IT.COM

interviews Why This Company Paid $150,000 for User.com

NameSilo
In October 2018, UserEngage made the monumental decision to pay $150,000 to acquire the domain User.com in a transaction brokered by Sedo. Since then, UserEngage has rebranded to User.com, putting the memorable four-letter domain to use almost immediately.

In this Inside Interview, we’re going to speak with Polish entrepreneur, Greg Warzecha, who is founder, and CEO of User.com. We will be discussing the thought process behind acquiring a premium .COM domain and what the upgrade means for his company.


Can you tell us about the business behind User.com?
User.com is a marketing automation platform aimed at boosting engagement and conversion with personalized automatic live chat messages, emails, SMS, pop-ups, chatbot, and many more. We have solutions for each marketing funnel level - from the first click on the website until the stable relationship with the customer.

Thanks to User.com you can nurture your leads, sending them audience-tailored communication, at the right time, through the right channel.


Your company started out life as UserEngage. Was this name your first choice, or was it prompted by a lack of available domains?
It’s never easy to find a catchy name for your company. We were thinking about the proper domain name for a long time and finally, we decided on userengage.com. It was simple enough and available at an affordable price so we contacted its previous owner, David Cohen from Techstars.com, and we bought it for $10,000.


What prompted you to look at acquiring the User.com domain name this year?
The marketing automation market constantly grows so it’s important to find a name that is short and easy to remember. User.com meets both conditions and is only four letters. We’ve been dreaming about it since the beginning but the price was out of our range at that time.

We never thought that we could succeed, but 10 months ago we began negotiations, just 'for fun' and because of curiosity about what the process looks like. During this period we exchanged an enormous number of emails with Sedo and finally, we bought the domain for $150,000.

I think the price is high, but still extremely low for such a short generic name. User.com shows we are customer focused. Our tool allows clients to create a user-friendly relationship between the companies and their customers, we facilitate businesses growth and we help users to find what they really look for on the Internet. I believe it’s a perfect name.

user.jpg

Did your recent $2.7 million in Series A funding influence your decision to pursue the User.com domain?
Definitely, yes. Even though we could afford the price, we still had doubts if this was the right decision. And then our investor appeared and gave us both financial support and business mentoring. Vercom is a winner of the prestigious Deloitte Fast 50 and the support they gave us was invaluable. They made us sure that we were making the right decision.


Did you use any tools (e.g., automated appraisals), services (e.g., manual appraisals, domain brokers), or data (e.g., sales data, search volumes, search results) to determine your best offer and/or the value of the domain?
We didn’t use any specific tools. We counted on Sedo, the domain broker and actually, that was enough.


How much do you think the domain was worth before you purchased it and why?
The initial price for User.com was $700,000. From the one perspective, it’s just a word, but the word is just four letters. Additionally, for our services, it’s a perfect match. We had to try the negotiations.


According to reports, you acquired the domain name via the domain marketplace Sedo. Did you have a positive experience dealing with Sedo?
Sedo was a very patient partner. As I said earlier, we were mailing so often and spent so many hours on Skype calls before we finalized the transaction. We had never made a transfer for $150,000 before, so we were checking everything - from the contract through to the bank account details. They were great, and the transfer agent we were assigned was courteous. The whole process went smoothly.


At the end of October, you announced your rebranding from UserEngage to User on social media. Was customer feedback regarding the name change positive?
The feedback I received was fantastic. My mobile was ringing for three days. We’ve got a huge number of calls from people sitting in and out of our business, my mailbox was full of messages and congrats. Our marketing team received many emails from our clients saying we’ve made something huge. We expected people will react somehow but no one thought it gonna be so positive and massive.

Of course, we heard a few voices discussing if the price is reasonable and some people had doubts about the investment we've made. But general feedback was great and it gave our new brand a ‘boost’ for further marketing activities.

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Thanks to Greg for taking the time to participate in our Inside Interview. Acquiring the User.com domain name for $150,000 seems like an excellent investment in the company. To learn more about User.com, you can follow Greg and his team on @userengage_com on Twitter.

This interview has 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.
They still got this domain on a lower side I think. Quite lucky to have this domain @ 150,000 USD.
I enjoyed the interview
thanks for sharing.
 
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Hi,

very interesting interview.

Thanks for sharing
 
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They got a great price on that domain
 
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Great name for $150k

Thanks for the interview
 
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I hope it was $150,000 down payment..
If not, the buyer got a steal.
 
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what a great price! thank you.
 
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This sounds not like a right price.
 
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Thanks for the info!

I agree, 150k is not much for this top class name. Congrats (mostly to the buyer)!
 
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what a masterpiece. Thanks for sharing James!
 
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so many of yall could have bought this one, wow, still unbelievable. congrats!
 
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IMO, that was a killer deal.
 
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USER are Boozer. good name ... bad price. was worth $223,000 at a minimum.
 
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Thanks for your sharing. This is a good price for buyer.
 
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The 150K price for a 4 letter easy to spell popular word is definitely great for the buyer. However, I'm not crazy about this name for a company. It's kind of mehh. Since they were called UserEngage- Engage.com would have been better if they could somehow buy it. Call to action, also short and much more exciting.
 
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The 150K price for a 4 letter easy to spell popular word is definitely great for the buyer. However, I'm not crazy about this name for a company. It's kind of mehh. Since they were called UserEngage- Engage.com would have been better if they could somehow buy it. Call to action, also short and much more exciting.
Yap! This is my view as well,Engage.com would have been more valuable.
But all things been equal; the price is wonderful for the buyer wow fron 700k down to 250k that was a great negotiation power.

Thanks for sharing @James Iles .
 
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Oh ! I meant from 700K down to 150k
 
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excellent interview very much enjoyed.

"UserEngage" got a "fair" price on the domain, the new branding showing a very customer focused business model will increase sales and enhance the business model significantly IMO
 
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Hi guys, thank you for your comments.

You must know that:
1) We were extremely lucky,
2) 150k USD for a company from Poland it's still a lot :)

If you have some questions I can answer them in later.

Regards,
Greg from User.com
 
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Remind me to NOT to use Sedo brokers when selling a domain.
$150k is way under what it is worth.
Especially when there is commission to pay and the original asking price was $700k.
 
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Hi guys, thank you for your comments.

You must know that:
1) We were extremely lucky,
2) 150k USD for a company from Poland it's still a lot :)

If you have some questions I can answer them in later.

Regards,
Greg from User.com

User.com is an absolutely fantastic asset to own. Everyone else is right, you got it for a bargain price. This domain is so so powerful and memorable, I'm sure you'll see an ROI in no time.
 
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After 1 month we see the value from the domain.

As a company, we make a decision splitting price for a domain for 8 years / 12 months, a time the domain will be amortized = 1562 USD monthly.
 
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