Enduser contact - Suggest price or ask for offer?

[Havela]

I sent out an email to some leads earlier this week and received the following short and sweet response from the President of one of the companies:

"We would be interested if the price is right."

Obviously I am curious to know what he considers the right price. Should I counter and ask him to indicate it? Or is it my turn to show my hand and give a fixed price now? If I ask too much I am afraid to scare him off, and if I ask too little I will never know.

I understand that opinions may vary on this and I am interested to hear different opinions. What response, in people's experience, would give me the best chance of closing the deal?

 

[twomoon]

You contacted him first, so you need to tell him what are you looking for to sell your name. At least it would look professional, in my opinion.

 

[Ted.T]

Never ask them to make an offer if you contacted them. He wants to know the price. Just tell him your price, the price you think is fair for the domain. To be sure they will not run away after first price, you could tell them the price is negotiable. If they are really interested, they will make a counter offer.

 

[Kenny]

The ball is in your court... give a price based on a % guestimated income of their business. Say if they are a TV repair shop, they wont have the assets compared to a shop that sells lots of TV's,.
So price accordingly + 20% for the "price is negotible" aspect.

Peace,
Cy

 

[Havela]

Thanks, guys. I sent off an email with my suggested price now.

 

[biggie]

I sent out an email to some leads earlier this week and received the following short and sweet response from the President of one of the companies:

"We would be interested if the price is right."

Obviously I am curious to know what he considers the right price. Should I counter and ask him to indicate it? Or is it my turn to show my hand and give a fixed price now? If I ask too much I am afraid to scare him off, and if I ask too little I will never know.

I understand that opinions may vary on this and I am interested to hear different opinions. What response, in people's experience, would give me the best chance of closing the deal?

:talk:

Hi

i think you should know amount you want for your domain, before you send out solicitations

but those solictations should only be sent to those who can afford to pay your asking price.

which means doing some research.


also, if you''re scared they will walk if price is too high....you'll never see a big payday

finally, i would not price a domain in terms of a % of that business' income, because the business will still be in business, without your name.


imo...

 

[alien51]

If you are the one asking me for my money, you should tell me how much do you want.

Because if you will ask me how much money i want to give to you, i will give you a dime.

 

[zoomactive.com]

I am speaking from experience...

If you contact them:

Once they are interested and want a price. Start with the high value of the domain name. They will either accept, try to counter or reply back with something like ARE YOU INSANE, I CAN GO TO XXXXX AND GET A DOMAIN FOR $10.

Reply back educating them if need be and show the value. If they want the domain name but want to do an offer. Do that. It's all about sales.


If they contact you:
If the domain name can be sold for a lot and you know that for a fact. Then say a price and stick to it. Otherwise let them know you are entertaining bids "they often offer more than if you say offer".


Good luck!

 

[johname]

Rule of thumb is you contacted them first so it up to you to be the first to spit out a price.

Things to think about are:

a) Is this the only person on earth that shown even a remote interest in this name even though spam emailed 100 google pages of people for a month, and never got an unsolicited email regarding the name.

b) The reseller value of the name. Is it a true regfee name or would your peers trip over themselves to give you money for it.

These two answers walk you on a path of determining how desperate you are to sell it to this particular enduser.
-------------------------------------------------------

If you have confidence in your name then set a reasonable price.

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If your at the most extreme desperation (names pure regfee and it pains you to renew, only contact ever)

You then come to the conclusion you have to sell this name to this person. In other words you let them be fulling in control.

A you can do this by politely asking them you make an offer with the caveat that your not expecting the moon, want them to be happy, etc, type of talk.

But remember only to use purple text when your super desperate.

Goodluck
.

 

[Havela]

But remember only to use purple text when your super desperate..

:lol: I'll keep that in mind.

Thanks to everyone who has taken the time to respond. I'm very grateful and have taken your advice on board.

 

[Theydon]

This goes against everything above but they haven't directly asked you for a price (we know that is what they are indicating but they leave scope for further discussion - without pissing them off). If you are confident in the name ask them respectfully where the price has to be to be 'right'. If you are looking for an opportunity to sell the name asap then name your price. Just a counter argument that may be worth considering.

 

[Name Trader]

I think you should already be prepared to give a price the very moment somebody expresses an interest in a domain. Don't pussyfoot around.

 

[Theydon]

I wouldn't disagree Stub but for the wider debate if I received a response like that and was selling a domain in the say $10k region I wouldn't be first to put a price on the table. Their response indicates to me they have a price in mind so I would phone them to discuss where their level is. Good luck Havela.

 

[biggie]

I sent out an email to some leads earlier this week


What response, in people's experience, would give me the best chance of closing the deal?

they haven't directly asked you for a price

If you are confident in the name ask them respectfully where the price has to be to be 'right'. If you are looking for an opportunity to sell the name asap then name your price. Just a counter argument that may be worth considering.

