CONTEST: 20 Free Domains - Win them here!

[The Group]

So, to give back to the community I have decided to hold a contest and give away 20 domains for free. They are not the world's most amazing domains - but - I'm sure you'll find yourself more than capable of flipping them. For the sake of the contest winner (decreasing value) I will not list the names here. They are all registered at GoDaddy and I will push them to you when you win.

Here are the contest rules.

Date Start: Today
Date End: Friday February 27th 2015 at 8pm HST

How to enter: I want to hear your best domain story! It has to revolve around your experience in the domain business. Whether it's a really funny experience you had, a crazy sale, a massive flip, a monster flop, a major regret... so on, the better and more detailed your story the more likely you will win!

How you win: I will personally read each post in this thread and choose a winner at the end of the contest. Keep the posts in the thread (no PM's). The better your story, the more likely it will be liked by others! The objective here is to tell a cool story, not win domains - but hey, who can deny 20 free ones

 

[The Group]

I'm pretty sure @defaultuser just wanted to chime in about the rule changing rules that change the changing of the rules! But, unless a movement is made for democracy, and we see a poll open about the rule changes, we should all assume that [B][U]@Ali Zandi[/U][/B] is King of this Thread. So....

Ha! I was like who is defaultuser? Because I don't see their reply... then I realized that its because they are already an ignored user. Works for me.

This happened between five and ten years ago.

One day, I read that the lead singer of a famous old rock band I liked was quite ill. I searched and discovered that his fan club's webpage was at OfficialFirstnameLastname.com [something like OfficialJoeSmith.com, but that's not his name]. I figured they'd been unable to acquire the .com domain of his name [the one like JoeSmith.com].

I found out that that domain was parked. On a whim, I emailed the registrant (through the whois address), offering $50 for the domain. A reply came back: "Bonjour: the price for domain is 4700 euros. au revoir"

Needless to say, I didn't respond. But I did start monitoring the domain ... and sure enough, at the end of its registration year, it wasn't renewed. I reg'd it the moment it was available.

I then wrote to the fan club president through the website, offering her the domain for free. She was skeptical at first, but when it became clear that my offer was legitimate, she wrote "It has always bothered [the singer] that his name was out there in the cyber world and he wasn't able to use it. I'd try to get it every time it would come up, but as you said, someone was always just a little quicker. As soon as I tell him of your extreme generosity, I know it will make him smile. ...and these days, there is no better healing medicine than another human's kindness."

When the transfer was under way, she said "I talked with [the singer] and he's thrilled. We both can't thank you enough!"

The transfer went through, and she has been using that domain for the website ever since. Sadly, though, his condition never got any better, and he died two years later. But I'm glad I was able to do this little thing for him.

I've sold more than 5,000 domains (really!), but few of those sales were as rewarding as the time I was able to give that sick musician a unique gift. That made me feel very good about being a domainer, and I've given some other domains to deserving organizations or people since then.

Wow. Goosebumps. Great story! Very kind of you

 

[LoneDeranger]

Mine's short but funny.. I always considered myself with bad luck..
It was the first domain I owned after winning an ebay auction.. I tried to sell it like a psycho for it had only one month to expire.. I was desperate and put it on a forum for sell starting price 1$.. I waited a month and someone bidded somewhere under 10$. It was sold. A day later someone offered me a high xx price for the same domain. Problem is.. I didnt owned it anymore.. FML and that stupid karma.. I actually dont care if ill win or not, just sharing haha

 

[The Group]

Mine's short but funny.. I always considered myself with bad luck..
It was the first domain I owned after winning an ebay auction.. I tried to sell it like a psycho for it had only one month to expire.. I was desperate and put it on a forum for sell starting price 1$.. I waited a month and someone bidded somewhere under 10$. It was sold. A day later someone offered me a high xx price for the same domain. Problem is.. I didnt owned it anymore.. FML and that stupid karma.. I actually dont care if ill win or not, just sharing haha

Haha! Man - that happens all the time!

