discuss Counter or no-counter on an opening offer?

[Soofi]

After over almost 2 decades in this industry, at times, I still fail to understand the endusers/buyers during negotiations and lose quite a few sales to the counter-strategy.

My question at hand is; Should we really counter to an opening offer or accept as it? What do most of you do?

So to build this discussion up and see what others have to say or suggest about this, recap on why I am interested to know what most of you do is because of this below mentioned situation/story:

Sold: FullertonLawFirm,com
Sale Price: $520
Venue: DAN
Listing type: Make Offer with Buy Now Price.
Sale type: Inbound

Registered for $5.49 at Epik from the daily drops list I prepare. Domain was held for 14 days.

Accepted an opening offer of $520 which came in this midnight/early morning (IST) via Dan where it was listed as make offer (minimum $500 which is my extreme lowest and minimum acceptable price) with buy now price of $1488.

I woke up a few moments ago, looked at the offer and sat thinking should I counter or accept this opening offer on a 2 week old domain name? You must be wondering why in the world was I thinking and should have countered for-sure since its an opening offer and my quick research also suggested the same, that it seems like a serious and genuine buyer who is operating on a+mydomain.com so he/she would be happy to have my asset for negotiated high $xxx to low $1xxx price point.

But let me share with you why I didn't counter, and I will literally think dozens of times before countering in the near future as well, at least to my daily drops hand-registered domain names, especially on DAN platform. This is because I have lost over 8 potential sales of similar names to a counter-strategy last month where buyer lost interest or disappeared. And guess what, my countered price was only mere $xxx price higher than their initial offer in most cases.

Oh and I think this is quite a fair price for 3 keyword domain name. Though I suck at negotiations, thoughts and suggestions here or through pm are genuinely welcome.

 

[Soofi]

...not way too far from the initial offer.

This works the best imo..

 

[Soofi]

Most buyers start at least 3 times below their actual budget.

Not all the time..

 

[Jurgen Wolf]

I said: MOST

 

[Soofi]

I received an offer of $1500 for one of my brandable domains at Squadhelp 5 days ago. Countered $3500 and there is no result, no answer from the buyer

Is it November already? lol

See this is where it becomes a little iffy when we put the initial offer on line in order to try and fetch some more and in turn we lose the initial offered interest as well.

 

[Soofi]

Depending on the domain, most of the time I make a counter offer. End result: 60-70% buyers walk away, 30-40% nice deal.

Buyer walking away is quite high for most of my leads.

 

[Soofi]

After receiving offer you don't have to do anything as an option or you can put a buy it now on the site and and ask for an offer closer to asking price. You don't have to counter to get more money.
I wonder why people half their price in 5 minutes.

I love this approach.

Let buyer do most of their work!!

 

[frank-germany]

What does that even mean Franka?

he offered 10€ ( 12 usd )
I told him he can rent it for 20 € / month forever

 

[Soofi]

I think it is always best to counter offer with atleast 100 to 200$ more (without being greedy) when you are prepared to sell it for your first offer, as a chance that client always quote their minimum and keep some room to go upwards.. so little more price increase probably may close your deal and client may consider your offer..

Thanks,
Sumeeth

Thanks Sumeeth, though haven't had fair success in that approach and the reason why I am tempted to bite the first offer.

Have you had a different experience in this situation?

 

[Soofi]

..When I hand reg heiritage dot com during a play on word..

...Just set a reasonable bin and let it fly.

What was your BIN on that one, and how did you get to that figure? Shall help few of us on getting to an approx. right number

 

[Soofi]

If name sounds good with the app just set your bin and leave it,so no room to negotiate as price is already set.

That's what I did after the above mentioned experience. And switched to Sedo, for better conversion on high ticket names.

 

[Soofi]

Result also depends on what you say to your bidders... how you comment your conter offers...

Do you think comments really work, if buyer isnt too motivated or serious?

 

[Soofi]

Another example from my past experience...
Was mid $xxx opening bid for my local ccTLD .com.ua
After negotiations - it was sold for $4.5K

What was your initial ask and how long did the negotiations go on for? How much did you reduce and how much buyer increased with every step? Thanks

 

[Jurgen Wolf]

If the opening offer is great, and your research indicates that the domain is useful but not mission-critical, then don't be a pig. Take your win.

Few years ago some US individual offered $10K for one of my .PROs
Within few hours I replied to confirm that his offer of 10,000 USD is correct - he confirmed.
Then I accepted it... and asked him to provide his Sedo username (to initiate this escrow transaction)...
And that's all. Then this US bidder disappeared.

 

[Soofi]

Regarding duration...
Speed depends on the buyers... some of them are (very) fast, another - (very) slow...

For example, in Feb I sold .ONE for $5K to some US company inbound...
Less than 1h of negotiations with their CEO...
Initial offer was $1K.

Was that .One domain name? Interesting

 

[Soofi]

I always counter, if the initial offer is close to my asking price (which is not common) I will counter less aggressively.

For many buyers, this(buying a domain name in the aftermarket) is a new process and in general they have no point of reference, it's not like a house or a car where you can easily find what's that asset's value. If you accept the first offer, it might make them feel that they offered too much and that you would likely have accepted less so there is a chance they might get cold feet(unless we are talking about a $xxx first offer which I think the majority of buyers would honor).

I also think that every serious buyer is prepared to offer more than their initial offer, so if a deal falls through due to a marginally higher counter offer(5%-100% depending on the offer, the higher it is the lower the %), I think chances are the buyer wasn't serious in the first place and not ready to make a commitment and buy the domain name even for their initial offer.

Thanks, nicely summed up!

Though, mostly small and medium businesses have limited budget and walk away rather than engaging in negotiations when countered to their initial offer, per my experience.

 

[Soofi]

https://negotiationsworkshops.com/n...hy-You-Should-Never-Take-the-First-Offer.html

Must Read Article- by Roger Dawson

Good one, thanks for sharing!

 

[frank-germany]

That was pretty inspired @frank-germany. Domainer wisdom to live by.

I guess you liked the term "God" most ...

 

[Soofi]

I've had an offer started at $500, but I countered $30k. We negotiated and the domain name was sold for $20k. It was above buyer's budget but the buyer was able to get additional funding after I refused to go below 20k.

In another negotiation, we eventually agreed to $7k, the "CEO" tried to get the funding but denied by the board. I still have the domain name, but I will not sell it for less than 20k today.

Some know how to negotiate, like negotiate real well and some just cave in to get whatever they can.. I believe I am one of the later ones lol but nicely done there

Counter/not counter really depends on the quality and types of the domain name. Most of my names are brandables and generic terms, and I will only sell for a specific price range.

I'd say you should always counter, unless you don't have time to negotiate. Every serious buyer have room for negotiation, will likely have some room, or they will wonder if the first offer was too high to begin with. If you worry about buyer walks away for mere $xxx, the buyer might not be serious in the first place, or was never authorized to make the offer anyway.

i totally agree with you that counter/no-counter depends on quality of domain names, but its actually tough to figure out in the initial stage on whether the offerer is serious enough or not.. what say?

 

[Soofi]

I value a domain names with 3 criteria:

• recently sold domain names of similar length/extension/keywords
• brand recognition if it were being used in a commercial
• prices of similar domain names by others

This is gold, thanks for sharing! I am sure this would help everyone sort out their negotiation strategies.

 

[Soofi]

sold for 250 €

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What does that even mean Franka?