NamePros.Com - View Single Post - How to Find Potential End Users?

Originally Posted by rodash

Another point of view. I adopted this exact same approach with a single-word dot com name I owned about 12 months ago. I did two months research until I had a shortlist of prospective buyers. I then emailed out to what I thought were several hundred highly relevant potential buyers, plus I did an actual worldwide postal mail-out that cost me about $700. I set the domain name on its own site and set out the terms and conditions for an auction on eBay. I published on the website what I consider to be an excellent presentation extolling the merits of why you would want to buy the domain name. I insisted on registration for the auction so I would only get qualified buyers. I set what I believed was a very modest starting price for the name. It was all done very professionally.

I did not get one bid.

I've also tried other approaches over the years and I have come to the conclusion that unless you have a very sought after name it is extremely difficult to sell a name at this point in time. There are just so many alternative names that people can buy and unless someone is fixated on your name it becomes quite hard.

I think you can usually gauge your chances by looking at how many approaches you have had over the past 3-5 years. I have had what I consider to be good names for in excess of 10 years and have not received one email re some of these names. That clearly suggests to me that this industry is just starting and has possibly 20-30 years to go before it matures to the point whereby you can quickly and easily sell a good two-word dot com for a significant amount. Leasing your names is also years away. That won't happen until name brokers become involved and we haven't really seen them established in the industry yet.

You are going to have a lot of luck to sell your names through your own initiatives. Your best chance at this point in time is through the auction and sales houses. The DDN system would have been great but it looks like the registrars have killed that by demanding huge commissions (it was initially proposed that 2% commissions would apply).

If anyone has a strategy that really works I'd love to know it.

:-)

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After years of sending out all sorts of beautifully written emails (I was once a copy writer for a Madison Avenue Ad agency), I finally stopped sending emails and started getting the PHONE numbers of the companies, either their marketing dept (for large corporations) or just the person in charge of online promotions for the business. I asked for names and phone numbers of the correct person to contact. I then CALLED these people, gave them my phone number and email address, asked for their direct email address, and asked if I could send them more information on the value of owning their keyword specific domain name for their products/services.

It's a lot of work, but it gets better results. Talking to someone, then sincerely giving them all the info you know for the value of a domain and how it applies to that specific company ( I have a huge list of "why buy domains" comments and bullet points I use) is very helpful in closing a sale that gets you the price you want. Sometimes you have to WORK for the deal. Just sending out tons of emails, no matter how well written, doesn't mean those emails will ever reach the person authorized to buy the domain from you for the company.

Do your due diligence, find out about your buyers, tell them your BIN price, and you're accepting all offers, but the BIN price is an immediate sale.

I sell about $5,000 - $10,000 a month this way, and these are NOT premium domains. Just simple keyword domains that describe niche categories for the buyers. Lots more secrets are in my files, but I'm a domain consultant, can't give it all away for free or my kids don't make it through college!