 

[randomo]

Mine's short but funny.. I always considered myself with bad luck..
It was the first domain I owned after winning an ebay auction.. I tried to sell it like a psycho for it had only one month to expire.. I was desperate and put it on a forum for sell starting price 1$.. I waited a month and someone bidded somewhere under 10$. It was sold. A day later someone offered me a high xx price for the same domain. Problem is.. I didnt owned it anymore.. FML and that stupid karma.. I actually dont care if ill win or not, just sharing haha

Yeah, that's a familiar story.

I got lucky one time: sold a domain for $39, got an $xxx offer a few months later, bought it back from my buyer for $80, and sold it for about $600. But it rarely works out that way.

 

[sofiapartner]

@randomo will be hard to beat with this great story. Respect, man !

 

[kawalsukhi]

Mine's short but funny.. I always considered myself with bad luck..
It was the first domain I owned after winning an ebay auction.. I tried to sell it like a psycho for it had only one month to expire.. I was desperate and put it on a forum for sell starting price 1$.. I waited a month and someone bidded somewhere under 10$. It was sold. A day later someone offered me a high xx price for the same domain. Problem is.. I didnt owned it anymore.. FML and that stupid karma.. I actually dont care if ill win or not, just sharing haha

It happens Man!! It may happened with many of us!!

 

[aditiyaa]

Hi I am from India,

I have two experiences in buying and selling domains.
I have been in this domain industry for 1 year and still struggling to have one good sale.

First,
I bought poweroulette.com few months back after coming to know about chatroulette.com domain selling and listed it in a domain selling website hoping to make it big. After some months I got an offer from a buyer who was really interested to buy that domain.
But the biggest mistake I did was I typed the domain name with a small typo error. I listed the domain name as powerroulette.com instead of poweroulette.com which means I added a letter 'r' in the domain name which I do not own and it was a typo error. I did not see that while listing but noticed after I got an offer. I contacted them saying it was my typo mistake and apologized and the sale was ignored which I felt should have been more careful while typing or copying the domain names while listing.

Second,
I bought usa360.com domain in an auction which I listed in Flippa two times but didn't get a good offer until now inspite of adding additional domains to the listing.
I realised that I am making a big blunder in some areas while judging a domain to purchase and also while marketing the domain to reach or convince the buyers.

Hence I started to follow people like Ali Zandi, domain sherpa and various forums to know the niche of domains and gaining knowledge each day.
I am sure I will learn soon.. Thanks for the opportunity to express myself and share with you guys

 

[elevator]

My Story is a bit Different from Others

My story began in 2008, that was 7 years ago when I saw a publication about domain sales on a journal called "successdigest" the journal is published in Nigeria by one great entrepreneur and at that time in my great Country, there was no means of any payment for domain registration; to cap it up, paypal was banned in Nigeria and so many other payment processors are unreliable, but later, I succeeded at getting one payment card for my first set of domain registrations in 2010. I registered ForexLord.com, eMarketDirectory.com, DomainSession.com, StripTubeDance.com and many other domains which I have dropped after one year.

I dropped most of my domains because I was down disappointed with my expectation of making early money from domain business. All I have in mind then was to buy and sell within shortest possible time, but when I could not flip any of my domains I dropped them and discouraged, but each time something kept on telling me that there is money in this business and if people are making money from the business why can't I make my own money from it.

But my surprises are that my domains are picked up as soon as I dropped them. I now realized that something was wrong with me or my strategies. I studied and realized that almost all the ones I dropped that were picked up are being used for websites. It was then I began to think that each of the domains I will register should be used for a site that can bring me money at least for registration. I began development and registered for adsense account and now making progress by getting few clicks on my websites.

I have done series of researches on many websites and blogs such as domainsherpa.com DNF, Dnjournal.com facebook clubs and many more. My plan is to invest more money when I have my first sale, so that I can be sure to have realized myself before embark on huge investment.

I realized that it is easier to make it through dropped or expired domains, but I do not have enough muscles (cash) to get through when I placed order on dropped markets; for one to get a good dropped domain, one needs to have good cash at hand.

So I kept on looking towards the day I will have my first sale of domain and that day will be my best day of my life wish I will never forget for the rest of my life.

I’m so much interested in this business and waiting for somebody to lift me up with wealth of ideas.

