Hi, I'm Twiki answering your questions today here on NP. AMA

[twiki]

I've just received a bunch of questions from another NP member via DM.

I thought it's more appropriate to reply to them in an AMA post as others NP members might have other questions. Never did an AMA before, here or anywhere else. Anyway, ask me anything below.

Before anything else, please note: I am really not a fan of the spotlight. So please don't put me on a pedestal - like a few folks wanted before. I really don't like / want / need all that. Just got a bit of more performance lately but it's nothing that uncommon I'd say. I'm just yet another domainer here on NP where I have learned a lot. There are many others here much better than me.

OK so here are the questions I've received, and the answers:

- Q: How long have you been in the industry?
- A: This is rather difficult to answer. I'd prefer to say 3 years, because these are the years during which I finally got performance. Which has been visible just as it went here on NP in the sales thread.

But I've been buying and selling domains on a constant basis since 2018. And I also had a few tens of short domains like 15 years ago or so. Unfortunately I let them expire an got out of domaining for a decade, would have been worth some decent money today. But I think it's never too late if you're willing to do the work.

- Q: What is portfolio right now?
- A: I guess you're asking about the size. I have 7400 domains right now, down from 25.000 historical max. I'm reducing the portfolio however and hope to go beyond 4000 so it becomes much more manageable.

- Q: How much would you say you have acquired in drop registered or closeout vs auction at GoDaddy/Dynadot etc?
- A: Again if you're asking about counts: I don't have a statistic, but probably 75% of my domains are drop regs, 15% are hand regs, and most of the remaining are closeouts. Auction buys, less than 1%. However I intend to develop that next but it is more time consuming for me to watch the auctions.

- Q: How much do you spend on average acquiring domains?
- A: If you ask about time, it varies. Sometimes a full day, other times I don't even work on domains. On average at least 2 hours per day. If you're asking about $, most domains are at reg cost OR closeouts which range between 5 and 50$ + reg fee. Auctions I only have bought domains worth $300 or less.

- Q: Looks like you are mostly focused on the dot com? Is that correct?
- A: Yes. I have a much better hand at .COMs. Like 99% of my domains are .COM.

- Q: Do you hand register domains also?
- A: Sure, but not every day. Sometimes I get an idea and will register some based on it. I've sold for example quite a few meta domains which are all handregs. I haven't sold any NFT domain so far. It depends. I tend to not go too deep in hand regs.

Please note that drops are also a form of handregs. Well drops I do daily, and sometimes several depending on the quality available that day.
------

I'm going to add a bit of more insight here as to how I get results:

What I do is simple, I'm working hard each day (really) and got a bit of luck as well. That's all, nothing out of the ordinary. I also try to help others when I can, here on NP and elsewhere (with some limits, of course). I am also a full stack developer and I build my own tools for domaining, that helps as well.

If anyone here on NP has another question to ask, please ask below. If there are none more, that's also cool with me.

Thanks!

 

[twiki]

That's a good point regarding the phone number. I never had a big enough portfolio to experiment. Do you mind me asking, what is your STR? (I know you probably don't have an exact number).

STR is the most useless parameter when you're looking at anything else but your own portfolio.

I'm going to tell you, with notes as to why it is so irrelevant. It depends on too many things.

I used to have STR of 6-8% in the past, but I was barely making anything in profit / ROI. Most of my sales where xxx range (until quite recently I must say). I've been a volume/discount domainer for long, and that had it's own advantages such as learning a lot of niches and domain types. But it's past now.

Today, I probably have around 1.5% STR (varies). But I am at 100% ROI and expecting to go quite higher in the next 12 months. This is because I only sell full retail right now and things are different, also portfolio has changed and improved.

( Edit: By 100% ROI I mean costs vs. profit. If I spend say 100k in domains per year in renewals, buys, yearly cost overall, then I also currently have more than $200k in sales with at least an $100k profit. Forward stats show that I can double or triple that though within a year's time unless something major happens in this market. )

 

[NYJimbo]

I see Alcy The Troll crawled out from under the bridge to harass the townsfolk. Thats why I keep him on ignore.

 

[twiki]

I see Alcy The Troll crawled out from under the bridge to harass the townsfolk. Thats why I keep him on ignore.

Same here. Thumbs up.

 

[MasterOfMyDomains]

He fell off the wagon again.
Thanks for the thrëad.
Is there certain criteria, repeating l or I, keyword’s that make you instantly like or dislike a name?

 

[twiki]

He fell off the wagon again.
Thanks for the thrëad.
Is there certain criteria, repeating l or I, keyword’s that make you instantly like or dislike a name?

I try to not like or dislike any of my domains. I see no point in that. Also not to get attached to any domain.

