I don’t like chit chatting on the phone. That’s especially true for business related conversations. Because of this, I hardly ever use the telephone to contact prospective buyers of my domain names. There is a good time to use the phone though, and I’ll share when I think it’s appropriate.
After sending emails to prospective buyers and you receive a reply from someone who seems interested but isn’t quick to reply or has short replies, you might want to give them a phone call to discuss. A phone call can help move a deal forward in several ways:
- Establish trust
- Speed up the pace of negotiations
- Allow you to get a better read on the buyer
- Move the negotiation to your schedule
- Take away some leverage from the buyer
The primary reason I use the phone is to move a conversation along more rapidly and to get a better read on the buyer. Based on the buyer’s needs for the name and/or interest level, I can price it accordingly and also offer better terms.
I can also gauge how familiar the prospect is with domain names and domain acquisitions. If I think the sale process and transfer will likely take more time and effort than usual, I can price the domain name accordingly.
One important thing to keep in mind is that a phone call can also kill a deal. If the buyer asks questions you don’t know the answers to or appear reluctant to answer, he or she might have no interest in doing business with you. In addition, if you struggle with communications (ie you don’t speak the same language as the buyer fluently), it might make things more difficult and might also cause trust issues.
I think using the phone can be an effective negotiation strategy. I would not use it to cold call, and I would use the time to build trust, establish a dialogue, and try to push a deal forward.
Elliot,
I agree. In my opinion, it’s a great way to close a sale, but it’s a terrible way to establish contact. Most business owners aren’t going to want to hear a “domain pitch” on the phone. Email is on their time – they can read and review when they want.
I just sold a $2800 domain to someone who retained an attorney for the purchase. First contact by the attorney was a phone message expressing interest on behalf of her client. Everything after that was accomplished by email. I think she was relieved to handle matters this way.
I would go for Email communication as my English is not so fluent…
I sold (transferred registration) Lowell-MA.com many years ago through afternic everything went through email. I may have had to print and snail mail something. Never met the buyer. I sold Lowell-MA.com for $8,500.
I sold Somerville.com to someone for a specific amount of money plus he gave me another equal amount as a loan. I have the documents in storage somewhere. I met the guy at his or his attorneys house. Me and my Asian girlfriend drove to the house. Got out of the car, knocked on the door, was greeted, walked into his house. He led me to the back of the house porch area, I was a little nervous. There I sat down my girl was with me. Another person cam in and placed a yellow envelope full of cash money in front of me. The guy i went to meet said go ahead count the money as he pulled up the Internic website to print out the documents needed to transfer your domain name. I put the envelope in my pocket, signed the printed out sheets and we left.
This will be a case i will have to go through in my life as the terms of our deal were not honored. Term: He was suppose to have a link to Commonwealth Internet Services (CIS) geodomains (geo domains) he didn’t. I was suppose to pay back the other half of the loan money that he gave me on top of the purchase (reassign) fee, I didn’t pay him. I believe I can get my geodomain name back.
I asked a soverign nation for $20 million for FOXWOOD.COM they offered $8 million this went to Federal Court. The judge ordered them to pay a certain amount.
Here are some numbers to add to this world. I have been offline for 5-10 years. Technology was not where I needed it to be. Time for disruption