Keep Alternate Spellings in Mind

Elliot Silver
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Last week, I was bidding on an auction at Godaddy and ended up losing. The name could be worth more than the winning bid, and I want to share why I stopped bidding without revealing the name, since that might not be nice for the winning bidder.

The reason I stopped bidding was there is an alternative way to spell the domain name. It may have been good for branding, but it would have failed the radio test and would have likely lost half its traffic to the alternative. This domain name had a number and a word in it, but there are alternative spellings. For instance, if you heard the word “first” in a domain name, some people might spell it first and others might spell it 1st.

For this particular domain name, I think both

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How I Deal With Auction Locks During a Negotiation

Elliot Silver
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Depending on the auction house, domain name registrar, and type of auction, a domain name may be locked for a period of time following the conclusion of an auction. This means a domain name cannot be transferred out of a registrar, and it may in fact be locked within the account and unable to be pushed to another account (again, this may depend on the registrar).

Because I sometimes receive an inquiry during the auction lock period, I want to share a bit of advice with how I deal with this type of situation.  Before responding to the inquiry, I will do a bit more research on the history of the domain name.

If the auction was a private auction and not an expiry auction, I might contact the auction house and registrar and ask them to remove the lock for me. If the domain name has been

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See Other Domains Before Inquiring

Elliot Silver
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I want to share a piece of advice for those of you who opportunistically acquire good domain names privately. Check out whether or not the domain owner has other domain names of interest before sending your inquiry.

Let’s say you are in the market for good one word .com domain names and think Exclaim.com would be great for your portfolio (my company owns the name).  Before inquiring, it might be good to have a short list of other domain names the owner has so you can inquire about those, too.

When you are buying domain names on a one off basis, the domain name might be priced much higher than if you are buying a package of domain names. In addition, by inquiring about more than one domain name, the domain owner will likely be able to tell that you are a domain investor rather than someone who is planning to build “the next big thing.”

I regularly use tools like

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Rebranding is Expensive

Elliot Silver
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When I am in a negotiation to sell a domain name to a company that would use the domain name by launching a new brand or rebrand an existing business, I often think about how expensive of an endeavor it will be for the company to do so. In addition to their web related graphics, the company needs to update signage, business cards, marketing materials, shirts or uniforms, and other merchandise. This is expensive. Frankly, the domain name would likely cost a fraction of the entire rebrand, even if the domain name is expensive.

On one hand, a domain owner can make the argument in a negotiation that the company should pony up a bit more for the domain name since they are going to have to spend big bucks on the rebrand. On the other hand, reminding a decision maker about the expense of a rebrand might give them second thoughts about buying the domain name in the first place.

I think there may be a disconnect

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Don’t Be Annoying

Elliot Silver
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The other day, I received an email that started with, “I have reached out several times.” I had not responded to this person’s email because I had no interest in what he was offering, but I will share some advice with you.

It’s fine to email me once about some domain names that you think I might like to buy. You can see the types of names I own, and if you have something that would fit in on that list, you are welcome to share them with me with your price. If I don’t reply, perhaps it is because I am not interested. There’s a chance I missed your email, so a follow-up wouldn’t be too annoying. However, if you send two emails that don’t generate a response, it is likely that the domain names you sent are not of interest.

I do my best to

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How to Buy Back a Domain Name

Elliot Silver
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Yesterday afternoon, I wrote an article detailing a couple of ways a domain name may go under new ownership, unbeknownst to the former owner. I suppose because of the surprise of this, sometimes these former owners have a poor attitude when discussing their former domain name, and that is not helpful to a negotiation.

I thought I would share a few tips to help former owners try and reacquire their lost domain names via negotiation with the new owner:

Be professional – Being an a-hole is not going to win you any points with the new owner, and it will likely lead to a breakdown in negotiation. When someone gets confrontational with me about a domain name my company rightfully owns, I generally completely ignore the person or have my General Counsel take over. I don’t have the patience to deal with people like that.

Know your rights – If the domain name is descriptive and it expired because an old email address was used as the contact email at the registrar, chances are good that the

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