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Glad I'm a Domain Investor

Elliot Silver
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The US Dollar is weak and real estate values are dropping in most parts of the country. To make matters even worse, the stock market has been tanking of late. With the value of domain names continuing to rise, I am certainly glad to be a domain investor at this point.
Who knows how much farther real estate values will decline or how much more the market will slide, but a common sentiment among people I know is that if anyone needs to liquidate their generic names to generate cash, there are plenty of people willing to buy them at fair prices. The Internet continues to grow, people are growing their online presence, and as the economy struggles, more people will move online to make money.
Down Jones

Smart (Domain) Thinking in Indianapolis

Elliot Silver
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Compliments to the folks who run the city of Indianapolis official website. They recently changed their domain name from IndyGov.org to Indy.gov. According to their press release:

“The Mayor’s administration and ISA have been working for more than a year to obtain permission from the federal government to use the new, shorter domain name which will make the site easier to promote and make local services more accessible to Indianapolis residents.“

Indy.gov is easier for visitors to remember, and there is no confusion as to whether the city runs the site or not, as .gov domain names are only run by governmental entities. Smart thinking! I would have recommended trying to obtain Indianapolis.gov as well, but maybe that can be done later.

One free piece of advice I would like to offer (even as a Patriots fan!) is to make sure the original IndyGov.org domain name doesn’t expire!! Keep this domain name and forward it to the new website to ensure visitors to the old domain name do not get lost. This domain name should be kept forever, as people may have linked to it, bookmarked it, and city promotional materials may have this old domain name listed.

There have been many cases where organizations neglect to renew an old domain name, and it can cause major problems!

Your Domain Name is Perfect for my Business

Elliot Silver
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“Good Afternoon,

I was driving on South Ocean Drive in Palm Beach the other day when I passed your undeveloped land. I noticed you don’t have a house built on the land, and I think the location would be perfect for the home I am planning to build. It is on the Intracoastal and across the street from the Ocean, which is exactly what I am looking to buy for my family’s new home. For your undeveloped land, I would be willing to pay you $50,000. Please call me if you are willing to sell it. I will even pay for the escrow and legal fees.

Regards,

Anne I. Diot”

Imagine if a property owner received hundreds of letters like this a month. While this letter is far fetched for a property/land owner, this parody is very similar to emails domain owners receive every day. People assume that just because they see an undeveloped domain name, they should be able to buy it for a fraction of the value. Developing a website on a domain name can take years to complete. Just because a domain name hasn’t been developed, doesn’t mean the owner has no plans for it.

When will people learn?

Understanding .Mobi Domain Names

Elliot Silver
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16

My friend from Fox Interactive writes…

“A topic that I would be interested to understand better is .mobi. I see that you mentioned it the other day — but what is the situation with buying these urls? How many people actually know to type in .mobi? Or if you are on a mobile, when you type in a .com are you typically redirected to one? Will those domains eventually become obsolete because the technology in iPhones and such?”

I am going to be out of pocket all day today, but I know there are many people out there with greater knowledge of the .mobi extension. I am going to give my very brief overview of .mobi below, but I am opening this up for others to answer the question above in the comment section. I will approve any respectful comment if you can keep your response to 3 paragraphs or less.

My opinion about .mobi is that it is purely a marketing play. Once consumers know about .mobi, they will know any domain name with the .mobi extension is pre-optimized for mobile phone usage. If companies use and promote their domain name with the .mobi extension, consumers will become accustomed to using .mobi on their mobile devices, and they will know what .mobi means.

Because it was recently introduced, most companies companies have not used .mobi, and most consumers don’t know what .mobi is or does. Many brands who own .mobi names registered them for protective purposes, just as they try to register every other foreign extension. If and when more brands develop their .mobi names, consumers will learn about the extension, and for people who own them, the value will presumably increase. Most of the big purchases seem to be based on speculation that the value will increase rather than companies buying them to develop into mobile websites.

B. King on Three Letter .com Sales

Elliot Silver
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I exchanged messages with King on DN Forum (his forum handle is B. King) after learning about his success selling three letter .com domain names. This type of domain name is one of the fastest appreciating sectors in the domain industry. According to the frequently referenced price guide on 3character.com, the minimum observed prices for this type of name is now $6,000, up from $5,500 just last month, and up consistently over the past few years. While this may not reflect the actual value of all three letter .com names, it can be indicative of the market value for this type of name.

