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Are You Pricing Yourself Out of the Market?
by @Keith DeBoer

"Arriving at the real value of a domain is like a blind man, in a dark room, looking for a black dog – that just might not be there…" -- Unknown

The most common mistake new domainers make is overvaluing their domains and listing them at ridiculous prices that no one will pay. After a while they feel frustrated and start asking: How much is my domain worth? The often heard answer to that question is: It’s worth what someone will pay for it. An answer that while completely accurate is simultaneously useless.

I think pricing is one of the most underrated variables in our industry. It can make or break our business model. Price too low and we risk leaving big money on the table. Price too high and we decrease the chance of a sale or possibly even price ourselves right out of the market.

I don’t have the magic solution to the pricing conundrum. But I can do what I usually do. Provide some sales data, give you my two cents and let you make up your own mind
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https://dngeek.com/2018/07/are-you-pricing-yourself-out-of-the-market/#more-7451
 
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The views expressed on this page by users and staff are their own, not those of NamePros.
Keith your post and explanation just goes to show how much of an exact science domaining can be. You never truly know the value of a domain as you don't always know who may be looking for what you have available. I guess that's why having a large portfolio of names is the best way to profit. Thanks for your insight and advice.
 
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A name is only worth what someone is willing to pay for it, But at the same time, I probably price my own names much higher than they are worth, I am not a reseller though, and the names that i own, that i like a lot, will require a good offer for me to sell them. renewal fees are a way of life for those who plan on staying in the domain industry long term.
 
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Thanks for the info.

I personally like to divide my domains into two groups namely:
1. The ones for quick flip priced within the margins stated above.
2 Those I see as the next big thing which I price high ready to wait and renew till I sale at the right price.

Though am fairly new in domain investment and don't yet have much sales to my credit, but I intend to follow that model.

Information like this provided by the Op helps me to sharpen the model and make adjustment where I consider necessary as a result of new info I didn't know before.

To me learning is a continuous process, which is why I enjoy NP so much. Thanks
 
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Thanks for sharing.

I have very few domains listed at BIN - prefer make offer option as it allows me (as I'm fairly new) to gauge pricing and open the door for negotiation as IMO domain Value is highly subjective.

Have a mixture of long term and (hopefully) quicker flips but under no pressure to sell cheap and a lot of my first purchases were crap anyway so will not be renewing them - really looking for quality over quantity going forwards and if I price myself out a deal every now and then so be it!
 
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Are You Pricing Yourself Out of the Market?
Yes .. BIN $5 out of the market
 
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90% of domains are overpriced which is why there is so little liquidity in the domain market. Many domainers treat their domains like it's their lucky lottery ticket and this is why most domainers will go to their graves with their domains.
 
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If your investing model is to be a flipper and short term then you should consider OTHER's pricing and the MARKET.
If you are a long term investor, you SHOULD price your domain without considering the market price.

How do you all think Mike Mann makes those 5 and 6 figure sales???
99% of all domain sales I see reported are way UNDER PRICED.
The bad thing about it is everyone thinks there's unlimited supply of good .com names.
Newsflash: prices for us investors to acquire high quality domains has SKYROCKETED, so WHY ARE WE SELLING CHEAP????
 
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If your investing model is to be a flipper and short term then you should consider OTHER's pricing and the MARKET.
If you are a long term investor, you SHOULD price your domain without considering the market price.

How do you all think Mike Mann makes those 5 and 6 figure sales???
Nice one.
 
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If your investing model is to be a flipper and short term then you should consider OTHER's pricing and the MARKET.
If you are a long term investor, you SHOULD price your domain without considering the market price.

How do you all think Mike Mann makes those 5 and 6 figure sales???
99% of all domain sales I see reported are way UNDER PRICED.
The bad thing about it is everyone thinks there's unlimited supply of good .com names.
Newsflash: prices for us investors to acquire high quality domains has SKYROCKETED, so WHY ARE WE SELLING CHEAP????

What if Mike Mann would price the fast majority of his portfolio in the same range as HugeDomains.com? Everyone always likes to focus on Mike Mann his fantastic sales prices but he usually just sells 10-15 domains a month on a portfolio that contains a staggering number of domains and costs MANY MILLIONS a year to maintain, in renewals alone. I don't have any data to back this up but I my gut tells me HugeDomains.com is running a much more profitable operation, selling a boatload of domains in the $2,000 range every single day.
 
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What if Mike Mann would price the fast majority of his portfolio in the same range as HugeDomains.com? Everyone always likes to focus on Mike Mann his fantastic sales prices but he usually just sells 10-15 domains a month on a portfolio that contains a staggering number of domains and costs MANY MILLIONS a year to maintain, in renewals alone. I don't have any data to back this up but I my gut tells me HugeDomains.com is running a much more profitable operation, selling a boatload of domains in the $2,000 range every single day.

You are right Mr Doron, Mike Mann cannot be a role model to common domainers. We really don't know how many domain names he owns and what is the percentage of the domain names that he sells in thousands of dollars.
 
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What if Mike Mann would price the fast majority of his portfolio in the same range as HugeDomains.com? Everyone always likes to focus on Mike Mann his fantastic sales prices but he usually just sells 10-15 domains a month on a portfolio that contains a staggering number of domains and costs MANY MILLIONS a year to maintain, in renewals alone. I don't have any data to back this up but I my gut tells me HugeDomains.com is running a much more profitable operation, selling a boatload of domains in the $2,000 range every single day.
What of combining the two models?
 
