Domain Empire

advice Patience in acquisitions is key to maximizing your investment in brandables

Spaceship Spaceship
We have all been there. You pay too much for a name.

Maybe it’s been a pretty slow week on the drops and auctions when you see a nice name ending that day. Since you haven’t purchased many names this week, you convince yourself the name is better than it really is. You and another bidder go at it for another 20 minutes and you finally “win” the auction for 5x or 10x higher than what you originally wanted to spend. Or, you get into an “ego” battle over a name and also end up paying way more than it is worth.

Then, two days later you see a handful of great names you can’t afford to bid on because you spent it all on that one name. Or, you spend too much on a handful of names that you would gladly trade for one superb name that you see being advertised in a broker’s newsletter a week later.

An often overlooked side of being patient in the domaining world is when it comes to acquisitions. Every domainer has cash flow restraints and needs to make sure every dollar they spend is maximized. There is no way of knowing what names will be expiring or dropping next month, or even next week, so it is vital that you don’t overreach when buying periods are slow.

We all know the adage of buying low and selling high, but for those of us in the brandable space, I have always felt that if you can buy low then you have already won. No, you don’t get to “lift the trophy” until a sale occurs, but if you are confident in your purchasing strategy and have a solid track record, you know that day will come. Whether you need the cash and you flip it for a 2x profit or you decide to be patient and wait for that 200x return, you know you've made money on the buy.

Even if you have a healthy domain budget, you can’t expect to add hundreds of brandable domains to your portfolio per month from the drops and auctions. You'd either be overpaying for names or making sub-par purchases, neither of which is a winning strategy.

So the next time you get caught up in an auction for a domain name that you know is overpriced, take a step back and remember not to overreach. Take the names as they come. Patience is key.
 
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just move to Asia or Australia.

Actually NO; being in Australia I can tell you it is a real nightmare to participate in auctions. They are all set around USA time zones and they normally happen to be at the most catastrophic hours here down under!!!!!!!
Catastrophic as per "rooster singing" hours...lol
 
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The solution to this problem is quite simple, just move to Asia or Australia. Auctions usually end well past midnight for us here so you have to set a proxy bid to participate. This way you (almost) never overspend :)

We actually get the left over scraps.. The domaining world works around the Pacific time zone (PST) which us Aussies are in our 18th dream when "it all goes down".


Sad face.
 
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@photonmymind @Nazz well that's the whole point. Because we cannot actively participate in auctions we have to put in a proxy bid which allows us to stay within budget.

The only "benefit" of being able to participate live is to overspend imo.
 
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Which auctions are you referring to?
 
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Which auctions are you referring to?

DropCatch, NameJet, GoDaddy Auctions, SnapNames, Pheenix etc - all of these allow you to put in a proxy bid.
 
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That's right Michael, it's best to have a cut off point pre fixed. During times visiting art auctions I'd always have my cut off, the buzz in a sales room was always intense.
 
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Great article Michael thanks. As the price goes up, so does your risk.
 
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