Because of his success with this type of name, I asked King to write about three letter .com domain names and to discuss the recent sale of one of his names, BCF.com.

(Editor’s Note: Although I can’t argue with the numbers, I think people should evaluate why each LLL.com domain name has value before shelling out thousands of dollars for it.)

From King on DN Forum:

“I was asked by Elliot , to write about LLL.com’s in general and in particular about my end user LLL.com sale.

As I am certain most of you are aware that 3 letter .coms are the fastest growing domain investments in this incredible domain market. As we approach the end of year I would like to recap the market – a year ago the minimum price for 3 letter .coms was $3,050 , as of December 1, 2007 the minimum stands at $6,000 , that represents an almost 100% growth. Now some might suggest that this is hollow growth and that LLL.com’s have mostly been doing hot potato between domainers. However I believe that the increase in value has been backed by strong end user sales. While most of these sales go under the radar, the ones that I am aware are as follows:

AMT.com 100,000 Advance Media Technologies

RCS.com 95,000 to RCS International

BCF.com 71,200 to Burlington Coat Factory

HBL.com recently acquired by the largest bank in Pakistan. Upon enquiring with some contacts there, they have indicated that they have paid $100,000 for it (keep in mind this is a bank in a third world country and they still see the value in a $100k domain).

IFP.com to the Institut Français du Pétrole . price is unknown

Since I was the seller of BCF.com, I’ll let you guys in on the incredible auction that went down on Sedo. I had initially listed BCF.com on a popular domain forum and put it up for sale under $20,000. However, desired bids were not reached and I sent the domain in to Sedo auction with a reserve of $20,000. On the third day of the auction in the middle of the night I received a call from a gentleman asking to talk to me. After introducing him self as the head of IT in a large public listed Australian company www.bcf.com.au. He told me that he had heard rumors that BCF.com was up on auction on “EBAY” to which I corrected him and told him that it was auction on Sedo. He offered to buy the domain straight away, but i told him that the reserve on the auction was already met so I was obliged to sell through Sedo only and that he could place his bids there. From that point onwards, I was feeling good about the auction and thought that the auction would go well and would manage to get a few K over reseller value. To my surprise the BCF.com had already entered the $40k range in the last hour of the auction , and after a bidding war the auction ended at $71,200.

At that point I was certain that there was more than 1 end user present at the auction, and indeed that was the case. Burlington Coat Factory had won the auction from www.BCF.com.au. To me this auction goes to show that poular 3 letter .coms are extremely desirable and there is usually more than one end user for them.

At the end of this article , I would like to add that I think LLL.com values will continue to rise at a rapid rate through out 2008 , both in reseller terms and in End User terms. LLL.coms offer a unique opportunity’s as the entry point in LLL.coms is comparatively much lower as compared to generic .coms and yet they are premium and have as much probability of making an end user sale as a generic .com .

Happy Domaining!!!

B.King”

Everybody’s Doing It

Elliot Silver
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It seems that everyone wants to get into the domain investment business. All it takes is internet access, a good idea and around $8.00 and you can buy yourself a great domain name! Shoot – you don’t even need a great idea to register a domain name. Come on, everyone has a few of those alcohol-induced purchases, right?

The point is that it’s very easy for people to register domain names and become involved in the domain business. One thing I’ve noticed is the diverse backgrounds of people I know in the domain industry. There are marketers, lawyers, doctors, techies, professors, salesmen…etc. The list of professions is deep, to say the least. This is because the domain industry spans every single profession and industry, allowing those with a strong background in a particular field to have an advantage over others.

Take my friend Ben for example. He’s a finance guy who knows that business well. After many discussions about the domain industry, my friend decided to get his feet wet and register a few domain names that jive with his finance background. Although he won’t be able to retire on most of the names he purchased, he did acquire some pretty good names in YuanInvestment.com (Yuan is the Chinese currency), MarginInvesting.com, and YenInvestment.com (BTW, if you are interested in acquiring these, drop me a line!).

Although he may not even realize it until reading this post, I think the most valuable domain name that he owns is his own first/last name in the .com. He is now in control of his name on the Internet, which will be important once he really makes a name for himself. Ben is a smart guy. When the domain industry really comes from under the radar, Ben will probably be managing billions of dollars, and he will have a leg up on everyone else. Shoot, maybe Ben will be the financier that helps propel the domain business forward.

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