Counterparty Needs to Have Authority

Elliot Silver
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14

I have bought and sold quite a few domain names to larger companies with multiple levels of decision makers. In these dealings, I have negotiated with a variety of individuals at different positions within the companies. One thing that should be discussed is whether the other party has the authority to negotiate terms and agree to a deal.

I have discussed deals with everyone from marketing managers to lawyers to executives. Generally speaking, I assume that the other party is authorized to discuss a deal because they either contacted me to discuss a domain name or they were the point of contact for me. As a negotiation gets going a bit, you should think about asking the other party if they have the authority to do a deal with you.

The primary reason for learning this information is that you don’t want to reach a deal with the other party only to learn that someone else has the power to cancel the deal. It can be a major time waste if you negotiate a price and terms only to learn that there are other people that need to get involved before the deal can be finalized. It is pretty

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Don’t Tell Me You Have a Small Budget

Elliot Silver
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19

“I am interested in buying your domain name but have a small budget”

One of my big pet peeves when dealing with a prospective buyer is when they open an inquiry by telling me they have a small budget. I understand that they are at least trying to set my expectations at a low level, but I find this quite annoying and sometimes won’t even reply when this is one of the first things mentioned.

I have read various articles advising domain buyers to tell domain owners that they are students, working for a non-profit, looking to start a small business…etc. in an effort to get a better price. When I receive an inquiry with that type of language, I almost immediately write it off.

I understand that

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“Trump” on Trending Registrations List

Elliot Silver
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2

I always like reading about the trending domain registration keywords  when Verisign shares its monthly report. This afternoon, Verisign shared the .com and .net keyword trends for July, and there was a pretty big surprise on the list. “Trump” was listed at #5 for .com domain names.

Using Verisign’s Keyword trend tool, it looks like 1,369 domain names with the keyword “trump,” were registered during the month of July.  I am quite sure the reason Trump was in the top 10 list is because of Donald Trump’s Presidential campaign.

Some of the domain names that were registered in July include the following:

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Paul Graham Shares Excellent Domain Name Advice

Elliot Silver
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21

Paul Graham is one of the most respected people in the startup community, and he frequently shares advice on his personal website, PaulGraham.com. In an article he just published, Change Your Name, Paul discusses the importance of domain names. More precisely, he wrote about the importance of startups owning .com domain names.

The opening sentence of the article says it all: “If you have a US startup called X and you don’t have x.com, you should probably change your name.” The basic reason for this can be found in the next paragraph: “The problem with not having the .com of your name is that it signals weakness.”

There is quite a bit of good advice shared in the article, and I will

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Was Registering 30,000 LLLL.net Domains a Good Idea?

Elliot Silver
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19

I received Giuseppe Graziano’s weekly domain brokerage newsletter this morning, and I was a bit surprised by  one of his observations.  In going through some recent domain industry developments, Giuseppe opined that “the most impressive development that I have seen is the registration of the remaining 30,000 Chinese Premium LLLL.net.”

Giuseppe later continued with some back of napkin calculations on why he felt this was a shrewd investment:

“Chinese Premium LLLL.com (also called “chips” – credit: Tim Schoon) have a current floor price of approximately $300, but their trading range is more in the $400/$600. If we play by the book and assign a value of 5-10% of the corresponding .com for each .net domain, we notice that, even if using the conservative 5% figure, all these LLLL .net should have a minimum value of ($300 * 5% =) $15 each. If someone registers a premium .net for $8, then they should be instantly able to turn a ($15 – $8) $7 profit per domain. Therefore, whoever invested the supposedly $240,000, should have an instant value capture of approximately ($7 * 30,000 =) $210,000, which is not a bad return for a day (or one hour) of tiring work”

In my opinion,

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CompanyName.com: New Domain Marketplace Launched

Elliot Silver
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0

CompanyName.com made a very generous contribution to Dana-Farber Cancer Institute as a part of my Pan-Mass Challenge fundraising campaign in exchange for the publication of this article.

One of the biggest challenges facing business owners is finding the perfect brand name. This is evidenced by all of the business publication articles discussing brand names and business naming. CompanyName.com was launched to help make the company naming process easier for business owners.

If you visit CompanyName.com and look at the listed inventory, you’ll quickly notice two types of domain name listings – brandable domain names and premium domain names. The brandable domain names are essentially made up words and phrases, while the premium domain names are high value keyword and liquid, short domain names.

The brandable domain names are typically listed for sale in the $2,500 range. I personally find it much easier to sell domain names in the four figure range, and CompanyName.com has priced their brandable domain name inventory right in that wheelhouse. Similar to other brandable domain name marketplaces, a custom logo is included with the purchase. Because of the nature of brandable domain names, customers can easily find other domains that work just as well, so pricing is important.

Examples of brandable domains for sale

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