How do you deal with low ball offers?

[srisri24]

Hi Guys,

I have a 3 char domain of LLN.com format. I myself purchased it at $800 few years back. I keep getting low ball offers every week.

How should i respond. I have requests for giving away for free(for student project!) to $150. Should i just ignore! are reply with my intended price. Now a way days its become a nonsense for me that i find one or two offers every time i login. I have no plans to selling anything below $3000. I dont want to use whois protection as dont want to hinder real buyers.

Regards
Srisri24

 

[alien51]

I have no plans to selling anything below $3000.

I usually reply with "mid $ x,xxx".

There are End-Users who honestly do not have any idea how domains are priced, so it's hard to blame them for the lowballs.

So for you to not waste futile negotiations that could go nowhere, set the tone of the pricing upfront with "low/mid/high $ x,xxx" response. So if what they had in mind was just around $200 max, they won't reply anymore and leave you alone.

 

[Electric-Shadow]

The fact your getting so many offers is a good indicator of value, but with 3 character domains there are several factors to consider;

- Combination (LLN NNL etc)
- Age
- Acronyms, abbreviations & generic meaning

The lowballers are probably working of the base value, in your case $260. Base value is based on combination alone, if your name has good acronyms or a generic meaning then it's quite likely your lowballers have missed this, then again they could just be domainers trying to take advantage of a slow market.

 

[werty]

I ignore them as they are mostly other domainers. If the end user is really interested, they will come up with a higher offer...

 

[biggie]

Hi Guys,

I have a 3 char domain of LLN.com format. I myself purchased it at $800 few years back. I keep getting low ball offers every week.

How should i respond. I have requests for giving away for free(for student project!) to $150. Should i just ignore! are reply with my intended price. Now a way days its become a nonsense for me that i find one or two offers every time i login. I have no plans to selling anything below $3000. I dont want to use whois protection as dont want to hinder real buyers.

Regards
Srisri24

:talk:

from my own experience over the years,

i'd say 85% of the lowball offers are from newbies who use three char com website as their price guide.

that's where majority of them have "said" that's where they got the price range from or they have provided a link to that site in emails or pm's I've received.

still, I continue to respond with "my price" and won't blink an eye if they walk.

my advice, add some more years to the registration and increase the price.




imo....

 

[SpareDomains]

still, I continue to respond with "my price" and won't blink an eye if they walk.

I do the same. Have quite a few domains that receive the $100 best offer and I'll just politely decline them without returning a price as were worlds apart and if someone is genuinely interested you will hear back with a higher offer. I'll shoot back my xxxx price if I think it can go somewhere based on their name, company name, phone, ip address etc... after some research on them, have not responded to a few but only after determining it was a popular domainer just fishing for deals.

Have turned a couple initial $50/$100 offers into mid-high xxxx, most of those offers never go anywhere but occasionally you will find an end user offering super low on the initial inquiry just to gauge if you recognize the value of your asset.

 

[Name Trader]

I never let a good selling opportunity go to waste on a qualified domain inquiry. 99% of the time I will reply with my price.

 

[mhdoc]

Helpful posts. I have started getting a few of the same kind of offers on a couple of mine. So far I have just ignored them.

 

[Whogister]

I once had a "I'll take it off your hands for $10 bucks so you can get your registration fee back" turn into a $875 purchase.

 

[BrandChimp]

It can be a experienced Domainer trying to get cheap domains from newbies .

To see if they are serious, I would ask around 10K depending of the name.

 

[GiftedDomains]

Supply and demand, thats all its about.
If you can get $3.000 for your LLN.com, thats nice.
If you don't need money and/or can wait 5 or more years for the right buyer, thats nice too.
Some sellers can't and need cash and are even happy to get their money (or even half of it) back for the domain they paid too much for in the past in the prime of DN biz, etc.

 

[alien51]

And on some occasions, when all you get are lowballers, then the sad reality is that maybe, THAT'S the true value of your domain. LOL

 

[GiftedDomains]

I see LLN.coms been sold for mid xxx all the time.
So from domainers/resellers/flippers point of view, offering $150 or $200 is not that astonishing.
We can't even call it lowball offer. Its simply the business model of flippers and totally legitimate, etc.
Thats what many (if not most) users here do!

In fact, if you don't want the so called low ball offers, you should ignore 99% of domainers anyway.
In your case (paid $800 and waiting ....), you must wait for an enduser with deep pockets and need for your domain. Nobody knows when that will happen. Could be tomorrow, could be in 1 year, could never happen.