Presently, I have about 20 domains in my portfolio at sedo.com, Godady.com and name.com

Cheers

 

[tomcarl]

The domain that wouldn't leave me.
My living pet Rosco-Dacom. A Domainer's best friend.
By tomcarl
​

This is a story about a domain that's been with me for the past 3 years. A loyal domain, a domain that almost has a self-awareness and a desire to be with me for whatever reason. This domain is similar to a pet you've had since birth and never wants to leave your side even though at times you push it away. Well, I've pushed him away a couple of times to different owners but he always finds himself back with me. I'm beginning to believe it was meant to be for me to keep him, bring him up, and help develop him into something great. For the sake of this story, I'll call this domain Rosco, Rosco-Dacom.

I acquired Rosco in 2011. He was a good domain, very neat, short in stature but well put together, I recognized great potential within him. He's been abused in the past, previous owners let him drop several times, but he has the will to survive even though so many others rather see him expire. Rosco-Dacom is a misunderstood creature but will get the job done if you just give him the chance, I think he's actually ahead of his time. Someone tried to give his little brother Rosco-Danet a chance but he too was abused, mishandled, and dropped several times after birth. I've considered adopting Rosco-Danet to keep his older brother company, but my home is too crowded this time to try to move-forward. I may take him to be parked one day even though I doubt there will be much traffic there for him to meet new friends and flourish.

Back in 2011, I didn't have the time to give Rosco the attention he needed, so I listed him on eBay, hopefully finding him a new home that would better appreciate him, which I thought I did. To my surprise a bidding war began for Rosco as I'm sure the two bidders recognized Rosco's potential. Well, Rosco was sold that day in 2011, for the amount of $220. Although I had only paid $1.99 for Rosco thanks to a loan from a close friend of mine, Scott Sigler, and I was making a fair profit off of him, I still felt guilty for pushing him away that day.

Rosco lived with his new owner a few months. The new owner didn't give him the attention he deserved, simply let a well known neighbor in the community, Mr. Sedo take care of him while he focused on his other children. Mr. Sedo tried his best to make Rosco feel at home but at the end of the day Rosco still lacked the attention he rightfully deserved.

A few months had passed and I checked up on Rosco just to see how he was coming along, and to my surprise he was about to expire and was on the verge of collapse. I quickly asked my father, GoDaddy, if he could help me order the survival of Rosco, which he agreed. Shortly after, Rosco was back in my possession, we were successful! My father, GoDaddy, asked me if I would like to acquire Rosco's little brothers too, almost forced me, but I insisted that Rosco-Dacom is all that I could focus on right now and that I got a loan from Scott295 at the time. I asked Jeff295 if he would help out to acquire Rosco's siblings but he wanted nothing to do with them.

I introduced Rosco to a friend of mine, Wordpress. Rosco and Wordpress got along fairly well for the next few months, they hung out often and would receive random visitors, too. I never knew Wordpress knew so many people from Russia and Ukraine, but they were always talking about buttons-for-websites so I quickly forbid them from visiting us any further. In the back of my mind think they may have been looking for trouble.

After another couple of months I decided to reach out to a small-time entrepreneur who owned several domains similar to Rosco's breed. I thought Rosco would thrive in this community and help his new owner make new friends. I quickly received a response, explaining that yes, they would in fact be interested in giving Rosco a good home and offered a generous adoption fee. Later that day I packed Rosco's belongings and themes, zipped them up and forwarded them to his new owner. I bid Rosco farewell and knew I had made the right decision this time with no regrets because Rosco will be with many of his kind and for once get the attention he deserved.

I paid Rosco a visit a year later only to find his new owner abandoned him and every other name he was hosting at the time. I was shocked to see such death and domains dropping everywhere. I quickly visited my Father to save Rosco yet again.

It's 2015 and Rosco is alive and well, still living with me. I realize after everything Rosco has been through and how many times he's come back to me with no complications, Rosco-Dacom is destined to be with me and is this time is being developed to be the best that he can be, for good.

 

[The Group]

Only 2 more days to get your stories in! Today and Tomorrow! I will be selecting a winner tomorrow night!