There are a ton of domains that I find, which I like much and still I won't register, all for the same reason:

I focus only on what my potential buyers will want to buy. And certain words are indeed far better than others. So are certain niches (at least with my methods).

I'm in this business for money, not for collectables.

 

[accuname]

bahaha co a fluke and xyz to stay... I cant believe u have nerve to claim u kown something about domains.. parhetic

I have a couple grand invested in .co and his comments on the extension don't bother me one bit. His experience or opinion isn't going to change if someone drops 20 or 30k on my best .co.

yes correct..so same as twiki here basically making his ego mighty threads and talking about pedestals while really peddling nonsense for amateurs like u to clap at

If you are as or more successful then he is in sales and portfolio size then by all means let's hear about it. Plenty of room at the top for egos in domaining.

 

[alcy]

I have a couple grand invested in .co and his comments on the extension don't bother me one bit. His experience or opinion isn't going to change if someone drops 20 or 30k on my best .co.



If you are as or more successful then he is in sales and portfolio size then by all means let's hear about it. Plenty of room at the top for egos in domaining.

let me guess .. u have no ego and aren't part of that top.. next

 

[topdom]

Where do you park?
Do buyers contact you directly or through an agent?
Do you do outbound, if so automated?, does it work?

 

[twiki]

Where do you park?
Do buyers contact you directly or through an agent?
Do you do outbound, if so automated?, does it work?

Good questions.

- Where do you park? > All my domains point at Afternic NS5/NS6. I don't park for parking revenue, just for sales.

- Do buyers contact you directly or through an agent? > None. I get 99% my sales via BIN at Afternic. Almost no offers (Edit: If the listing has no BIN, I always receive a price request and then I have to set a BIN anyway, which makes the whole make offer thing useless at Afternic).

In the very rare occasions when there is an agent involved when there is a sale through the agent, but only 1 out of 5 of these materialize. In most cases there's either lowball or the client goes unresponsive shortly.

Please note that I use fixed price (my min = BIN) but still a few potential buyers might call to negotiate, but rarely.

- Do you do outbound, if so automated?, does it work? > No. I've decided early in that outbound is not for me. Too time consuming / little effect. I focus on quality of the names today and that's it.

 

[Ariff BD]

1.Do you think what domains you sold by using afternic (NS5/NS6) lander, also would have been sold if they were pointed on Dan or Epik Lander with regular Afternic marketplace listing?

2.What are you thinking of new trend of domain like Ens &HNS .eth .c .token? You also trying your luck there?

3.You only do regular domain or also premium domain for high end sales with brokerage support?

4. What are your suggestion on outbound?

 

[accuname]

Was there a specific point at which you realized you need to increase portfolio size into thousands or the tens of thousands you had at one point? Or was it linear? Little by little?

Given the low STR for domains even if someone is making some money off a small portfolio at some point it's clear scaling up is necessary to make a living. I should add that the higher quality the names the less you need to own.

 

[twiki]

1.Do you think what domains you sold by using afternic (NS5/NS6) lander, also would have been sold if they were pointed on Dan or Epik Lander with regular Afternic marketplace listing?

2.What are you thinking of new trend of domain like Ens &HNS .eth .c .token? You also trying your luck there?

3.You only do regular domain or also premium domain for high end sales with brokerage support?

4. What are your suggestion on outbound?

1. No, because I tried and it doesn't work for me. The best is NS5/NS6 lander.

2. Not interested in eth token etc.

3. I don't understand what you mean. If you talk about SH, I no longer use SH.

4. None. I don't do outbound. Just said this above.

 

[twiki]

Was there a specific point at which you realized you need to increase portfolio size into thousands or the tens of thousands you had at one point? Or was it linear? Little by little?

Given the low STR for domains even if someone is making some money off a small portfolio at some point it's clear scaling up is necessary to make a living. I should add that the higher quality the names the less you need to own.

Not linear, kind of a bit accelerated / exponential but yes at some point I moved into higher area. Took about 6 months or so. Still have some low demand 4-figs to ditch.

I don't think the number of domains is the biggest thing, but rather the quality of them.

You can have 10 names but if top quality you can make millions with just that.

For better earnings, a mix of both quantity X quality is needed.

 

[accuname]

Not linear, kind of a bit accelerated / exponential but yes at some point I moved into higher area. Took about 6 months or so. Still have some low demand 4-figs to ditch.

Fear of the renewal fees rolling around has been a big reason I've never scaled up. Was your decision initially to scale up very logical? Did you think something like "Ok, I've got 10k+ I can invest in increasing my porfolio. It's 10k (as an example) I can lose. If I don't make that back the first year on those names, I'm dropping them and scaling back."