:talk:

if they ask, "what price do you have in mind?"

how more direct can they be, in wanting to know what you want to sell the domain for?

you have to remember who "sent" the email and who received it and what the intent of the solicitation was.

I think you should already be prepared to give a price the very moment somebody expresses an interest in a domain. Don't pussyfoot around.

exactly, if you initiated the contact.

this will show professionalism and illustrate a potential expedient transaction in the mind of the potential buyer.

you contacted them...be ready to do business!

I wouldn't disagree Stub but for the wider debate if I received a response like that and was selling a domain in the say $10k region I wouldn't be first to put a price on the table. Their response indicates to me they have a price in mind so I would phone them to discuss where their level is. Good luck Havela.

:talk:

my position is to be concerned with my price

again, if you solicit to budget where your price fits, then amount considerations are less than domain considerations.

imo...

 

[Theydon]

BIGGIE: if they ask, "what price do you have in mind?"

how more direct can they be, in wanting to know what you want to sell the domain for?

you have to remember who "sent" the email and who received it and what the intent of the solicitation was.
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they said "We would be interested if the price is right".

Listen I agree if the domainer is making the contact then the onus is on you to name the price. I am just saying its not always black and white (re: their actual response and the value of the name).

 

[dave2013]

sounds like theyre interested but could live without it, throwing out a huge price would likely not generate a response. On the other hand you could be dealing with someone who is experienced and who knows how to act on an offer to get the domain at a price much lower than you think its worth. I would suggest having the domain appraised professionally if your at all uncertain of its value and than you have some flame to backup your fire. Most of the time domain owners price value their domains much higher than what their actually worth. If you bought the domain for x amount of dollars and want to make a profit than be careful how much your marking it up. If you bought it at auction its likely not worth more than you paid especially if there were lots of bidders. To get more than you paid you need an end user. If you got the domain at reg fee than an appraisal is highly reccommended, dont use auto appraisals. Let us know how you made out. Good luck

 

[oldtimer]

For years domainers have been trying to come up with a uniform formula for this, but the truth of the matter is that they still haven’t found one and the reason for that is because there are several variables that are in effect which makes each domain to require different tactics and strategies to deal with.

The best one can do is to emulate what the more successful domainers in the forum are doing, keeping in mind that most of those people categorize their portfolio into separate groups and use different tactics and strategies depending on the domain name, their need to sell, the number and quality of potential buyers, and the level of the buyer's interest.

If this was just one of my average domains and it was going to affect me badly if I lost the deal, then I wouldn’t worry about getting the absolute most out of this one domain, I would put a reasonable price on it and tell the buyer that I was willing to work with them if that was out of their budget.

IMO

 

[Havela]

First of all: Thank you to all who contributed. NamePros really is a very friendly place. You can ask any old question and within minutes someone has taken the time to give you a decent response.:wave:

I do not have much experience with enduser sales; in fact all my sales up until this one have been at auction. When I started last summer I contacted some endusers, and I mostly generated some interest, but (I think) I scared them off by asking too much in my follow-up email. So as far as I can tell, not all endusers are prepared to enter the numbers game and negotiate. The ones I contacted simply said 'too high' and could not be enticed into returning with their own offers.

So this time I was determined not to let my enduser get away. (Purple text suitably illustrates my feelings on this matter) So I probably went too low rather than too high. It would have been great to know what the buyer deemed to be the 'right' price, but I took the advice from the majority and suggested a reasonable price myself. Anywho, the buyer quickly accepted - which probably means it was too low - and now the money is in my PayPal account.

But I think oldtimer has an important point that each sale is different. I rinsed and repeated today with another domain, sent a price to a respondent and expected him to either accept or pull out, but he countered with a much lower price (which I had not calculated with, since in my limited experience buyers do not counter). So I will either have to sell the domain to him at no profit, or try to counter with an in-between figure. Is that possible? (Please note that we are not talking $xxxx here - I understand that negotiations may go on for weeks in that league.)

 

[Theydon]

Congrats on the sale Havela.

Re your second domain, I certainly wouldn't sell for no profit. They have showed an interest by naming a price which is a good sign. There is a good chance they will meet you halfway so maybe pitch it a little above the halfway and go from there. Good luck.

 

[verbster]

Contrary to what most people are advocating, I figure the first person to throw out a number is usually the loser. One thing I see over an over is this thread is the use of "reasonable," except it's directed toward the seller.

When someone asks me for a price, I usually write back a friendly reply and ask the buyer to consider how much the domain is worth to them and then make me a fair and reasonable offer...if your offer is truly reasonable, I'll sell it with no further negotiation.

Three out of five "reasonable "offers are more that I would have asked, and I sell immediately. One out of five is stupidly low, and I politely write back, Thanks, but no thanks. (Sometimes they come back.) And the last one out of five turns out to be a negotiation.