General Domain Information

Today is the (first) day. John Berryhill and I are riding in the Pan-Mass Challenge to raise funds for Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. This is my 11th PMC ride and John’s 6th ride.

The PMC is making a difference in the lives of patients at Dana-Farber and around the world. The funds we raise support the innovative work of doctors, nurses, and scientists in their search for cures for cancers and related diseases. Dana-Farber is one of the top three cancer institutions in the world, and over the last 10 years, has helped develop nearly one in four FDA-approved cancer drugs in the US. The PMC is Dana-Farber’s single largest contributor, accounting for 62 percent of the Jimmy Fund’s annual revenue.

This year with the help of domain investment industry friends and colleagues, John and I have raised nearly $21,000. I would be delighted to add more people to our list of domain industry colleagues who are supporting us. My fundraising goal for the year is $18,000, and I am about $3,500 away from hitting it.

On Sunday, John and I will proudly wear a special domain industry PMC jersey with the logos of supporters. John and I appreciate everyone who has helped us help Dana-Farber. It is a fantastic organization with a critically important mission.

I would imagine the average sell through rate (STR) for most domain investors is below 3%. If you have a domain portfolio with 1,000 domain names, that would amount to 30 domain name sales per year. If the rate is much higher, I think it probably means the seller’s prices are too low. The trouble with this, in my opinion, is the difficulty in replacing these assets once sold.

Mike Cyger posted a poll on X asking people if they have self-doubt about their domain investing strategy and tactics:

Do you ever have self-doubt about your domain investing strategy and tactics?

— Michael Cyger (@MichaelCyger) July 30, 2024

As you know, I am riding in the Pan-Mass Challenge to raise funds for Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. When people ask how to donate to my fundraiser, I give them the link, which is profile.pmc.org/es0223. It is easy enough to share the link via email or in a blog post, but it is not so easy when I mention the PMC ride to people in passing.

Domain investors know a complicated domain name or web link can make it difficult for people to directly navigate to a website. It is one of the biggest reasons why many major companies own domain names they use for forwarding. Customers can easily navigate to a business website with a memorable descriptive, call to action, brand match, or acronym domain name.

Earlier this year, I won CancerStinks.com in a GoDaddy expiry auction. I began forwarding the domain name to my PMC fundraising page. I am sure there was very little existing type-in traffic to the domain name, but using it for forwarding makes it easy for people to find my fundraising page when I tell them about it.

Dharmesh Shah is most well-known for being a Co-Founder of HubSpot. Notably to domain investors, Dharmesh has been involved in a number of high value domain name acquisitions, including Chat.com, Connect.com, You.ai, Wordplay.com, and quite a few other domain names. Dharmesh has spent tens of millions of dollars acquiring valuable domain names.

Dharmesh recently launched Agent.ai, a website that allows people to create and use AI agents to accomplish various tasks. Over the weekend on LinkedIn, Dharmesh announced that he created a domain name appraisal agent within the Agent.ai platform:

Ten days ago, Elliots.com sold for $2,759 via GoDaddy Auctions. I was a bidder on the auction, but I maxed out just below $1k. I appreciate that many people reached out to make sure I was aware of the auction.

This morning, I received an email from someone who wants to buy the domain name:

I spent Father’s Day weekend at our son’s soccer tournament in the middle of New Jersey. It was a 6 hour drive, but it made more sense to do that than to fly and rent a car. New Jersey never disappoints when it comes to billboard content, and this trip was no different.

On the way to New Jersey, I took a photo of this billboard advertising a 5 word .com domain name – IGotHurtInJersey.com. This is a memorable domain name that is used as a forwarder to the Fredson Statmore Bitterman law firm’s website. Smartly, the firm also bought and uses the longer IGotHurtInNewJersey.com as well. I don’t think I have ever seen a longer domain name on a billboard before.