question 600 domains aiming to make $30k and expand portfolio - Your Advice

[lknights1987]

I own 600 domain names 65% Hand Reg, 20% bought at auction, and the rest bought from Godaddy closeouts.

For the past 3 years I've sold 8 domains 1x $2888 1x $2500 1x $995 and 5 x $265

I've changed prices on the majority of my domain names to lower than what my GoDaddy rep thinks they're worth but nothing has sold since about 5 months ago. ( reduced prices from $1500 to $795 )

My aim is to expand my portfolio size from 600 to 2000 domains and make at least $30k per year in sales.

What advice would you give me to get to 2000 domain names and make over $30k in sales per year? Should I reduce the prices of my domains and sell them off cheaper?

 

[twiki]

I've changed prices on the majority of my domain names to lower than what my GoDaddy rep thinks they're worth but nothing has sold since about 5 months ago. ( reduced prices from $1500 to $795 )

What advice would you give me to get to 2000 domain names and make over $30k in sales per year? Should I reduce the prices of my domains and sell them off cheaper?

Don't do that - reduce prices. Big mistake.

Most of my domains are in this zone and wildly different niches so I can tell.

Been testing reducing prices a lot, throughout this years, on various price levels. No positive influence on sales, I mean really. In fact the more you reduce them, the less they sell. Particularly in my case anything under $1700 tends to NOT sell at all.

Low discounted prices like $265 worked until 2021 and somewhat through. I believe these were bought by individuals, very small firms, small investors etc. Since the pandemic took effect, this zone has stopped. They are spooked and keep their cash instead. ( Edit: Or, they do not have cash anymore since household cash reserves have dropped to very low levels even in US, for obvious reasons . )

Keep your prices up. You're ruining your domaining. Edit: And everyone else's by mass effect, if too many domainers are doing that.

I have actually increased prices, like what most experienced domainers here have done already. Not going overboard though. Just a steady, gradual increase. You cannot make money if sales are scarce and you're decreasing prices, while domain prices go up and auction prices are insane.

The profit comes from higher end buyers that would spend several K on a domain.

That demand is still there, by reducing prices you actually make them think that your domain might not be that good after all. The better the name, the more deep pocket the niche, even say crypto despite the current decline, the better the chance of selling.

Domains I used to price at say $2.5k, now I price 4K and then they negotiate to $2.5K or so and buy it.

Edit: We're in this to make money, not to basically give away good names, this ain't charity.

 

[DrJacoby]

What advice would you give me to get to 2000 domain names and make over $30k in sales per year? Should I reduce the prices of my domains and sell them off cheaper?

Don't expand until you're profitable.

 

[Billidn]

Buy less domains, but higher quality.

 

[Joe drake]

My advice and you should take it ,the domains you have that you hand regged and are replaceable start selling them for whatever you can get ,keep 200 of them that you consider your best and raise the price to 3k to 6k accordingly you should start seeing your sellthru rate go up ,but at 200 domains your only talking 2 k renewal so even if you sell on3 domain bin. Your ahead of the game ,after that buy domains in auction from 1 to 3 k ,10 good ones should give you a 10 to 20 percent sell thru ,so you will sell 1 or two of those names at 7 to 20 k and only have to renew210 domain at 2100,getting to 2000 domains that are high quality requires alot of capital,,,if your just going to get mediocre domains the model will not work and your looking at 2k a month between renewals and interest ,because you will carry a balance,im digging out from this type of mess now ,only by doing real outbound ,,,,,picking up a dialing ,dont add so so names unless you are rich and renewals mean shit to you. Good luck

 

[lknights1987]

I've had a few domainers reach out to me trying to sell me their domains. I am not looking to buy any domain names right now!

 

[Igor Mironyuk]

I have my own marketplace but haven’t had any legitimate price requests come through. Maybe it’s the layout of my site DomainKnights(dot)co(dot)uk

I am getting 3k visits per day with all the domains on the redirected to there landing pages but like I say I haven’t had any legitimate price requests.

Would you recommend I change the landing pages with a BIN button ?

Your marketplace needs SEO promotion on the web. Your domains redirection isn't enough.