 

[twiki]

Fear of the renewal fees rolling around has been a big reason I've never scaled up. Was your decision initially to scale up very logical? Did you think something like "Ok, I've got 10k+ I can invest in increasing my porfolio. It's 10k (as an example) I can lose. If I don't make that back the first year on those names, I'm dropping them and scaling back."

Very good question.

Well, since I have a long business history behind, I knew certain things before even starting.

One thing I knew was that I'm going to make losses in the first 1... 2years. So that was a risk I've taken. (Edit: business experience teaches you this; if you expect immediate profit then you're probably off by a lot.)

The second thing I knew is that I'm very late to the party. Most great .com's were already taken by 2018 (actually earlier). I had some dabbling before but didn't keep my names, unfortunately.

So this was the starting point.

I did have some money to invest, therefore I asked myself what I do not have. Two things stood out: experience and time. And If it took long to get experience, I would lose even more time, which meant that I will lag even further behind because by then the market has moved ahead and competition had increased already.

So what I said is, OK I'm going to burn money fast to learn even faster. That's the only thing that could help mitigate the problem and reduce time.

I spent $41K in my first year, sold $27K and banked an $14K loss. But I learned a lot.

The second year, I iterated the process and went better.

Then gradually I stopped burning money on discovery tiers (experimental domain registrations) and moved into investing for 4-5 fig and better quality.

As you can see, it's all logical. That's why the fear of renewals was never there.

Even now, if fear of renewals hits me at times, (since the market is indeed slowing down), logic then takes over. I do have up to 1 year ahead momentum from already paid domains . Which I can sell, liquidate, and depending on the money made during this year I will adjust renewals accordingly so I'm still in profit and have my best names to sell going through whatever times ahead.

Where there's logic and planning, fears become irrelevant.

This (what I do) is business management, not impulse investment, collector habits, irrational decisions and getting in love with your own names.

That is how money are being made. Logic is perhaps cold in itself, but it is what pays off.

Edit: The difficult part in all this, always applying logic and financial math, is discipline = never becomes easy.

 

[accuname]

Very good question.

Well, since I have a long business history behind, I knew certain things before even starting.

One thing I knew was that I'm going to make losses in the first 1... 2years. So that was a risk I've taken. (Edit: business experience teaches you this; if you expect immediate profit then you're probably off by a lot.)

The second thing I knew is that I'm very late to the party. Most great .com's were already taken by 2018 (actually earlier). I had some dabbling before but didn't keep my names, unfortunately.

So this was the starting point.

I did have some money to invest, therefore I asked myself what I do not have. Two things stood out: experience and time. And If it took long to get experience, I would lose even more time, which meant that I will lag even further behind because by then the market has moved ahead and competition had increased already.

So what I said is, OK I'm going to burn money fast to learn even faster. That's the only thing that could help mitigate the problem and reduce time.

I spent $41K in my first year, sold $27K and banked an $14K loss. But I learned a lot.

The second year, I iterated the process and went better.

Then gradually I stopped burning money on discovery tiers (experimental domain registrations) and moved into investing for 4-5 fig and better quality.

As you can see, it's all logical. That's why the fear of renewals was never there.

Even now, if fear of renewals hits me at times, (since the market is indeed slowing down), logic then takes over. I do have up to 1 year ahead momentum from already paid domains . Which I can sell, liquidate, and depending on the money made during this year I will adjust renewals accordingly so I'm still in profit and have my best names to sell going through whatever times ahead.

Where there's logic and planning, fears become irrelevant.

This (what I do) is business management, not impulse investment, collector habits, irrational decisions and getting in love with your own names.

That is how money are being made. Logic is perhaps cold in itself, but it is what pays off.

Edit: The difficult part in all this, always applying logic and financial math, is discipline = never becomes easy.

Appreciate you going into detail. I know you might be repeating things you've covered in other threads - your reply made me think that I've already read something about your first year experience. Your comment of being very late to the party is something probably most domainers have thought, including me. I'm learning to think more along the lines of "there will always be opportunities".

One thing I see when people succeed in business is that it's not just about risk but also about commitment. Congrats on navigating both well - or at least better then most domainers. lol

 

[twiki]

Appreciate you going into detail. I know you might be repeating things you've covered in other threads - your reply made me think that I've already read something about your first year experience. Your comment of being very late to the party is something probably most domainers have thought, including me. I'm learning to think more along the lines of "there will always be opportunities".

One thing I see when people succeed in business is that it's not just about risk but also about commitment. Congrats on navigating both well - or at least better then most domainers. lol

Thank you for the congrats.