 

[urlurl]

I have a few stories but this one is just so sweat. I responded to a request (WTB) on a different forum for a specific type of niche domain name. I sent them a few suggestions and one of them they were interested in. The negotiating went back and forth for a while - but the buyer would not budge over $100. I guess I must have been desperate for cash that week because I actually was considering taking their offer. The buyer started pissing me off trying to get me lower and lower. Eventually I said here's the price, firm, take it or leave it. He said he was not interested and he didn't want it any more.

About a month or so later I ended up selling that name on sedo for $x,xxx, lol

I am so glad I didn't accept the first crappy offer.

 

[khansql]

Hello Everyone

My name is waqas and I am from Pakistan. I jump into the internet world in 2010. After facing different scams and rubbish courses. I found this business (domain buying and selling). I buy my first expired domain 2 days back. I search on google and try to sell my domain.

I found this forum now let's see what happens next...

 

[Domainor]

Here's an experience of mine when I recently sold a misspelled domain name. It was one of those words which are difficult to spell correctly and would even leave one who is good at spellings a tad confused. Something like fluorescent vs florescent(which one is the correct spelling?...lol). So now you get the idea.

I think I sold it to someone who was obviously new to domaining because when he was on chat after the sale and before the push, there was a long pause and then he came back saying, "Well shame on me not to have known the correct spelling of fluorescent!"(*spelling from the example, not the actual domain name).

Someone who has a bit of experience would copy the domain name and paste it into a thesaurus or even Google to check the correct spelling. I always copy and paste the word while buying a new domain name so that I don't buy an incorrectly spelt domain name by mistake. When I was new to domains, I actually went through such an experience and ended up returning a domain for the first time on Namecheap when I realized that I had bought the wrong domain in a hurry!

Anyway I felt sorry for the guy and gave him another domain that he could use for free and offered him help if he wanted to build a website. He realized that I was being helpful and immediately cheered up, thanking me in the end.

In any case it wasn't a very big sale at under $100, and the mispelt name also gets a good amount of traffic though not as much as the correctly spelt word. (is it "spelt" or "spelled"...lol again)

 

[DU]

Ha! I was like who is defaultuser? Because I don't see their reply... then I realized that its because they are already an ignored user. Works for me.

Ignored? Wow, someone has a lot tolerance level for something.
I guess we need a rule that says if you're on the ignore list you can't win.. yet another rules change (clarification at least).

BTW: I'm not serious with the whole rule change thing. I couldn't care less who won 20 unknown names.

 

[Compassion]

I have many stories, however I will reveal a bittersweet one with a twist I learned about just seconds ago.

Once upon a time I was knee deep in two graduate schools exploring, learning and practicing Chinese medicine. I used some decent names to get a collateral loan with Rick Latona's digipawn.

One of these domains got an offer while in his account. He asked me the price I wanted and I said $750 minimum, however as much as possible of course...

Within a few days Rick wrote back that he got the $750 price. I really liked the name, however it was alright for a hand registration so I was feeling ok about it.

About a year and half later I'm in the midst of doing research for my dissertation. I search on the Internet to find an MD to collaborate with - one open to the idea of ancient Chinese energy medicine. I find an oncologist nearby on the first page of google results that looks like a match.

A second later I realize I clicked on a link to the domain I let go for $750 while it was pawned.

A little excited, completely shocked - feelings of remorse begin to ooze out my pores. I dig around the site for a few minutes to see what they are all about. It appeared the company was substantially funded, they built a sleek in-depth website. I think to myself Rick must have sold it for A LOT more than $750

At the time of the sale I asked what he took as a commission and he said "I made a little bit"

Maybe he sold it for $1,000, maybe $5,000....I will never know.

I did learn that I must be very clear with my language. I should have demanded Rick take a % rather than let him know my rock-bottom price and presume he'll take an honest commission after relaying their offers to me.


Alas, today I check to see what is on the site now ---- and...it is a blank godaddy page!

Set to expire in just a few days, 12 years after I registered it....Hmmm, time for a backorder?


The name . . . . expertconsensus.com

 

[elevator]

Nemesis is behind them. Cheers

 

[interassets]

When I was 21, living with my parents, running an online print business I'd built from scratch, I'd decided it was time to think big! Sales were sitting at $10-15k per month, and I'd just maxed out my Dads credit card to buy an $18,000 web app for improving automation, when I decided I'd go as big as possible, initiating a Sedo broker to negotiate the purchase of Print.com! They got back to me, asking for $1million for it! Of course, this was way out of budget, but I was naive and determined. The following day, I asked the bank for a million dollar loan! Needless to say, they weren't too keen on lending me it.. But it was worth the try!