 

[lock]

Do what we all do old or new cull. It can be tough giving up names and yes others will grab them. The best few names that best describe a business is enough you don't need to buy forth fifth best.

 

[freety85]

Try to buy names in popular niches or names which have broad appeal across various industries. Stick with 2k+ names in order to get the math work IMO. Give the buyers the option to pay through instalments also. Good luck

 

[boker]

What’s the minimum your selling domains for? And are you selling via outbound?

Also what landers are you using ?

Dan landers, doing outbound for xxx value domains, mostly cctlds, targeting exact match of companies, so the chances for a sale it's very high. Prices are from low xxx to high xxxx, also selling to other domainers for low prices.

 

[Igor Mironyuk]

doing outbound

How many emails you sent per day?

 

[Sjpals]

I own 600 domain names 65% Hand Reg, 20% bought at auction, and the rest bought from Godaddy closeouts.

For the past 3 years I've sold 8 domains 1x $2888 1x $2500 1x $995 and 5 x $265

I've changed prices on the majority of my domain names to lower than what my GoDaddy rep thinks they're worth but nothing has sold since about 5 months ago. ( reduced prices from $1500 to $795 )

My aim is to expand my portfolio size from 600 to 2000 domains and make at least $30k per year in sales.

What advice would you give me to get to 2000 domain names and make over $30k in sales per year? Should I reduce the prices of my domains and sell them off cheaper?

If you want to do 30k then just do the maths and work it out. My maths sucks, but I think this is right....

3 years sold 8 domains - that is 2.66 domains per year.
You own 600 domains. therefore your current STR is 0.44 (so not even 1%)

If you sell domains at 3K, then you need to sell 10 per year. Which on 3000 domains would be an STR of 0.33%

If you sell domains at $300, then you need to sell 100 per year. Which on 3000 domains would be an STR of 3%

Work out the figures yourself. Then you will know what price you need to sell at and how many you need to sell.

 

[Sam1234]

In 3 years you sold just over 1% of your names. It seems like you probably have not even covered your costs. Do you have any figures on what percentage of your names sell in the first year that you own them? As others have said, pricing them differently may not be the "key" to becoming more profitable. Unless you are very very sure that you are already profitable, I recommend against enlarging your portfolio with what is probably a lower quality of names than you already have.

 

[Clover]

You've made $7,708
If you bought those all at reg value, then you've invested about $5,500 for one year renewal.
Soon you will be about $3,500 at loss in the above is accurate (not saying it is just giving an idea) due to renewals.

Now, you want to x4 your inventory.

I think you could invest in things more reliable and profitable.

 

[Joe drake]

You can have the best domains ,no one knows there for sale ,if you have great end user domains or popular company domains they hardly sell by listing them ,BUT if you call companies directly you have a good shot at selling a good percentage of them ,I find never mention prices until they ask ,while talking to them think of yourself as a social worker talking to a person in need ,like you have nothing to gain ,with this the sales pitch will not be standing out,domainers dont like making calls but the end result can be very profitable if you have a domain thats a great match id say 2-3 out of 40 calls will lead to a sale.Think of the penny stock callers making 500 calls a day to get a few leads they pass along to more experienced seller aka ,stockbrokers ,lol ,with the right domains you are beyond all this ,so pick up the phone tell them your new selling for your boss ,this works ,,,,,,,,,,,,good luck post your results

Also send my a list ,I will let you know which ones are sellable or that I think I can broker for you,Ill even tell you that your names are crap IF THEY ARE,sometimes peolpe just renew junk

 

[lknights1987]

Don't do that - reduce prices. Big mistake.

Most of my domains are in this zone and wildly different niches so I can tell.

Been testing reducing prices a lot, throughout this years, on various price levels. No positive influence on sales, I mean really. In fact the more you reduce them, the less they sell. Particularly in my case anything under $1700 tends to NOT sell at all.

