Diligence Tip: Remove the Domain Name from Email

I do diligence on a prospective buyer because I like to know who is on the other end of an inquiry/offer email. In general, most people will reply with their full name and email address. Some people may reply with a fictitious name or nickname to try and retain some level of anonymity. For the most part, prospects don’t completely obfuscate who they are.

For my inquiry forms, the only mandatory fields are name and email address. A person may use a fake name or nickname to shield their identity, but most won’t use a unique email address nor do they take the time to create one for the purpose of inquiring about a domain name.

A Google search of the full email address rarely provides additional information. In fact, searching my own Gmail account for that Gmail address can be more helpful by way of the icon/photo a Gmail account owner uses. I have used photos and logos to identify people with common names many times.

One tip I want to share that has been very helpful is searching the email address without including domain name. For instance, if ElliotDomainInvestorSilver@FreeEmail.com inquires about my domain name, I would search Google for the term “ElliotDomainInvestorSilver.” This will often return unique Google results that will help me identify the buyer.

Many people match their email username to social media handles on X or Facebook or forums like Apple or Google support forums. There are millions of forums online, and people often use an email address that matches some other account they use online. Tracking down accounts that match the email prefix can help identify who is trying to buy my domain name. Even better, looking at these user accounts may lead me to the reason for their inquiry. Perhaps this person mentioned their new startup on social media, for example.

It’s always good to know who is on the other end of a purchase inquiry, and this has been a pretty good way to identify prospective buyers along with learning why they are trying to buy my domain name.