Well, I actually feel bittersweet about any congrats. Unlike some around here who think I'm ego fed and so content of what I've achieved. I am getting positive signs but it's not all bright as it seems. My position is still risky and further decline of the market might get my portfolio into a more narrow corner.

As you might know, there are others here who are doing better than me - so in this regard I'm sending congrats further to fellow @blogspotter here - thumbs up for the ascension.

So as I said thing's aren't as bright as they appear. I'm actually glad to be sharing this now, it's clarification and I also feel well about speaking out.

TBH I actually still feel quite disappointed of my own results; and even more about the market in general.

I feel disappointed that there aren't so many here with similar results, and therefore I do stand out. I shouldn't be standing out. There should be so many others reporting at least the same or far better, as there are many who own larger number of domains.

This tells me something: Domains are severely under-appreciated... still. So the buy market is mature, but the sales market... isn't. If we can segment in this way.

I know I'm only an average domainer, I probably just work more than the average. And despite all this visible success, it's still a very small business, and not impressive at all by my own standards. However there is room for growth, future potential, which keeps it interesting. Otherwise I might have dropped out by now already.

Yes there are always opportunities. But.

Today, you need a ton of things in order to get a slice of the pie for yourself. Wild west years are long gone. It only gets more difficult with time. If I would have just arrived today, I would probably not be successful at all, given how I started years ago. Things are much harder.

The .COM market is mature, even the gTLD area is gradually getting there, and getting good names is a challenge. Auctions are highly overpriced. Dumb drops are caught by expensive DC backorders. Decent drops sell at auctions for prices where there is no meat left on the bone, or even for more than what they are worth.

Note, with domains the money is always made on the buy, not on the sale.

So with all this, it is still a question for me what lies ahead. (Edit: Including the fact that I'm able to figure out what comes ahead with economy in general; and it's not pretty; so I won't even discuss that further, done that enough already).

I do however enjoy the knowledge, being able to understand domains and differentiate between something good and something worthless. That's a good part of it. I also have a tech journey in parallel and hope that will bring more money in different ways, ones that don't involve selling domains.

 

[Ariff BD]

Do you have twitter account for domains where you post sales & other things?

 

[twiki]

Do you have twitter account for domains where you post sales & other things?

No. I only post here on NP.

 

[phaethon]

Twiki, do you think, using NS5/6 has a huge impact on your sales? If you parked your domains or used no landing pages at all, do you think that would affect your sales and to what degree? Maybe after all, all that matters is having your domains on Afternic and their premium network and that is the actual sales force?

 

[twiki]

Twiki, do you think, using NS5/6 has a huge impact on your sales? If you parked your domains or used no landing pages at all, do you think that would affect your sales and to what degree? Maybe after all, all that matters is having your domains on Afternic and their premium network and that is the actual sales force?

As I said this setup works best for me.

I can't determine exact sales percentage coming from NS5/NS6 landers, but based on my tests, switching to these landers added at least 1/3 extra sales, which makes up for a lot of profit.

 

[phaethon]

As I said this setup works best for me.

I can't determine exact sales percentage coming from NS5/NS6 landers, but based on my tests, switching to these landers added at least 1/3 extra sales, which makes up for a lot of profit.

Or could simply be the fact that you became a better domainer

 

[twiki]

Or could simply be the fact that you became a better domainer

No, I have accounted for that. Although you are right, quality increased over time.

But even so, I have tested various other landers (including my own) and monitored the results. There's definitely a difference.

However I'm pretty sure this might differ from one domainer to another a lot. For example Dan never worked for me and it's still puzzling as to why.

Edit: The most important factor in sales, by me it's trust.

The GoDaddy name there and phone number on NS5/NS6 beats everything else.

 

[Ariff BD]

No, I have accounted for that. Although you are right, quality increased over time.

But even so, I have tested various other landers (including my own) and monitored the results. There's definitely a difference.

However I'm pretty sure this might differ from one domainer to another a lot. For example Dan never worked for me and it's still puzzling as to why.

Edit: The most important factor in sales, by me it's trust.

The GoDaddy name there and phone number on NS5/NS6 beats everything else.

Another thing, is there any certain type or tld you think work better for afternic lander? or any random domain or extension will use the afternic 5-6 lander equally?

 

[ZeroVariance]

@twiki I am reading through these posts and answers, and I appreciate you're taking the time answering.

For me ,my core business is finance (vc and private equity), secondary is digital publishing /media.

You need a lot of commercial and business acumen to combine logic and math in order to accelerate and grow in this industry. Which you pointed out in a previous reply.

your answers in this thread gave me a better perspective on how to improve my current domains I am selling and expanding my portfolio.

Thanks!