Low discounted prices like $265 worked until 2021 and somewhat through. I believe these were bought by individuals, very small firms, small investors etc. Since the pandemic took effect, this zone has stopped. They are spooked and keep their cash instead. ( Edit: Or, they do not have cash anymore since household cash reserves have dropped to very low levels even in US, for obvious reasons . )

Keep your prices up. You're ruining your domaining. Edit: And everyone else's by mass effect, if too many domainers are doing that.

I have actually increased prices, like what most experienced domainers here have done already. Not going overboard though. Just a steady, gradual increase. You cannot make money if sales are scarce and you're decreasing prices, while domain prices go up and auction prices are insane.

The profit comes from higher end buyers that would spend several K on a domain.

That demand is still there, by reducing prices you actually make them think that your domain might not be that good after all. The better the name, the more deep pocket the niche, even say crypto despite the current decline, the better the chance of selling.

Domains I used to price at say $2.5k, now I price 4K and then they negotiate to $2.5K or so and buy it.

Edit: We're in this to make money, not to basically give away good names, this ain't charity.

Thanks for your response @twiki

 

[Igor Mironyuk]

Make your marketplace on your own domain and make it popular. The best advice!

 

[boker]

Make your marketplace on your own domain and make it popular. The best advice!

This is a good advice, but you need either to deal with a single industry/niche, as finance/tech/health/crypto and so on or you need at least 5k-10k domains to have a chance. Also, you need a big marketing budget and time to spare.

 

[boker]

I own 600 domain names 65% Hand Reg, 20% bought at auction, and the rest bought from Godaddy closeouts.

For the past 3 years I've sold 8 domains 1x $2888 1x $2500 1x $995 and 5 x $265

I've changed prices on the majority of my domain names to lower than what my GoDaddy rep thinks they're worth but nothing has sold since about 5 months ago. ( reduced prices from $1500 to $795 )

My aim is to expand my portfolio size from 600 to 2000 domains and make at least $30k per year in sales.

What advice would you give me to get to 2000 domain names and make over $30k in sales per year? Should I reduce the prices of my domains and sell them off cheaper?

That's around 7k sales in 3 years, with closeouts and auctions, that's not to much, probably you bed to tune up your choices for domains before scaling up, because you risk to loose a lot. I'm selling 3-4 times that in a single year and that's in a bad year, with mostly hand regs and with around 500 domains. You can't be happy with that, if you count your own time as well. The best I did was around 50k in a year, with around 500 domains. You need to change your buying strategy or choose better domains, buying them from closeouts or auction doesn't guarantee the value.

 

[boker]

Big marketing budget can earn gradually but first you must spend on advertising %50 of your income. The main is to find good marketing solution/agency that makes your marketplace popular on the web.

I don't think that paying a marketing agency when you have 500 hand regs/closeouts will worth it. I've tried Google ads and facebook ads for a year and even if they brought extra sales, at this level, it didn't worth it.

 

[Igor Mironyuk]

The better the name, the more deep pocket the niche, even say crypto despite the current decline, the better the chance of selling.

The higher prices, the attractive domain for buyers?

 

[lknights1987]

That's around 7k sales in 3 years, with closeouts and auctions, that's not to much, probably you bed to tune up your choices for domains before scaling up, because you risk to loose a lot. I'm selling 3-4 times that in a single year and that's in a bad year, with mostly hand regs and with around 500 domains. You can't be happy with that, if you count your own time as well. The best I did was around 50k in a year, with around 500 domains. You need to change your buying strategy or choose better domains, buying them from closeouts or auction doesn't guarantee the value.

What’s the minimum your selling domains for? And are you selling via outbound?

Also what landers are you using ?

 

[lknights1987]

Make your marketplace on your own domain and make it popular. The best advice!

I have my own marketplace but haven’t had any legitimate price requests come through. Maybe it’s the layout of my site DomainKnights(dot)co(dot)uk

I am getting 3k visits per day with all the domains on the redirected to there landing pages but like I say I haven’t had any legitimate price requests.

Would you recommend I change the landing pages with a BIN button ?

 

[boker]

How many emails you sent per day?

Not doing volume, 1-2-3 companies per name, but they are exact match, so high STR.

 

[1Darko]

@lknights1987
How much money did you invest in those 600 names?