Test Your Sale Message

Elliot Silver
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12

One of the nice aspects of parking with Internet Traffic and Voodoo is the ability to add a “for sale” message across the top of your domain name landing pages. I have found that people are more apt to visit the landing page and inquire vs. sending an email after looking up the Whois information.

Having a message in a bright header is great, but the wording of the message is also important in order to get the visitor to inquire about the domain name. You are given a few options for this message:

  • Message wording
  • Pricing (or no pricing)
  • Where to send visitors to make an offer or inquire

In my opinion, it’s important to test the wording on your landing pages to see what drives the most offers, as well as what drives the most sales. I would assume it’s only a statistically significant test if you receive enough offers that the test is valid, but you can test just the same even if you don’t receive many offers.

I recommend looking at Frank Schilling’s company landing pages to see what his wording is and compare it to the default in the Domain Name Sales platform back end. Check out what other people are using, and test your own variations. It might be helpful if you have different portfolios and do some A/B testing just to make sure all things are as equal as possible.

At the end of the day, the quality of the domain name is what will drive the most offers, but you want to make sure it’s clear that the domain name is for sale (or lease) and the visitor should easily be able to get in touch to discuss.

List What You Want to Buy

Elliot Silver
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90

It’s Sunday fun day, so let’s try something that could be fun and could easily be  disastrous! Just about all of us are looking to buy certain types of domain names and others are looking to sell them. Let’s see if we can match some buyers to sellers.

For buyers:

I invite you to post a comment with a type of domain name you are in the market to buy should something be available. Be very specific because people tend to throw names out there they hope will match but clearly don’t.

Set your parameters clearly. For example, you can ask for things like 3 letter .com domain names that don’t have the letter Z and are for sale for $4,000 or less. The more specific you are, the more likely you are to get matching domain names.

For Sellers:

I invite you to reply to these wanted comments with your matching domain name and price as well as a way to contact you. I only ask that you reply to specific posts rather than submitting comments so that we can track what comment you are replying to.

If I notice something that either clearly doesn’t match what the buyer is looking to buy or isn’t a reply to a specific comment, I will probably delete it.

Keep a few things in mind:

  • I will not be involved in any transactions unless I personally buy or sell a domain name
  • I will not accept any commission as a result of a sale
  • I am not verifying any domain names that are listed for sale
  • I will not intervene on any transactions that have problems or fall through
  • Do your due diligence when buying and/or selling a domain name

The Name I’ve Received The Most Inquiries About in The Last Month…

Elliot Silver
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12

Yesterday, I ran a $100 contest asking people to guess which domain name of mine has received the most purchase inquiries in the last month. I gave a list of domain names, some that are developed but most that are parked.

There were two people who correctly guessed BoracayHotels.com, Jen and Mike. Both of these people will split the $100 prize, and I’ll be in touch to get Paypal payment information.

Although BoracayHotels.com has received the most inquiries, it hasn’t been sold yet. I had a deal in place to sell the name to a domain investor for a little under $10,000 last year, but the buyer failed to pay.

I’ve turned down a number of solid offers on the name in the $5-8k range, but I haven’t sold it yet. Most of the recent offers have either been very low or no offer was made after letting the potential buyers know what I’ve turned down in the past.

In any case, it was interesting to see the psychology behind some of the guesses. Names like SHS.com, Burbank.com, and others are developed, and that has led to fewer inquiries. Also, some people guessed long shots to avoid sharing the prize.

I appreciate your taking the time to participate. I am sure I’ll have another contest to give away some money soon.

Domain Name Marketplaces

Elliot Silver
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23

There are many places where you can purchase domain names in the aftermarket. I wanted to share an updated list of aftermarket websites with you. Some of these websites sell privately-owned domain names and others sell company-owned domain names.

I did not include auction sites such as NameJet or Snapnames or forums like DNForum. I also didn’t include eBay since it’s fairly challenging to search for specific types of domain names.

If I missed any aftermarket websites, I hope you will add them in the comment section.

Where else do you buy or sell your domain names in the aftermarket?

Interesting Article About Seller Financing

Elliot Silver
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8

During the last few years, I’ve heard about a number of people offering seller financing on their domain name deals. If a buyer can’t pay for a domain name purchase entirely up front, and he doesn’t wish to seek a more traditional financing option like Domain Capital (or doesn’t qualify), seller financing may be an option.

There are a number of advantages to self  financing  a deal, and there is also a fair amount of risk involved for both parties. Inc. Magazine has an article about seller financing, and I think it’s a good read if you’ve ever considered this option when selling a domain name.

I self-financed one deal, and it hasn’t turned out as great as I hoped. The plus side was that after the first payment was received, the deal was profitable for my company. The downside is that the buyer hasn’t paid off the purchase yet, despite passing the final payment date last month. The buyer is an end user who has a small business, and I felt guilty about demanding payment. He has promised payment in Q1.

Self financing can be a decent option to close a domain sale, but you should know the risks and weigh them against the advantages.

Thanks to Lonnie for sharing.

Prevalence of NDA Deals on Domain Names

Elliot Silver
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12

I hardly ever report purchase sales prices when I complete a transaction on a domain name. I know that many others prefer to keep their business dealings private, too.

It’s often cited that Ron Jackson’s weekly domain sales report is just the tip of the iceberg when you consider the number of sales that aren’t reported due to non-disclosure agreement (NDA). This “secrecy” is what some conspiracy theorists refer to when they state that unreported sales numbers are pretty much BS and perhaps non-existent.

I want to give you an idea of just how prevalent NDAs and private sales are, and it’s certainly something you can try out if you’d like to see for yourself.

Last week, I went through some old inquiry emails I made to acquire domain names in private. I sent about 15 follow ups to emails I had sent in the last 18 months. A few people replied, and two of those people told me their domain names were sold (I had offered $7k for one who came back with a $50k asking price, and I offered $33k for another who said she paid more for it).

Of those two people who sold their names, I asked what the sales price was. The person who had priced her name at $50k told me the price was private but it was for much more than she had offered it to me. The second person told me it was sold for an undisclosed amount that she couldn’t share.

Neither of these people are domain investors (both women coincidentally), and they have no reason to report the sale price. These types of transactions happen every day, and most are deals between people and/or companies that aren’t domain investors and don’t have any reason to report sales or even know who they would tell if they wanted to report the sale. They probably don’t even know why they would want the sale reported anyway since it’s most likely a somewhat straightforward business transaction.

If you want to see how prevalent private domain sales are, I recommend checking out the Whois History tool after you learn about a company’s rebranding or product launch on a newly acquired domain name and ask the former owner how much the sale was for. My bet is you’ll find almost all of them are private and unreported. I’ve tried to get sale prices for articles, and you’ll almost always find that sales prices are private.

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