I spent much of yesterday afternoon at a chemotherapy center with my Aunt, which made me think about a few things, including my own mortality. While I am thankful to be healthy, life changing events can happen at almost any time. Being a domain investor/developer puts me in a position that is different from many others, and I think we need to think about a succession plan should unexpected something happen.
The most important thing is to make sure a loved one (wife, child, brother, parent…etc) or other trusted person knows about your business. They should know details such as registrars, domain holdings, passwords, email accounts, forums, parking companies, partners, clients, bank accounts and other details. If something happens to you, it’s important that someone trusted knows what to do with your business. Here are some things I recommend:
Let your trusted person know which registrars you use, the account numbers, and the passwords (kept in a safe and secure location). If you have an Account Manager at the registrar, the trusted person should have your AM’s email address to make sure domains are paid up and accessible if liquidation is necessary.
For those of you who develop your domain names, a trusted person should know what agreements you have in place with advertisers – or at least know where to find your agreements. While advertisers and partners will be understanding if something happens, money is money, and they will eventually expect to have their agreements honored or their payments refunded.
For those of you who rely mostly on PPC, a trusted person should know the contacts at your parking company. You will want to make sure your revenue continues to be paid regularly.
Your important domain contacts, clients, forum login names, and other industry accounts should be known to your trusted person. If liquidation is necessary, you’d want the names to sell for the most money possible, so it’s important that the trusted person know where to sell them.
Your sales and tax records are important things that your trusted person will need to know where to find. The government will still expect to be paid based on your sales from that year no matter what happens to you.
I am sure you will want your trusted person to take over your business or to liquidate your domain names, and they will need to know how to do so. For those of you who have full fledged businesses with strong PPC earnings or developed website earnings, the business should probably be maintained or sold – rather than just the domain names being liquidated. When deciding, you should take your trusted person’s interest in the business into consideration. If you would want your domain names to be sold, you should let your trusted person know what names you own, which are most valuable, and how to sell them.
While your business isn’t the most important thing that someone will be thinking about if something should happen to you, it is important that someone know what to do in the event of an unexpected life changing event.

Any way you look at it, the economic situation is impacting nearly all domain investors. Less PPC and somewhat lower sales means even less revenue for the many in the industry. Without these two revenue streams being at full strength, it’s getting more difficult for domain investors to pay bills. Since you can’t pay your bills with domain names, liquidity problems are something that many domain investors are facing.
If this is the case for you, there are at least two viabile options – both of which involve using your domain names as leverage. Domain Capital and Digipawn are two companies that are willing to give loans to many domain owners with their domain names as leverage. These companies are domain experts, and they are able to value your domain names for lending purposes.
If you are in need of a loan, visit these companies’ websites or drop me a note and I will send you an introductory email.   I don’t work for either company, nor do I receive a commission for referrals.

About 10 months ago, I wrote a  post about people who were “lucky” enough to receive lines of credit by accident at K-Mart. While everyone is pinning the credit problems the country is facing on Wall Street greed, I think the blame needs to be shared. I believe this is a good illustration about how Main Street needs to share the blame with Wall Street.

“‘Free Money!!!’ was what some Wauwatosa, Wisconsin residents were yelling as a Kmart computer glitch caused all credit applicants to be approved for lines of credit between $850-$4,000 this past weekend.
So many people got excited about the available credit that the store ran out of applications, and someone was selling applications from another Kmart for $20 in the parking lot. From an outsider’s perspective this is both sad and foolish. The sad part is that people were crazily exclaiming “free money” simply because their credit applications were approved. The foolish part is that these people somehow believe credit is “free money.”
As we have been learning, the United States economy is facing some difficult times due to an abundance of companies giving mortgages, loans, and other forms of credit to undeserving citizens. Sure, the reward is much greater for these higher interest borrowers, but the risk was too great. It’s clear that Americans view credit as something other than what it is.
Marketers jam our mailboxes with credit applications. Telemarketers call us and offer us lines of credit over the phone. Department stores practically beg us to apply for a card to save 10% on all purchases we make that day. It’s about time we become responsible for the credit problem and not continue to enflame the situation.
As corporate citizens, we need to think beyond the next quarter or fiscal year. We need to realize the impact of our decisions and how they will impact us down the road. Maybe denying high credit risk borrowers is a bad business decision today, but doesn’t it make sense?”