Make a Connection, Not a Pitch

Elliot Silver
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10

Quite frequently, I meet people who buy domain names for their business and/or invest in domain names. Some of these people introduce themselves to me after finding my blog, some are met at conferences and other events, and some are met by happenstance. Whenever I meet someone for the first time, my thought is to make a connection with them rather than making a domain name sales pitch.

When I meet someone who immediately tries to pitch something to me, whether it is a domain name or an insurance product (for example), I tend to have my guard up. This is especially the case when it comes to a personal meeting where I am not expecting to receive a sales pitch. More often than not, I am nice about it, but I will assume that any further contact with the person will involve a sales pitch and I will most likely ignore future emails and phone calls to avoid a subsequent pitch. This pretty much eliminates any chance of a connection with the person.

Instead of thinking about

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Add Your LinkedIn Profile to Landing Pages

Elliot Silver
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7

I am not very active on LinkedIn, but I do use it to share articles, read articles, and see who is looking at my profile. While checking out LinkedIn this morning, I saw that a prospective buyer for one of my domain names had viewed my profile, and it gave me an idea for my “for sale” landing pages: add a link to my LinkedIn profile.

When a logged in LinkedIn user clicks on a profile, the person whose profile was clicked can see that their profile was viewed by that person (unless they are a premium member who blocks this feature). If a prospect would visit one of my landing pages and clicks on my LinkedIn profile link, this will allow me to get an idea of who is poking around my domain name for sale landing pages. This information may be more helpful than the IP and other anonymous tracking information that Google Analytics and StatCounter share.

There are two reasons why this might be beneficial.

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Getting The Right Contact is Key

Elliot Silver
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10

When trying to sell a domain name, I believe the most important thing is getting in touch with the right person at a particular company. If you call or email the wrong person at a company, you might not receive a reply when that company might be willing to spend the most money of any prospect for a domain name.

I’ve seen and used a few lead generation tools. It seems that most are able to provide a domain name seller with the Whois contact email address for potential prospects. Some tools are better at finding targeted prospects than others, although I would argue that doing this by hand is better than by using a tool.

That being said, the Whois email address is

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Before You Buy a Domain Name, Check How It Was Used

Elliot Silver
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12

My daughter was watching a movie on our flight home, and I used this time to think of some potential domain name acquisition opportunities. I spent a few minutes doing Whois searches for keyword domain names, and I found a great kids product domain name that was parked and listed for sale for under $1,000. I took the next step to buy it (clicking the DomainTools “for sale” link) when I noticed a giant “XXX” in the header of the parked page. Thanks, but I will pass.

Although many domain investors don’t really care all that much how a domain name was used in the past, I think it is important that we research the various iterations of how the domain name was used by its former owners. The domain name I found yesterday was one I would have bought in order to re-sell, and I would not want to have to explain why it had adult links at one time, assuming a prospective buyer sees that it was once laden with adult links.

In the future, when a

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Your Domain Name Should Sell Itself

Elliot Silver
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16

I am of the opinion that if you have to explain what your domain name means or why the domain name means something, you probably should not use outbound marketing to sell the domain name.

It seems like every day, I receive at least one email from someone trying to sell me their domain name(s). As a domain investor, I understand why these people are reaching out to me, but I feel badly when I receive a large list of domain names that make no sense to me and don’t really seem to be worth anything unless someone wants to use one as a brand.

Some people seem to believe that if they explain to me what their domain name means, I will be more apt to buy it. Unfortunately, the opposite is more likely to happen. If someone has to explain the meaning of a domain name to me, I will have less interest because I don’t really want to acquire a domain name that is inherently confusing.

There are plenty of brands that use

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5 Tips to Prevent Domain Hijacking

Elliot Silver
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21

It seems that domain name theft has been on the rise of late. Theo at DomainGang.com has done a good job of reporting on this, and I am sure there are many other cases that don’t get reported. Domain theft, also commonly known as domain name hijacking, can impact anyone who owns a domain name, and it has an especially negative impact on businesses whose domain names are used for commercial activity.

If a case of domain hijacking occurs, I recommend contacting the registrar immediately to see what they can do to help. You should also contact a lawyer with domain name expertise to help facilitate the expedient return of the domain name. The lawyer might be able to advise you one filing a report with the FBI and a local or state police report. There are other things that should be done, and a domain attorney is the best person to advise on these matters.

Listed below are 5 tips to better protect your domain names from having them stolen. If you can

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