My Price Reduction Offer

Elliot Silver
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7

I have a substantial portion of my domain portfolio listed for sale via GoDaddy / Afternic. I tend to price this inventory a bit on the high side because I am always able to reduce my price if necessary but obviously can’t increase it once someone agrees to purchase it. This isn’t the case with every domain name listed with a BIN price, but I do tend have a bit of wiggle room on my names.

When someone inquires about the price of a domain name via my Embrace.com landing page, I quote the price I have listed at GoDaddy (if there is a BIN price listed). I give the buyer the option of buying directly via GoDaddy or closing a deal privately via Escrow.com. Yes, I would need to pay a commission if the deal closes via GoDaddy, but there are several advantages to selling via GoDaddy, including:

  • Not having to worry about collecting funds (ie fraudulent payments or stop payments on checks or claims of fraud / not receiving products at PayPal)
  • Fewer worries about the domain transfer
  • People know GoDaddy and understand it is a huge company, so fewer issues sending payment
  • Many people already have a GoDaddy account
  • No KYC verification delays

All that being said, sometimes the prospective buyer thinks the price is too high or is thinking about buying other domain names. Oftentimes, they don’t even respond to my response even when my price is fair or the price is somewhat close to their offer. The later situation is especially frustrating.

If a buyer makes an opening offer of $4,000 on a domain name I have priced at $12,000 (assuming a purchase price of

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Farmers Business Network Upgrades to FBN.com

Elliot Silver
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4

In one of my morning alert emails from DomainTools, I noticed that NameFind appears to have sold the FBN.com domain name. When I visited FBN.com this morning, I saw that it appears to have been acquired by an organization called Farmers Business Network. A message on top of the landing page says, “Farmers Business Network will be moving from www.farmersbusinessnetwork.com to www.fbn.com soon! To visit our current website, please click here.”

I think this is a smart upgrade for Farmers Business Network. Although the organization owns its exact match domain name, it is quite lengthy. Shortening the website url to a three letter .com domain name (LLL.com) will be much easier for marketing and should also be easier for email.

From what I can see on its Twitter profile (@FBNFarmers) it looks like the group already abbreviates its name as FBN. Having the FBN.com domain name to match

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WW.com: Weight Watchers Rebrands as WW

Elliot Silver
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6

In July of this year, I reported that the WW.com domain name appears to have sold. WW.com previously sold in 2014 for an undisclosed price. Although the Whois record was private and the domain name did not resolve in July, I speculated that Weight Watchers may have acquired the domain name. In addition to the fact that Weight Watchers’ initials are “WW,” the domain name transferred to corporate brand protection registrar SafeNames, where Weight Watchers registers its domain names.

Last week, I updated the article I wrote because WW.com started forwarding to WeightWatchers.com. Although the Whois record remains private, it could be assumed that Weight Watchers acquired the domain name because it wouldn’t make sense for anyone else to forward the domain name.

This morning, it was reported that Weight Watchers is rebranding as WW. According to an article published this morning on CNN Money, “Weight Watchers really wants to let you know that it’s not just a diet company — so much so that it’s changing its name to WW.” Smartly, the company bought the matching WW.com in advance of the rebranding.

Since noticing the changes to WW.com, I periodically

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Valley National Bank Acquires Valley.com

Elliot Silver
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8

Valley National Bancorp is a publicly traded financial institution (VLY on the New York Stock Exchange) with a market capitalization of nearly $4 Billion. The company operates Valley National Bank, a consumer facing bank that uses the three word ValleyNationalBank.com domain name for its website. Based on current Whois records, the bank appears to have recently acquired the high value Valley.com domain name.

After seeing the registrant information change to Valley National Bank on the Valley.com Whois records (courtesy of the Domain Monitor Alert tool from DomainTools), I visited the domain name to see if the bank is using it yet. The domain name is not yet being used by the bank, and I was forwarded to an offer form hosted on the Lumis Domain Brokerage website. In looking through my email records, I see that Lumis was brokering the sale of Valley.com. When I had inquired about the price in January of this year, I was told it would cost “mid six figures.”

I reached out to Hobi Michalec and Slade Michalec,

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Packet Raises $25m Series B; Buys Packet.com

Elliot Silver
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0

A company called Packet has raised $25 million in Series B funding. The news was shared this morning in a tweet from Techmeme:

A quick Google search showed that this startup is using the Packet.net domain name for its business.

A Whois search reveals that the company likely acquired the Packet.com domain name within the last week or so. On September 6, the domain name was registered to domain investor

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Mastermind.com Sold for $275,000

Elliot Silver
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15

Domain broker Darryl Lopes shared a YouTube video that was uploaded in July that reveals the Mastermind.com domain name was purchased for $275,000. Because the Escrow.com invoice looked a bit funky to me (the domain name was covered up), I did a bit of investigating to confirm the veracity of the report.

In doing a Whois search via DomainTools, I saw a screenshot that showed the Mastermind.com domain name forwarded to a eNaming landing page. eNaming is the domain brokerage founded by Tracy Fogarty. I reached out to Tracy, and she confirmed the sale to me. “Generally I do not disclose any sales or sale prices however since the buyer has I can confirm I was the broker at the price he mentions,” Tracy told me via email.

Assuming that Ron Jackson is able to chart this sale in DNJournal, it will become the 21st largest publicly reported sale of 2018.

Here’s the video Darryl sent me. In it, the buyer explains why his company bought Mastermind.com for $275,000:

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