NamePros Blog

James Iles · Aug 30, 2019

Animal domain names have been desirable assets for investors thanks to their unique properties and versatility. Domain sales database NameBio is littered with animal .COM sales in the five and six-figure range including Walrus.com for a reported $55,000, which now looks to have been resold based...

Bob Hawkes · Aug 29, 2019

Dan Bingham (@DefinitelyDomains) asked an intriguing question: At what point do you stop buying domains? The question could mean, “When do you stop adding to your portfolio?” or “When do you get out of domain investing?” Good advice related to both...

James Iles · Aug 26, 2019

This weekend, I was in Zurich Switzerland for a short break and as a domainer, it’s difficult not to notice domains that are being used by local companies. It seems that although the ccTLD for Switzerland is .CH, many companies have opted to use .COM instead. Tourist destinations such as the...

Bob Hawkes · Aug 21, 2019

Earlier this week the high-value domain name hippo.com apparently changed hands. The domain name now redirects to MyHippo.com, the site of Hippo Insurance. The company now brands simply hippo, writing it in all small letters.

Hippo is licensed to offer...

James Iles · Aug 16, 2019

There have been some stellar articles on the blog recently from a couple of new writers, @Bob Hawkes and broker @Darryl Lopes. So far, these published pieces have covered topics such as negotiation, domain sales and domain name data. A quick tip for those of you who may have missed...

Darryl Lopes · Aug 16, 2019

One of my favorite movies is Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World. By watching this movie, I have developed a superior skill set for negotiations, based around illusion and a bluff, in a way that is not harmful to either party.

Credit: History...

James Iles · Aug 11, 2019

A sale that seems to have slipped under the radar is that of Meerkat.com. This popular animal domain name was owned by the original registrant up until this year, even after declining advances several years ago from the once-popular Meerkat live broadcast app.

The buyer of Meerkat.com is a UK...

Bob Hawkes · Aug 8, 2019

Domain name sales of value $100,000 or more represented only 0.10% of all publicly-recorded .com sales in 2018, but they accounted for almost 30% of the dollar volume of sales for the year. While average sales prices can be useful, they mask the fact that most sales...

James Iles · Aug 4, 2019

A major domain name acquisition took place in recent weeks, and that was Sobeys' acquisition of the Voila.com domain name. Sobeys, a large Canadian food retailer, recently announced plans for a food delivery network called Voila, which would be launching in Toronto in 2020. Upon launching the...

Bob Hawkes · Aug 1, 2019

With the natural focus on selling domains, it is easy to overlook the fact that those domains can, and sometimes do, change lives. This point was highlighted in the recently-released 2019 Canada’s Internet Factbook that contained the catchy graphic the internet changes lives....

James Iles · Jul 27, 2019

Before we get to Top Topics this week, there's news of a recent three-letter .COM domain sale that hasn't been covered elsewhere. The domain name ECG.com sold for an undisclosed amount, with the transaction seemingly taking place around late May to early June 2019.

According to DomainIQ's...

Bob Hawkes · Jul 25, 2019

The NameBio database this morning shows the sale of the new extension domain name test.center for $195,000 through a Sedo auction. This is the second highest-value new extension sale so far in 2019, with free.games having sold in May 2019 for $335,000...

James Iles · Jul 21, 2019

George Hong, founder of @GUTA domain name brokerage shared a video on social media earlier, which featured an old interview with Lei Jun, the founder of one of China’s most successful companies, Xiaomi.

Dubbed the Chinese Steve Jobs, Lei Jun described the importance of domain names...

Bob Hawkes · Jul 17, 2019

The first half of 2019 has been great for domain sales with the rate of NameBio-reported sales up 28% and the average price up almost 17% compared to full year 2018. The sales rate is up in all three major legacy extensions .com, .net, and .org, although average prices are down...

James Iles · Jul 12, 2019

Last week, we shared the news that the NCC.com domain name had sold for an undisclosed six-figure fee. I noticed in this week's DNJournal sales chart that the domain's sales price has been revealed at $300,000 with Mark Thomas of VIP Brokerage responsible for the deal. This means...

James Iles · Jul 10, 2019

We're able to disclose a few details of another one-word .COM domain sale this week. The domain name Wind.com has changed hands in a deal facilitated by BQDN's James Booth (@BoothDomains) for an undisclosed fee.

The four-letter domain was previously owned by Alex Tabibi's ZCapital, who...

James Iles · Jul 7, 2019

In this week's Top Topics, our featured discussion is regarding the .UK domain extension release. It seems like hundreds of investors have been looking to pre-register and acquire .UK domains, which have been released to the general public this week. Elsewhere, domainers talk about GrubHub's...