As far as how to reply to all those offers, its pretty simple:
"Thank you for your offer but I do not intend to sell this name below $3.000" , no discussions, no attempt trying to teach them "how not to be a lowballer" lessons, etc. - simply reply this to all emails and wait. Thats the best you can do to filter the middlemen and find THE CHOSEN ONE lol

 

[Biddabox]

If you get a low offer on your domain name you are selling, don't take it as an insult, most people even do not know the real value of a domain name, but if you want to have a chance to close the deal to a sale, you should also answer in a polite way, you can use the examples you did get from @stub and @gifteddomains

 

[DavidH]

I have found recently that I am having a lot of success simply saying "No thanks".

If they are serious about wanting the name, they will increase their offer or ask what price is wanted.

Whereas before I used to really want to try and get something from every approach, now I don't care whether they come back or walk (probably because someone else will be along in the next few days!) and that has made me a lot stronger.

I have turned offers of up to $25k down without blinking because I KNOW I will get a better price in the future. If the name is good, the potential buyers will come to you. They have to persuade you why you should sell, not you be begging them to buy.

Just my 2 cents !

 

[biggie]

If the name is good, the potential buyers will come to you. They have to persuade you why you should sell, not you be begging them to buy.

Just my 2 cents !

Hi David

i emphasized that excerpt, because it's worth more than 2 cents.

imo...

 

[Eric Lyon]

If you attempt to use psychic powers to read a potential buyers mind or wait for them to reveal what their budget is, you inevitably end up doing way more work than needed.

Essentially you want to be the first one to spit out a number and use that to start filtering out serious buyers, thus eliminating tire kickers / low-ballers. Beating around the bush and playing guessing games with potential buyers is not only creating more work for yourself, but you can sometimes end up burning the lead as well trying to hard to sell (Desperation kills deals).

Great negotiators start out with a solid number (value) and they try to be the first to put it on the table. Working from YOUR starting point down is much easier to negotiate than working from THEIR starting point up. UP in cost is scary to buyers, DOWN in cost is more comforting and = savings (Psychology 101). So try to be the first to stick a value on your domain in any negotiation.

Just my thoughts anyways,

Eric Lyon

Added Note: Try to keep the initial set value as realistic as possible though of course. don't start at something silly like we see on eBay sometimes with JackRanUpTheHill.info for $1,000,000,000 :p

 

[alien51]

If the name is good, the potential buyers will come to you. They have to persuade you why you should sell, not you be begging them to buy.

That's where the real issue comes in.

Because domainers have various interpretations to the term: "if the name is good".

Most of the time, the elite cream of the crop who owns the diamonds, will have a very easy, relaxing time to say 'no' to an offer.

But as you can see in the forums, many people are holding Mickey Mouse diamonds. And they seriously believe they are genuine.

The tricky part, is how to avoid your own pricing delusions, and at the same time acquiring the talent of selling garbage at diamond prices.

 

[SpareDomains]

I have found recently that I am having a lot of success simply saying "No thanks".

If they are serious about wanting the name, they will increase their offer or ask what price is wanted.

Whereas before I used to really want to try and get something from every approach, now I don't care whether they come back or walk (probably because someone else will be along in the next few days!) and that has made me a lot stronger.

I have turned offers of up to $25k down without blinking because I KNOW I will get a better price in the future. If the name is good, the potential buyers will come to you. They have to persuade you why you should sell, not you be begging them to buy.

Just my 2 cents !

Been working for me for 10+ years. I email nobody. The quality of the domains bring the leads and when the leads roll in serious ones receive polite negotiations and garbage ones get the "gonna pass, thanks for the offer" Helps that I have quite a few profitable developed sites which makes it easier to say no thanks when the offers aren't up to par with value as I don't really need the money.

I once had a "I'll take it off your hands for $10 bucks so you can get your registration fee back" turn into a $875 purchase.

Best low initial one I had was $50 into $7500, still trying to beat that one but most usually start in the xxx range so not everyday I see 2 digit offers.

But as you can see in the forums, many people are holding Mickey Mouse diamonds. And they seriously believe they are genuine.

I get quite a few emails offering these type of domains. Would like to respond and say what the hell are you thinking but realize that will lead to f-bombs my way so I just delete them. Understand there are different business models flipper versus buy/hold. Guess I just don't get buying garbage, spamming thousands of people for minimal profit as that equals a job. Buying better quality equals go on with your life, updating your websites etc... and just answering inquiries that rang your doorbell first which equals easier sales/higher profit margins and basically no work.

 

[Electric-Shadow]

Sound advice, though not everyone has the money to invest in profit generating sites nor pay a little more for domains with better quality, you have to start small and work your way up. That said you can turn a minimal spend into sizeable profit, I say that because I've done it. You just have to keep your eye on the game, or you'll miss your turn.