 

[DU]

I did learn that I must be very clear with my language. I should have demanded Rick take a % rather than let him know my rock-bottom price and presume he'll take an honest commission after relaying their offers to me.

You almost used the word broker and honest in the same sentence. Just don't deal with them - tell them you work on your own and might pass on commission and shut it down imho.

WWD

 

[The Group]

Just a reminder, this ends in less than 7 hours! I have the 20 domains pulled(they cost me $572 to acquire). I am giving all 20 of them away to one "lucky" winner tonight!

 

[Ian Goh]

Well for me, I grew up with the preconception idea that if I were to graduate from University, then life will be set for me. Boy was I wrong, after graduation, I found out that a degree is just a stepping stone. Due to the downturn in economy, I had to return home as I was abroad for 7 years of my life.

Coming home to a small town with the hopes of having a startup, a dream that I could learn from my experiences abroad and start something.

The first thing that came to mind for my startup is something online and specific to my country. Creating something that could help fill a need or create a new opportunities in my hometown.

I bought my first domain (a CCLTD) and hosting. I was enthusiastic, and kept working on it. However, I was curious as to why there was no visitors and the wordpress theme I bought had so many bugs, that it was not possible to launch it. I had to do more research as to how to deal with traffic, SEO and wordpress maintenance.

After consulting many programmer friends, they told me that in order to make a website successful, you either must have an edge (Knowledge on content) or Knowhow (Programming) and people will come to your website.

Furthermore, I met an internet Marketer by the name of Derek and he told me that .com is king if you want an international exposure. I got curious and check if I can try and find alternative names in .com. During the search, I was a bit surprised that so many names were taken and some were commanding premium price.

Thus, this led me to the domain world, where domains are virtual real estate. You see, I love investing. I bought my first shares when I was 13 and land at the age of 19. For me, I like to see future value in things.

Started of buying random crap names I thought were premium, using valuation sites and taking them to heart. Lucky for me, I'm quite spend thrift and only bought a few.

Learn a lot from Namepros and some domain gurus blog and soon it became a daily habit. Wake up in the morning and the first thing I open is ExpiredDomains, see what has drop. Use all the codes to buy.

My family and friends were looking at me strange when I tell them my hobby is buying and selling domains. I think I'm the only one in my hometown that does this.

My first sale were from Flippa were I flipped a 2 weeks old name for $56. Then sold another for $50. I was happy. USD is a strong currency and when converted to my currency, it's a couple of hundred . I thought to myself that this is good investment. After all, it's a hobby and it's making me some money to cover my other investments.

However, I have always seen people getting x,xxx figures or even xx,xxx. I learn that either the person bought it from the aftermarket or resell it from another domainer.
I thought to myself, I don't think my handregs can fetch that amount.

I learn about how to contact end user and their favourite replies were "sorry, not interested" but I still pesevere on and rewriting my proposal email till one day I contact a young startup whether they wanted my two week old name that has recently dropped. They were interested and I told them to make offer and they offered me x,xxx! Boy was I happy.

What I learn from this.
1. There is a lot to learn and continuous learning in this industry
2. The name you buy must have an end user in mind
3. Lots of research
4. Be humble
5. Never give up
6. Have fun

Thanks for reading.

 

[Chetan]

