Why I’m Not a Domain Broker

Elliot Silver
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20

In the last week, I’ve received three requests to broker domain names, but each time I respond that I’m not a broker, and I refer the person to a couple of people who are successful domain brokers. Although I do allow domain names to be listed for sale on my blog, I am not a domain broker, and there are a few reasons for this.

When a person agrees to broker a domain name for someone, especially if that person is the “exclusive broker,” there is the expectation that the broker will contact likely end user buyers. These people are generally the group that can afford to pay the most for a particular domain name. There are two problems with this.

First, an end user is far more likely to pay top dollar for a domain name when he needs the name, rather than when he is approached out of the blue. Many end users still don’t understand the value of a domain name, and even if they do, many still won’t pay these great prices because they might shake their head like they understand, but when it boils down to it, they don’t always want to write a check for $50,000 for a domain name when they have employees to pay and other obligations.

The second problem is that it can be difficult getting in touch with the right person within a company, and it can be just as difficult to get a deal approved. If you haven’t made a sales call before, they can be very difficult – especially when it’s a cold call. Once you finally get through to a decision maker, you then need to convince him about the value of domain names, which can be an equally difficult task, even if you’ve convinced the marketing team that it’s the right move.

Another issue I have with acting as a domain broker is that it can take a lot of my time, but there is still a good chance nothing will come of it. I do enough work on my websites where compensation isn’t guaranteed for my efforts, that it’s difficult to justify working for someone else without any guarantee of pay.   🙂

Even with an exclusive agreement, it can be difficult to get a seller to pay a commission if he is marketing the domain name elsewhere at the same time and a lead goes directly to the domain owner with the hope of cutting out the middle man. I live by the fact that this is a small industry, and if you burn someone once, it can be the end of your reputation, so I wouldn’t do that. However, there are people that don’t seem to have issues with this. Sure, even under an exclusive deal you might have the legal rights to the 10%, but what busy domain broker is going to file a lawsuit over a few hundred dollars of lost commission?

I would rather spend money buying a name on my own in the aftermarket and selling it on my own, where I keep all the profit, than to sell someone else’s name to only make 10% of the sales price. I can sell the domain name on my own time, and I can target whoever I want. I take on all of the financial risk, but as a person who knows the market fairly well, this isn’t a problem.

Sure, it’s much easier to broker a 15 year old domain name for a guy who won’t sell for anything less than a premium price, but see the first two reasons I listed above as to why that isn’t always the best idea. There are several great domain brokers in the industry, but I am not one of them!

Great Viral Marketing … errr Mistake

Elliot Silver
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3

Apparently Domino’s pizza made a big marketing mistake that was uncovered by someone looking to find a coupon code. The customer entered the word “bailout” when he was ordering his pizza online, and the website responded by saying his medium pizza was free.

The person then told other people about this error, and when all is said and done, there were about 11,000 pizzas given out for free by Domino’s. Although this was apparently an error, the viral marketing can’t be beat. In a move that cost them under $50,000 (assuming their cost per pizza is just under $5.00), they are now getting thousands of dollars worth of free press – not to mention all the sodas and other things people ordered when they found out their pizza was free.

Although this was a mistake, it shows how powerful viral marketing can be, especially in the age of Twitter and other instant news distribution outlets.

Cool Feature on the New York Times

Elliot Silver
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0

Perhaps it isn’t a new feature and I just haven’t noticed it before today, but when you highlight a word or phrase in a New York Times article (in Safari or Firefox), a small question mark graphic pop-ups. If you click on the graphic, it opens a new window with an Answers.com powered reference search.

The search results page includes dictionary definitions and other tidbits of information.   Instead of a visitor having to leave the site to find out what a particular word means, the NYT provides the answer – and monetizes it. At the top of the search box is PPC advertising powered by Google.

This is a neat feature that should generate additional revenue revenue, increase page views, and keep people on their site for a longer period of time. Smart thinking from the New York Times!

Spam Tactic Bloggers Should Know About

Elliot Silver
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8

For those of you who run a blog, this might be of interest.   Someone posted a comment on my blog with a fairly unique nickname, which he uses in domain forums and other places. Having seen his “handle” before, I approved the comment after briefly reviewing it.

Shortly after posting the comment, virtually the same comment came in with the same handle, but it had an extra sentence at the bottom of it. Since I just woke up, I immediately approved the comment without much review, as I do for most people I know and trust. I received an email follow-up from the initial commenter who mentioned that he didn’t add the erronious sentence at the end.

I looked into it in my referrers/IP log, and sure enough, it wasn’t from the same IP. In fact, the second comment contained a back-link to a porn site – clearly unrelatated to the original commenter. Essentially, the spammer assumed (correctly in this case) that I would simply approve his comment.

Usually I check the back link (even though all back links are “no follow”) just to make sure I am not approving spam. You can tell what’s generally spammy when there are hyphens and other interesting URLs. Needless to say, I will now be more cautious when approving comments to make sure someone isn’t trying to get me to post their spam link.

Great Google Lab Features

Elliot Silver
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0

I was on Gmail today and saw the Google Labs button was red, indicating that Google has some neat new products and features under development they want to show off.

Here are my favorite experimental Gmail features, although I haven’t used all of them yet:

Muzzle
Conserves screen real estate by hiding your friends’ status messages.

Mail Goggles
Google strives to make the world’s information useful. Mail you send late night on the weekends may be useful but you may regret it the next morning. Solve some simple math problems and you’re good to go. Otherwise, get a good night’s sleep and try again in the morning. After enabling this feature, you can adjust the schedule in the “General” settings page.

Forgotten Attachment Detector
Prevents you from accidentally sending messages without the relevant attachments. Prompts you if you mention attaching a file, but forgot to do so.

Undo Send
Oops, hit “Send” too soon? Stop messages from being sent for a few seconds after hitting the send button.

Charity Party in During NYC SES

Elliot Silver
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1

SES is coming to New York in a little over a week, and if you are in town for it, you should know about a charity party that is being held on March 23.   The event is organized by an Internet marketing networking group in New York.   Below is some information about the event from their website:

Who: All Internet Marketers are invited
What: $50 Charity Donation For Open Bar Party
Where: Heartland Brewery in Union Square, New York, NY
When: Monday March 23, 2009 from 8pm-12am
Why: Because this is the hottest networking party for internet marketers. It is being held at Heartland Brewery, NYC’s very own microbrewey which has won many awards for their craft beers. Most of the conference speakers and top internet marketers will be there. Did we mention that all raised money is going to charity! Go ahead make business connections, have fun and help save the life of someone with cancer.

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