James Iles · Jul 7, 2019

Three-letter .COM domain names have the cabability to sell for six or seven-figures a piece. In the last year, we've seen DXL.com sell for $1.15 million, NWM.com for $325,000 and PFF.com for $270,000. Today we can report on another likely six-figure sale, and that's NCC.com.

The NCC.com domain...

James Iles · Jun 30, 2019

In case you missed it, we shared details of two domain sales this week, the first being the €700,000 sale of Links.com at a record "buy now" price, and the second being the undisclosed sale of Orion.com. These two sales are only the tip of the iceberg in terms of other recent six and...

James Iles · Jun 28, 2019

There have been some stellar six, seven, and eight-figure one-word .COM domain sales recently and while some, such as the $30 million Voice.com sale, have been disclosed publicly, there are plenty of deals happening behind the scenes.

One such recent deal looks to be Orion Advisor Solutions'...

James Iles · Jun 25, 2019

This morning, Sedo announced via Twitter that they sold the domain name Links.com for €700,000. The domain marketplace routinely brokers six-figure sales including the recent $400,000 Casinos.org sale, but what makes this more interesting is that Links.com was sold at the "buy now" price...

James Iles · Jun 23, 2019

It’s rare to hear from the owner of an ultra-premium domain name on their reasons for selling a domain name, but the original registrant of Coconut.com commented on a recent story to explain his rationale for selling the name to James Booth (@BoothDomains). According to the comment...

James Iles · Jun 20, 2019

The majority of domain investors will have come across a domain owned by Digimedia at some point while navigating the web. Lead by founder Scott Day and president Jay Chapman, Digimedia started registering and acquiring an expansive portfolio of highly valuable domain names in the late 1990s...

James Iles · Jun 16, 2019

In case you missed it, we published an analysis of several well-funded companies that might consider rebranding since their ultimate .COM domain name is unavailable. It is, I believe, a reality check. There are a large amount of companies that still do not understand the value that a...

James Iles · Jun 14, 2019

In the domain industry, we regularly read reports about startups or established companies that have made the monumental decision to upgrade their domain names from something obscure to a powerful, short, one-word .COM. Recently, for example, MassDrop rebranded to Drop and acquired the...

James Iles · Jun 9, 2019

According to my DomainIQ monitors, Nat Cohen’s Telepathy Inc, which holds an incredible portfolio of premium names, sold the domain Properly.com this week. The buyer is a holiday home management company called Properly, who upgraded from ManageProperly.com.

According to Crunchbase, there are...

James Iles · Jun 7, 2019

Recently, we published an article looking at how various animal domain names are used. We highlighted animal .COM domains since they are a versatile type of domain name that is coveted by investors and end users alike. Another niche that is highly desirable is color domains. Exact match color...

James Iles · Jun 3, 2019

Analytics company MicroStrategy owns a stellar portfolio of domain names, which we have profiled on the blog in the past. Alongside names such as Emma.com, Hope.com and Alert.com is the highly valuable Voice.com domain. It seems that MicroStrategy has just sold this name.

The domain moved...

James Iles · Jun 2, 2019

In this week's Top Topics, we find out more about the best way to acquire a complete domain name portfolio, and an investor asks about the lack of demand for new gTLD's. Elsewhere, this week's featured poll asks domainers to vote on the number one factor to take into consideration when choosing...

James Iles · May 30, 2019

In 2012, ICANN started the monumental process of releasing the new class of domain extensions. This represented the largest introduction of new extensions in over two decades. As such, over 1,900 applications were submitted to ICANN, with 751 of those applications being contested. Large...

James Iles · May 25, 2019

This week's Top Topics comes to you from Dublin, Ireland! From a domaining point of view, Ireland is heavily invested in their .IE extension. The large majority, probably close to 85%, of billboards and local advertisements I've seen, have contained a .IE domain name. In comparison to my...

James Iles · May 22, 2019

Brothers Michael and David Castello are founders of CCIN (Castello Cities Internet Network), a portfolio of domain names and city-based websites that has been amassed since 1994. Previous sales from the brothers’ portfolio include Whisky.com for $3 million, Rate.com for $725,000 and Driven.com...

James Iles · May 18, 2019

We recently wrote an updated "Top 10" domains article profiling the recent acquisitions of James Booth (@BoothDomains). One more name that could be added to that list is Booth.com's recent purchase of Coconut.com, which was announced by James on social media this week. This monster name is...

James Iles · May 14, 2019

In March 2019, the domain name DoubleDutch.com expired after being used since the 1990s by a Minnesota-based multicultural leadership development company. The owner likely received some offers in that time, but for whatever reason, the domain expired earlier this year.

