Make a 1,000% Profit

The title of this post isn’t what you generally expect to see on my blog, but I found a way to make 10x my investment in a short period of time, and I want to share this because I don’t think it’s a limited opportunity. What I am going to share probably won’t work for everyone, and it won’t work all the time, but I can tell you that I did this before, and I did very well.

Snapnames and Moniker have made it very easy to list domain names for sale on Snapnames. The problem many people have is registering domain names that other people want to buy. Sure, I can go ahead and register 1,000 new domain names and put them up for auction right away, but if nobody wants them, I’m basically out $8,000.

With Snapnames’ new interface, I can see what people are bidding on or buying in real time, and frequently, I can spot patterns that can help me buy domain names that someone else is looking to buy (and is willing to pay a premium). Using this information, I can register domain names that are essentially part of the same pattern, and offer them for auction. Assuming the buyer has a special alert set for that particular pattern, I can auction it for a $79 minimum bid, just like many other auctions.

If I paid $7.50 for the name, and I sell it for $79, I’ve made 10x my money (minus the 20% commission). If I do this with 100 domain names, I can make some decent money relatively easily.   If I do this with 1,000 domain names, I can make some very good money.

Of course there is a risk to this – in that the buyer may not be buying anymore or may have only been searching for a particular type of name on a random day, and I’ll get stuck with the names. However, I personally believe it’s worth the risk, as I basically only need to sell 1 in 10 names to break even, and my leftovers can be sold in bulk or at a loss – either way I’ve already broken even.

You may be asking yourself if I’ve done this, and I have and I’ve had pretty good success.

Again, there is no guarantee with this whatsoever, and you obviously need to know what to buy and what not to buy based on perceived needs of buyers. Sometimes patterns may look obvious, but they aren’t, and you can get stuck with the names. However, with the chance of making 1,000% profit, it may be worth the risk, and when I did it before, I did very well.

Elliot Silver
Elliot Silver
About The Author: Elliot Silver is an Internet entrepreneur and publisher of DomainInvesting.com. Elliot is also the founder and President of Top Notch Domains, LLC, a company that has closed eight figures in deals. Please read the DomainInvesting.com Terms of Use page for additional information about the publisher, website comment policy, disclosures, and conflicts of interest. Reach out to Elliot: Twitter | Facebook | LinkedIn

18 COMMENTS

  1. I suspect a few people are doing the exact same thing, I’v noticed that sometimes there are dozens of similar names eg: there is currently a couple of hundred (Geo)luxuryHotels.com names listed at BUY NOW PRICES – quiet alot are newly registered and showing Moniker Privacy Services.

    ..bit of a gamble but if the numbers work out then why not 🙂

  2. Surely Elliot,

    someone bidding on a name must have done their
    research of what’s available for reg fee, closer to what they are looking for, before bidding?

    I’m surprised you are saying it worked well for you.
    someone bidding for a name wants THAT exact name, isn’t it?

    Best,
    Ritz

    • @belshass

      I did very well with this method. I didn’t sell all of the names at first, but I liquidated many after and let others drop. On some of the auctions there were 2-3 bidders, so some of them made more, but the vast majority were for the minimum.

  3. Not a bad idea and definitely worth trying… Can get a few suckers to buy the names here and there, I am sure — but I highly doubt it would work on a larger scale x100s+ as all of the bigger players are able to run bulk whois checks on keywords on their own 😉

    Also a good idea to register domains and try to sell them within 2 – 3 days… If they don’t sell, you delete them and get 95% of your money back, minus the registry fee. Moniker offers this too.

    There is no shortage of creative ways to make money with domains… Domain flipping is definitely top 3.

    Cheers,

    Mike

  4. If it was significant.. You should go at it and keep it on the hush hush!!! Pull the post before everybody reads it on Sunday 🙂

    Unfortunately once word gets out, as with most things, everything changes. More people = more competition = more headaches.

    It’s a good option to explore though.

    Also, to clear-up my previous post regarding deleting the domain.. Moniker charges a small processing fee, not registry fee.

  5. Sounds like you need a 30% sell through rate?

    10% for the reg fee and 20% for the commission.

    I’m not sure anyone can maintain a 30% sell through rate but if you have a knack for spotting trends in purchasing, maybe it will work?

    Talk to the guys at privatenames.com. I think they are doing this. No idea if it is working or not for them but I have bought several indirectly and directly but in most cases since I chose not to hand reg it, I chose not to pay the auction price either. I did have a good experience with them.

    Note that strong and repeat buyers of keyword domains know what’s available for a hand reg and may buy some from you to start but I know I ramped up my hand regs once I got a whiff of what was going on.

    So, I have nothing against this business model just don’t expect to maintain a high sell through in one niche.

    See if one registrant is buying all of a particular keyword domain. If there is only one buyer buying all the blue widget domains for example then your customer base is VERY limited.

    Good luck. Will make for a great business story.

  6. Not sure how this would work on large scale. I guess it might have worked on good times. But now i am a bit sceptic especially on large scale. Snapnames is a buyers market imho and most domainers will figure out its a new reg. Still worth a try.

    • @LazyDomaining

      I did it on a large scale last year and did it on a little smaller scale within the last couple of months – in the ballpark of 20 sales.

    • @Michael

      True about 900%, but a few of my sales had more than one bidder, so in the end it was about 1,000%.

      I don’t know how frequently it would work hence the disclaimer and notice at the bottom.

      I have nothing to gain – and actually more to lose with this post, but wanted to share and give other people some ideas.

  7. I would really like to try out this method but I’m encountering a problem. Where do I go to on the Snapnames website to see what people are bidding on or buying in real time?

  8. As an update, I sold 26 names in the last 4 weeks @ $79/each, and 10 more have bids. These are names I bought for under $8/each in the last month. 10 of the sales were made on the second listing. In total, I bought around 70 domain names, and I made a profit on the first sales batch. Every other sale, including the 10 names last week, is all profit.

  9. HI

    Do you pay the 20% commission up front or once the domains sells..

    Do you have to push the domains to snapnames in order to list them… I heard this was the case.

    How long does it take before you get paid for domains that sell and how do they pay you… PayPal ?

    Very interesting article thanks for sharing.

  10. @Tom

    Commission is taken out automatically by Snapnames after the domain names sell. If the domain names are registered at Moniker, no push is necessary as Snapnames and Moniker are owned by the same company. If they’re registered elsewhere, I believe they will either need to be pushed to an account at Moniker or to Snapnames (as was the case in the past).

    Once the buyer pays, which can take hours to a week or so, it takes 7 days for the funds to clear, and they pay via wire transfer. They may pay via Paypal for smaller amounts, but I am not sure off hand.

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