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interviews Expert Exchange: Should You Always Quote a Price?

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When it comes to selling a domain name, establishing price expectations is an important step. Whether it’s securing an outbound sale or negotiating an inbound inquiry, the price is a vital factor. In this edition of Expert Exchange, we are asking seven top industry brokers about how they handle price requests.

With our panel’s help, we will decide whether it’s best to quote a price, a price range or whether you should you wait for the other party to make the first offer.

Do you find it's best to quote a price, range, or nothing at all when a potential buyer first expresses interest? Is the strategy different for inbound vs. outbound interest?


@Joe Uddeme, Founder of NameExperts LLC
The inbound vs. outbound strategy is certainly different. Inbound leads are those where a buyer is expressing interest: they are already set to make an offer or proactively come to you. Those buyers typically are more aggressive and can close faster. The targeted outbound approach seeks to gauge interest, and then educate if necessary as to why this is a good fit for their brand/company.


@Jen Sale, COO of Evergreen.com
It varies depending on the domain name, price, buyer, and/or seller. However, providing a range or firm price (when selling) is always a quick way to identify serious buyers.

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George Hong, CEO of @GUTA
For inbound interest, typically you don't want to quote a price because that will set a ceiling on the sale price of your domain name. For outbound interest, when a buyer asks for a price quote, you have to be prepared to answer the question directly.


@Giuseppe Graziano, CEO of GGRG
Some domain owners and brokers like to quote a range or shop a domain name around for offers without an asking price, but we prefer to be completely transparent and always quote the exact price.


Kevin Fink (@iHaveThisIdea), COO of Starfire Web Holdings
We quote a “Buy It Now” (BIN) price that is set by the client. We seek dialogue and negotiations from there. The conversation, of course, changes case-by-case based on the prospect’s initial reaction or response to us.


@Dave Evanson, Senior Broker at @Sedo
I find it is generally best not to quote pricing specifics or parameters in the beginning. For outbound, I will usually quote a price range or asking price when potential buyers first express interest unless they prefer to make an opening offer. For inbound, I typically try to get an offer from the buyer and will work at it a bit more, compared to outbound, before I will provide pricing specifics.


@Hobi Michalec, Co-founder of Lumis Group
When it's inbound, you usually have a leg up as someone's coming directly to you attempting to purchase. I almost always quote a range initially to gauge interest. However, upon further inquiry by a buyer after quoting a range, I'd recommend providing a number. Again, I would recommend this be done over the phone if possible to gauge tonality.


These responses have been edited for clarity.
 
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The views expressed on this page by users and staff are their own, not those of NamePros.
As the majority of the domainers are making sales through Marketplaces likes godaddy, sedo, afternic etc, we do not have the flexibility of not quoting a price, we have to quote a price for the system to work. Most offers start with 100$ and when there is a huge margin between the offer and the price that the seller is quoting most buyers run away without any dialogue.

If the buyer reaches via email then, we would be able to apply different strategies.
 
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Fact is, you will always reach a point where you will have to quote the price (as an offer or a counter offer) if you want to sell your domain...
 
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We have found our best sales in dollar terms and in quarterly sales volume by using BIN pricing on landing pages and in marketplaces with no chance of negotiations. It's up to the prospective buyer to take it or leave it at the BIN price. If they take it, it's up to the buyer to go find the funds to procure it for themselves, serving themselves via the BIN button and an escrow service. If they decide not to buy it, we simply practice patience to wait for another buyer to come along and pay the BIN price.

Every six months we test new pricing (up or down) to give new and old buyers alike the chance to consider/re-consider the new pricing vis-a-vis their perception of the value of the domain name on a take it or leave it basis.

So far, based on testing, this BIN approach has had the greatest impact on making our entire portfolio profitable on an annual operating basis. This BIN approach has the added value of making the process simpler for buyers given that they generally loathe negotiating with domain name owners. Less grief and friction due to lack of negotiation means more happier buyers, even if they are only begrudgingly happy having paid a premium BIN price.
 
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I'm testing the same with BIN pricing.
 
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What I learned is: do your search, have your price in mind, even if not quoted; and be ready to close the deal, always! :D
 
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