The name was caught by...

James Iles · May 12, 2019

In case you missed it, we reported on Ubiquiti's acquisition of the UI.com domain name this week. The sale looks to have taken place at the backend of 2018 and Ubiquiti transitioned to UI.com in early 2019. After reading several comments on various websites from Ubiquiti clients, it looks as...

James Iles · May 8, 2019

Another two-letter .COM domain looks to be off the market forever after California-based Ubiquiti Networks stealthily acquired the UI.com domain name, upgrading from the four-letter domain UBNT.com.

Ubiquiti, founded in 2005, is a publicly-listed technology company that achieved revenues of...

James Iles · May 8, 2019

Since entering the industry in 2015, James Booth has been responsible for hundreds of high-value domain sales, which has seen him ranked consistently in Escrow.com's annual Masters of Domains list. In October 2018, we published a Top 10 list of names owned by James along with his brother...

James Iles · May 5, 2019

In this week's Top Topics, an investor asks for advice on how to respond to a difficult question, Eric Lyon evaluates “STER” domain names and another domainer has an issue with a potential GoDaddy sale. Elsewhere, a .TV investor sells Privacy.tv for $5,000.

How Would You Reply to...

James Iles · Apr 30, 2019

Political domain names have made some major headlines in the past few years. In 2015, US Senator Rand Paul paid $100,980 for RandPaul.com and "Donald J. Trump for President, Inc." purchased ClintonKaine.com for $15,000.

Recently, another significant political domain purchase took...

James Iles · Apr 28, 2019

In case you missed it, this week we published some details of a 2018 four-letter .COM sale. The Keep.com domain moved into the possession of a Chinese fitness company in what we would consider one of the biggest transactions of last year. If we look at DNJournal’s 2018 chart, it’s likely...

James Iles · Apr 25, 2019

It's not often that a domain is sold twice to end users within a matter of years, but that seems to have been the case with Keep.com.

In early 2012, according to DomainIQ's WHOIS history, Keep Holdings purchased the Keep.com domain name from its previous owner in an undisclosed deal...

James Iles · Apr 24, 2019

Animal domain names are some of the most sought after investments in the domain space? According to NameBio, domains such as Walrus.com and Snake.com have sold to investors for five and six-figures a piece, but why? What makes an animal domain name so desirable? To find out, we have...

James Iles · Apr 19, 2019

The ultra-premium White.com has been sold, with BQDN's James Booth (@BoothDomains) reporting via social media that he brokered the sale. According to DomainIQ, the domain showed "Booth.com", as the owner briefly before it went under privacy protection. DomainIQ's WHOIS history shows that...

James Iles · Apr 17, 2019

Recently, a prospective client told me that a domain name is "not that important in comparison to our social handles". This CEO owned a company offering a valuable, physical product. To someone involved with domain names, this came as a shock but upon closer inspection, it shouldn't be a...

James Iles · Apr 13, 2019

During some research this week, I came across a one-word .COM domain sale that I don't think has been reported before. The domain Abstract.com looks to have sold to workflow platform Abstract as a direct upgrade from GoAbstract.com. Abstract recently raised a total of $30 million in Series C...

James Iles · Apr 10, 2019

The prestigious DNJournal has been collecting data since 2003 and compiling it in a weekly sales report. Operated by Ron Jackson, DNJournal is one of the most credible sources for the domain name industry and has been referenced in outlets such as Wall Street Journal, Forbes and Bloomberg.

Now...

James Iles · Apr 7, 2019

Over the last couple of days, I've taken part in an AMA (Ask Me Anything) on NamePros. It's been an interesting experience that has produced a couple of challenging questions as well as a few fun ones! One of the main talking points seems to have been my prediction that rental names (with...

James Iles · Apr 4, 2019

In a new industry, it's often difficult to know where to start. Coming in with an abundance of enthusiasm and a desire to make money quickly, it may be hard to resist the urge to start acquiring new domain names immediately with the hope of selling them within days or weeks.

It's been well...

James Iles · Mar 31, 2019

This week, we released the final installment of our four-part series teaching you how to perform outbound sales. Mike Robertson, Director of Business Development at Fabulous.com, contributed a phenomenal amount of information to this series, and I truly believe that it's a valuable...

James Iles · Mar 28, 2019

In this fourth and final edition of our outbound sales series, we have possibly some of the best negotiation advice possible. Over the past three installments of "How to Perform Outbound Sales", we have teamed up with domain name broker and Director of Business Development at Fabulous.com...

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