lawyer” in my example, and then you can see what I did to sell one of my domain names to an end user company.

Obviously the term needs to be generic, so something like VolvoDealer.com wouldn’t pass that test, even though there are a number of dealerships that use the term “VolvoDealer.com” in their domain names.

Successful End User Sale From Start to Finish

Elliot Silver
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112

I want to share information about a successful end user sale I made with a domain name I recently acquired on Snapnames. Out of respect for the buyer, I am keeping the name and price private, but that’s not really important for the sake of this article.

I was looking through Snapnames a couple of weeks ago, and I saw a niche category defining domain name with one bidder. The name is one aspect of a large industry, but there are companies that specialize in this area. The GAKT numbers are decent, and there are a lot of companies that use this term in their domain names (CityXxxxxxXxxxxx.com for example).

As the auction progressed into its final minutes, it shot up from under $100 to several hundred dollars, but I was the winning bidder. I know the domain investment company I was bidding against, so I knew that I wasn’t battling an end user who would have more knowledge about the actual industry value than I could have.

As usual, I offered the domain name for sale to some of my clients, but there wasn’t interest. I was concerned that I possibly over paid for the 10 year old domain name, but I thought a company that specializes in this would be willing to pay above what a domain investor could justify. I did some Google research using the term (in quotes to ensure this exact term was being used), and I sent prospects the following email:

Good afternoon,

I noticed that your company is listed (used the word “advertising” to companies that are paying for Adwords) on Google for the key phrase “xxxxxxx xxxxx,” and my company is selling the exact match domain name “XxxxxxxXxxxx.com. The domain name was created back in January of 2000, and developing it could provide a SEO boost.

If you are interested in acquiring XxxxxxxXxxxx.com, please let me know. I am offering it to several xyz companies in the next few days.”

Regards,
Elliot

– –
Elliot J. Silver
Top Notch Domains, LLC

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I sent a total of 24 emails to prospective buyers using the contact forms or email addresses available on their websites. In total, I received 7 replies, all of which were from people that were interested. A few people said they’d love to buy the name but times were tough. A couple suggested I hold the name for another year or so to increase the value because that particular business is just now seeing a recovery.

I received two offers – one for under $1,000 and the other in the thousands of dollars range from a NYSE publicly traded company that happens to be the leader in the industry. Although I attempted to negotiate, they stuck to their initial best offer, and I agreed to sell them the domain name. We used Escrow.com for the transaction, and the transfer/sale was finalized this week.

I believe I sold the name for much more that it would have sold to another domain investor. I know there are people doing this type of thing every day, and I want to share my approach from start to finish.

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Please help me raise funds for the Ronald McDonald House

Some Sales May Not Seem to Make Sense to Me, But They Make Sense to The Buyer

Elliot Silver
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12

I frequently see domain sales reports that don’t make a whole lot of sense to me at face value. The sales prices may seem off the charts compared to names I believe are similar. Does this mean that a sales venue or seller has fraudulently reported it or that there was something else nefarious that caused a sale to happen? In most cases, that is unlikely (especially because Ron does his best to verify sales). It’s more likely that the people analyzing the sales – like myself – just don’t have enough information about the sale in order to form an educated opinion on it.

As I have mentioned in the past, you sometimes need to overpay to get the domain name(s) you want or need for a project. Sellers frequently need to be convinced to sell their domain names, and it can take a significant offer to make it happen. With a proven business model or a strong business plan, these domain acquisitions may make sense to the buyer, although they leave others shaking their heads.

Likewise, a domain name may have certain attributes (like type-in traffic) that results in significant revenue opportunities. When this is the case, a buyer may have a plan to monetize the traffic much better than the seller, and he can therefore pay more for the domain name than others would value it at. A sales price may seem high, but in reality, the price is favorable to the buyer.

Aside from questioning the validity of specific sales, another thing that some people do is transpose their perceived rationale for a domain sale onto the value of their own domain names.   “XYZ.com sold for $100,000, so my domain name, e-XYZ.net must be worth $10,000,” some people exclaim. This is usually not the case since domain names are unique.

While abnormal domain sales take place all the time, uninformed domain investors shouldn’t question the validity of the sales without any type of evidence (other than their own perception), especially in a public forum. Further, domain investors shouldn’t presume their domain names are worth the same amount since all domain names are unique assets.

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