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What if Mike Mann would price the fast majority of his portfolio in the same range as HugeDomains.com? Everyone always likes to focus on Mike Mann his fantastic sales prices but he usually just sells 10-15 domains a month on a portfolio that contains a staggering number of domains and costs MANY MILLIONS a year to maintain, in renewals alone. I don't have any data to back this up but I my gut tells me HugeDomains.com is running a much more profitable operation, selling a boatload of domains in the $2,000 range every single day.

I know for a fact Mike Mann sells 4-10/names a day for $500-$3000 that he does not report. (If you use Domaintools and setup a watch filter for his domainmarket.com name servers you can see he MOVES a lot of domains OUT every single day) He only reports what he wants, and usually only the big sales.

HugeDomains.com wants QUANTITY sales over QUALITY and their sales reflect just that. The model is huge portfolio with lower pricing thus the quantity of sales. I know they also offer payment plans and I am sure that also helps them close more deals...

My view is that you can not replace high quality names cheap and build a portfolio, so why sell cheap??
2k is to cheap for a 2 word .com that HugeNames and BuyDomains sells for...
 
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Depending what you mean by "pricing out of the market". What kind of market, reseller market, end user market, corporate market, million dollar market or billion dollar market?
You must target your best domains to the Big budget market, otherwise your will give your domains for cheap price.
The rest of your domains are for end user, resellers markets.
And your crappy domains goes directly to huge domains crappy portfolio! LOL basically let them expire and huge domains will catch them and never sell them :ROFL::xf.laugh::xf.grin:
 
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Few factors which I would consider in pricing my domains, unless they are super premium.

1. My cash liquidity and holding power.
I review my pricing according to my cash liquidity, I might sell a few if need arises, or just hold long term on my price until the right buyer comes.​

2. Market demand.
The market demands sets the price for the domain, I keep changing according to the market trends.​

3. Quantity or Quality
When I have time, I try to move some low priced domains in quantity via outbound or listing on auctions, else I stick to select few sales in a year.​
 
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Keith your post and explanation just goes to show how much of an exact science domaining can be. You never truly know the value of a domain as you don't always know who may be looking for what you have available. I guess that's why having a large portfolio of names is the best way to profit. Thanks for your insight and advice.
I happen to think a small portfolio of boutique-y names of high quality is the way to go
 
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End users price theyselves out of the domain market. Some of us domainers do "price"ourselves out of the market but will(and do)take a solid offer thats on the table.

How are you going to get a great/big sale if you dont "price yourself out of the market"?

Afterall, "NO" is actually a good answer to most domain negotiations. facts.
 
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you cant really know, so imo you treat it a bit like fishing, initially list crazy high and wait a little while, no buyer of course, then drop the price a bit, keep dropping/waiting if you can afford to/really believe in a long term enduse, keep dropping until you get a "bite" only then you will have a true idea of what people will pay
 
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Nice artical its best to own high quality names then the leads will always come.
 
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But there are times beginners like me allow condition to determine our pricing. When buoyant, may just raise the prices and when pressed financially may want to reduce prices.

Is it peculiar to me?
 
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you cant really know, so imo you treat it a bit like fishing, initially list crazy high and wait a little while, no buyer of course, then drop the price a bit, keep dropping/waiting if you can afford to/really believe in a long term enduse, keep dropping until you get a "bite" only then you will have a true idea of what people will pay
Sounds good in theory, but a domain needs a buyer for you to get a bite. Just because you price it lower doesnt mean someone is suddenly going to be interested. You might drop all the way down to "reg fee" when suddenly your very first interested buyer shows up and says "$8.99 ? I would have paid $1000 for this !".
 
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I use a mix of make offer and BIN listings. It is probably common practice to use a low minimum offer to weed out the $50 offers but still allow the more serious leads to get through. What I find however is that when buyers see a minimum offer amount it seems they become fixated on that price as though they should not have to pay much more.Then when you quote them twice the minimum offer they believe they are being taken advantage of. Why should I pay $1500 when the minimum offer was only $500? I even had one recent interaction where I had a BIN plus make offer listing and then changed it to BIN only at the original BIN price. Someone had apparently been considering the name and then they hunted down my contact info (not available via Who is or the domain landing page) to aggressively offer close to what had previously been the minimum offer - that is all I can pay BS. When I respond that I am looking for a much higher offer their response is what is the best you can accept? Look at the BIN price on the landing page.
 
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Sounds good in theory, but a domain needs a buyer for you to get a bite. Just because you price it lower doesnt mean someone is suddenly going to be interested. You might drop all the way down to "reg fee" when suddenly your very first interested buyer shows up and says "$8.99 ? I would have paid $1000 for this !".

IMO any even half decent domain has a buyer out there. It's more about the fact that 99% of people would never pay over $10 for the domain. And your domain has to be more than half decent to get those type-in 100 views in a year.

With real visitor stats, it is possible to an extent to spot those who might be interested in buying a domain regardless of it's premium price. IMO playing with prices can tricker a sale.

For the largest pool of domain name buyers, i.e. everyday people wanting cool emails and different kind of hobbyists etc., the price is THE factor. Most of them are not willing to spend, ever, anything above reg fee, and those who are, are thinking mid $XXX at best. When you go under $300 the pool of buyers grows substantially in my experience.
 
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If we consider SEDO's quarterly domain market studies where the median .Com sale in their platform was around $600 with other extensions at median prices somewhat lower, then if the distribution of aftermarket sales hovers around that point, relatively few sales are over $1500. Historically 95% of my sales have been $1500 or less. Hopefully my inventory is better than eight years ago but buyers do seem to be limited in what they are willing to spend.
 
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