domains Real Domains, Real Brandable Sales

Very nice! Thank you again! I learn too much with all your threads

Good insights about pricing. I tend to overprice .... must rethink pricing strategy.
Thanks

Nice things..the only issue I have is with the 5% of sales to end users. I dont think there are just a few sales to end users and also probably sedo sells a lot of 3-4 letters domains and numeric, so they are counted as investors. I can see to many domainers paying xxxx or more for a branable. I was checking BB and NR sells and I can see that there is a 'battle' between short invented names and 2 keywords which form a brandable....with which one you had more success? And also there is the forever question, some insights about how to reach end users? Maybe some unusual ways?

Most end sales go unreported, so it is hard to know how accurate the % is.

From my experience also, the requests are from small companies, startups etc. that are very sensitive to price and they have very often expectations of $200-400 range that they will not come out of even if it is the perfect name for them by their admission.

I think the issue of pricing is due to the fact that we do not consider whom we are dealing with before we dish out prices.

I learned something recently and I feel will be beneficial to others.

When you contact an end user, always consider the following:

1. size of the industry
2. financial capacity
3. projected earning per clients

the above vs how much you bought the domain name should guide you what price your domain name. It is better to have consistent 200-500 sales 3-5 times a week than a $5000-$10,000 sales once a month or once in 2 months.

And even after that analysis you can have a dumb management, even at multi-million company that have no interest or understanding of exact match or better name.

In key of great brandables is actually....... being 'brandable' and 'relevant'.

Might sound obvious, but you would be surprised how many names I come across that seem to take more energy just to say, than they do inspire and evoke action.

For example:

Customized Robots vs Commandables

First one is pretty dull and uninspiring, though granted some emd lovers out there will like it.

Second one creates curiosity, is bouncy, has a aura of mystic and excitement, while also being very relevant.

Brandables are all about 'branding', delivering a connection through the name to inspire the audience to want to delve further into the company.

Great read by the way Keith, as always

Yes, after ten years in this industry I would have to conclude that while I still believe domains can make for nice brands and they should be valued accordingly, end users generally place very little value on domain names. I am a financial professional so I see the kind of spending which goes on in small and large companies - IT expenditures, marketing, travel, professional services, etc. The same company which spends seven figures annually on IT costs and professional services is buying $#%^@! reg fee domains. The smaller company will argue they don't have a budget above a few hundred but at the same time will spend thousands on a company party or an executive's trip to visit customers. Most sales are investors selling to other investors hoping for that elusive end user with a fat budget. So if your best sales prospects are to other investors then you better be careful about buying massive numbers of alt TLDs and nTLDs and other domains that are not going to sell for much more than reg fee to another investor.

boker said:

Nice things..the only issue I have is with the 5% of sales to end users. I dont think there are just a few sales to end users and also probably sedo sells a lot of 3-4 letters domains and numeric, so they are counted as investors. I can see to many domainers paying xxxx or more for a branable. I was checking BB and NR sells and I can see that there is a 'battle' between short invented names and 2 keywords which form a brandable....with which one you had more success? And also there is the forever question, some insights about how to reach end users? Maybe some unusual ways?

Click to expand...

According to BrandBucket's monthly newsletter to sellers.......... their sales are about evenly split between keyword based domains (including hybrids like Domainly) and invented names like Tovoro. These stats seem to vary about 5%-8% from month to month.

Reading the aeromet sale, I remembered when I sold my aero / chill domain (btw rejected by BB)

I expected it to be sold to an air-condition related company but no, it was sold to a company that sold cooling clothing ( I didn't even know such thing existed)

I have also found that the sweet spot on brandable sales is the $600-$1200 region ... reason could be me and my domains though

thanks for a great article

Oh dear! I am going to have re-price all 400+ domains on Sedo. Thanks for a very interesting article. I've got work to do!!

very nice post..thanks

I just posted my list of my favorite brandable sales from this past week at DN Geek, in the comment section below the list of the biggest brandable sales of the week.

great read, thanks

Thanks for great insights you gave to us with these end user examples. There are many useful comments here in thread too.

In addition, I want to point out specially to 2 great posts (one from above mentioned DN Geek) about relatively recent BrandBucket domain sales HERE and little older HERE. Maybe you already know both links, but someone new to this market could find them useful. I visit them very often and find them valuable in my learning curve.

Thanks once again!

Recons.Com said:

Most end sales go unreported, so it is hard to know how accurate the % is.

From my experience also, the requests are from small companies, startups etc. that are very sensitive to price and they have very often expectations of $200-400 range that they will not come out of even if it is the perfect name for them by their admission.

Click to expand...

Both points are spot on.

Thank you for sharing your experience and view.

Really good post. I always price well below.

Great post and nice experience. Thanks to share it. It's valuable for us

Good article, thanks for posting!

Your " TakeaWays " were right on target with my own recent changes in pricing directed toward
end-users, particularly recognizing their likely budgetary range and constraints.

Now I know I followed the right pricing path!

Great Read! Thanks For The Share!

Keith, your focus in entirely on positive data. What is the ratio of brandables sold v registered and unsold? Once you know how many brandables are sitting idle, a majority of them, which will never find a buyer, only then one can conclude the success of brandables as a niche worth getting into. This may well be for any niche in domaining and domaining itself. For years, only sales are celebrated not accounting for the damper which is, most of them are bag holders.

imc said:

Keith, your focus in entirely on positive data. What is the ratio of brandables sold v registered and unsold? Once you know how many brandables are sitting idle, a majority of them, which will never find a buyer, only then one can conclude the success of brandables as a niche worth getting into. This may well be for any niche in domaining and domaining itself. For years, only sales are celebrated not accounting for the damper which is, most of them are bag holders.

Click to expand...

You're right that there are way more names which do not sell than the ones which sell. But you have to keep in mind that the acquisition of brandables is way more cheaper than keyword or others, mostly reg fee..so, if you count the sales of a professional portofolio, it should be around 2-3%, so for 100 names bought at reg fee, around 1k cost, if you sell 2-3%, at an average of 1,8-2 k (BB or others average), you still make profit of 500-600% per year, so not bad. And the better ones have a success rate of around 10%, so even better. The only problem is that they are not liquid assets, so you need patience.

boker said:

You're right that there are way more names which do not sell than the ones which sell. But you have to keep in mind that the acquisition of brandables is way more cheaper than keyword or others, mostly reg fee..so, if you count the sales of a professional portofolio, it should be around 2-3%, so for 100 names bought at reg fee, around 1k cost, if you sell 2-3%, at an average of 1,8-2 k (BB or others average), you still make profit of 500-600% per year, so not bad. And the better ones have a success rate of around 10%, so even better. The only problem is that they are not liquid assets, so you need patience.

Click to expand...

Well said.