It was the time when I just newbie in the industry and made my first three $XXX websites sales on flippa and gathered around $1000 in profit, that i decided to reinvest and was after buying Advice.net & Claim.net, which were being auctioned at godaddy for no reserve that time. But since both of them crossed $1000 mark, I settled for Critic.net and Suck.net which I paid $XXX each.
As soon as I got the ownership of Suck.net I started receiving emails (4 emails in one week , saying that the missed on auction and want to buy domain and offered from $500 to $3000 for only suck.net) I responded everyone and was feeling as on top of the world. Then I researched a little and listed domain on GFY and namepros, soon I got $5000 and $1000 offer on GFY whereas $200, $500, $1000, $2500 offer on Namepros. I decided to raise the person on GFY to $12500 but he held me to $7000 and no one else went above $5K mark, but when I was about to agree I just received a $14K from a namepros member. I agreed on the deal instantly. He was an old member named "Kuerten" and asked me send invoices via paypal.( I was too new to the industry and was not knowing that we should use escrow for that kind of deal.... to be honest I went crazy after hearing $14K and was out of my mind)
He said that since I am new to the community so I should push domain first and then he will pay for invoice I sent him. He was a verified paypal and old namepros member, also he was offering me twice the amount then the best offer I had, in addition I knew that whenever i push any domain from godaddy then Godaddy asks for confirmation that the transfer is legal or not. So i agreed and pushed him domain.
He was supposed to pay me within 15 minutes, but he disappeared and was not answering, it was night time and I had made a phone call on the new whois record phone number to ask for payment, and he said that he don't knw what I was talking about. Then I contacted many godaddy executives and non of them were helpful at all... they used to transfer calls and feel sorry for me. Again the whois changed after few hours and I saw that this time I was of a web hosting company.
So I contacted Namepros Admin Eric Lyon, who in true sense guided me and banned that scammer immedietaely after few verifications.
then after his and few fellow namepros members guidance I came to know about attorneys and possible actions that I could take against scammer, So I hired an attorney who suggested to file a dispute at WIPO, and it was going to cost me $1500 for single Arbitrar and $4K for panel of three arbitrar. Now the trouble I had was I did not hve any funds, as I was newbie, i also knew that If I paid $1500 and get back Suck.net then I can earn atleast $7000 , that means $5500 in profit. So I decided to gather Funds and took chances with my other .net domain I had then "Critic.net" on Flippa. I asked my sister to please let me use her card and purchased a ultra premium listing worth $350 for Critic .net and got it sold successfully on Flippa for $5100. I was very happy and used escrow this time, andgot my funds.
Now I had paid $1500 to attorney who contacted with current owner of Suck.net and we came to know that this is the same person who had me offer of $1000 on GFY, scammer sold him domain same night as he had posted $1000 offer on my gfy profile which was visible to all.
So we agreed on settlement with current owner, paid him $1000 back and reclaimed back suck.net for $1000 (paid to OP) + $1500 (attorney took for WIPO, that he said is non refundable), and hence Suck.net was back after spending $2500 in all.
Now I was motivated to sell the domain on Flippa and listed it there and was surprised to see domain go up to $10K, but the resereve was not met, in middle the $497K bin was triggered by some indoneasin member and I told flippa to verify them and decided to decline as they don't seem ligit, I also showcased it on topspot for a day and spent over $500+ again in listing but it was not sold then.
I was happy to receive offers of upto $12500 from flippa bidders, but was now committed to sale the domain for atleast $14K, as I was offered once. (I know I was stupid on that)
Since then I had received many $X,XXX offers from many DNF and Namepros members, once I was also offered a piece of land in USA in exchange by Namepros member Ezcoms and I never accepted any offer.
The person who was offering me $10K on flippa has reduced his offer to $9K now as he think that .net credibility is reduced, and currently i am sitting on thename and planning to develop it into something good as I am from a family who will kill me even if I watch porn, so I can't even imagine of developing it into pornsite.
This domains earns me $50/ month in parking till last month and now it being developed.
I have all the communications snaps and details near me, Ali if you want can show you all.
I would like to thank Eric Lyon and other members who tollerated my panic at those stressful days and still helped me and showed the correct path. I lost my trust on Godaddy and paypal from that day, and never takes risks now with both of them. I know it was all my fault, and I learnt a lot from that. I believe that I paid $2500 as tution fees to learn importatnt lessons of life, I am very bad at expressing things, still hope that you understand the entire case. if any queries please feel free to ask me
Thank You !

 

[The Group]

Times up!

I have to say, there were some great stories in there!
It's awesome to read and hear about peoples experience in the industry!

But, I know you’re all wondering one thing… who won? Well.. I’ll tell you.

First place goes to….. @randomo

Congratulations my friend. You have earned yourself 20 domains! That was a very noble, selfless and over all amazing thing to do. There should be more human beings like yourself!

(I will message you for further instructions.)

Honorable mention goes to @tomcarl

I hope Rosco is doing well! Glad to hear the lil’ fella is back home with his rightful owner!

Thank you all for your stories, they were a true pleasure to read!

This happened between five and ten years ago.

One day, I read that the lead singer of a famous old rock band I liked was quite ill. I searched and discovered that his fan club's webpage was at OfficialFirstnameLastname.com [something like OfficialJoeSmith.com, but that's not his name]. I figured they'd been unable to acquire the .com domain of his name [the one like JoeSmith.com].

I found out that that domain was parked. On a whim, I emailed the registrant (through the whois address), offering $50 for the domain. A reply came back: "Bonjour: the price for domain is 4700 euros. au revoir"

Needless to say, I didn't respond. But I did start monitoring the domain ... and sure enough, at the end of its registration year, it wasn't renewed. I reg'd it the moment it was available.

I then wrote to the fan club president through the website, offering her the domain for free. She was skeptical at first, but when it became clear that my offer was legitimate, she wrote "It has always bothered [the singer] that his name was out there in the cyber world and he wasn't able to use it. I'd try to get it every time it would come up, but as you said, someone was always just a little quicker. As soon as I tell him of your extreme generosity, I know it will make him smile. ...and these days, there is no better healing medicine than another human's kindness."

When the transfer was under way, she said "I talked with [the singer] and he's thrilled. We both can't thank you enough!"

The transfer went through, and she has been using that domain for the website ever since. Sadly, though, his condition never got any better, and he died two years later. But I'm glad I was able to do this little thing for him.

I've sold more than 5,000 domains (really!), but few of those sales were as rewarding as the time I was able to give that sick musician a unique gift. That made me feel very good about being a domainer, and I've given some other domains to deserving organizations or people since then.

 

[Gian]

I know internet marketing a few years ago, focus on Clickbank affiliate marketing. It's need a hard work on creating quality content and backlinks building for SEO and traffics purpose.
One of my technique is buy a domain to build some website for various product on Clickbank. I am looking for a domain at Godaddy and check whether it is suitable to build a website for selling one or few of Clickbank products.
Then I found ObxBicycle.com, I think this domain has a good keyword for bicycle niche and have a good enough SEO metrics (PR2, 5 years old...etc). I search on clickbank marketplace and found that there is a product that suitable for this domain. I decide to bid ObxBicycle.com and won for only $15 on November 2013.

But due to lack of time, I have not had time to build a website for this domain because I also have other websites that should be maintained.
Until one day (July 2014), I get an email from someone who is interested in buying the domain, and he asks what price I can offer to sell the domain. But I have no idea what price that suit and I don't want to sale it. I decide to keep it and I'll build a site with this domain.
But I still no had time to build a site, then I try to listed this domain on Godaddy with $469 Buy Now price (September 2014). I was just on a whim, I really not familiar and have not been interested in the business of buying and selling domains. I think the price I offer is no sense, because I just bought it for $15, and likely no one will interested in buying it.

But surprised, only on a few days I received an email from Godaddy told me that the domain has been sold
I really surprised and it make me open my mind that the domain business is one of the great business on the internet.
Now I got interested and started to learn, Glad to find and join this forum that has a lot of domain experts as members. I learned a lot from this forum.

That's my story, maybe not so great for others, but this is an incredible start for me. Thanks Ali for create this thread.

Thanks for reading,
Gian

 

[elevator]

It is all well and good! Ali Zandi has done the best by considering @randomo for his kindness to human being by cheering what he has for his fellow human being.

This is a good lesson learned here.

May the Almighty give us such mind to give when people are in need.

I suggest when next you are doing this kind of context, the prize should not go to only one person. The prize is enough to go for about three people like in sports contest.

However, thank you for this great initiative.
Cheers.

 

[The Group]

It is all well and good! Ali Zandi has done the best by considering @randomo for his kindness to human being by cheering what he has for his fellow human being.

This is a good lesson learned here.

May the Almighty give us such mind to give when people are in need.

I suggest when next you are doing this kind of context, the prize should not go to only one person. The prize is enough to go for about three people like in sports contest.

However, thank you for this great initiative.
Cheers.

I agree with you my friend! Next context will have more than one winner