How would you invest $5000 for maximum liquidity?

[G_C]

Howdy folks,

I recently came into possession of a chunk of cash and am looking to reinvest that into domain names. To this end, I'm wondering - how would you invest $5,000 in this business to ensure maximum liquidity (and, by that, I mean fast turnover?) I'm prepared to sacrifice some of the lucrative margins associated with holding onto a domain name for a long period of time to find the right end user.

Looking forward to your feedback,
George

 

[mwzd]

If liquidity was the primary driving factor, a bank account would be the safest way forward.

Otoh, if you're looking for flipping profits, spend the 5k on one domain at reseller prices and score an end user sale.

I've seen people turn around 5k purchases into 100k sales in this business, not the easiest thing to do, but it's doable. Good Luck.

 

[nicedomains]

Are you laundering money? :lol:

In this case I would stick with:

LLL .com
LLL .nets
CCC .coms
Quad Premium .com (more specifically in the CVCV format)
Meaningful .COM phrases

 

[G_C]

Thanks for the very prompt feedback so far! And just to clarify - I'm not laundering money, I simply brokered a few acquisitions which netted me a hefty profit now sitting in my bank account. So what I'm now looking to do is to invest some of them profit and make it grow into, erm, more profit? Nothing irks me more than idle money in a bank account (especially a Swiss one, where interest rates are ultra-low).

 

[tech4]

$5K isn't much these days.

You could spend on a few premium domain names and spent it. You could wait forever and no one would buy.

Here's the truth:

You are inexperience, meaning it takes a while to get it right
You can only buy a few like 2-3 good names, your chances of selling 2-3 names is lower like almost zip
If you spread that $5,000 out, and buy alot of domain names, your chances might increase if you buy the right one. But chances are, you end up wasting money.

How to approach this:
Diversity -develop, buy, don't go too far or you spend all your money
Quantity -low quality names cost less, will give you idea on how to approach things, but low quality =0 chance, or fat chance
Test Drive -test different methods

Last bit:
Don't spend more than you can afford

Make a plan: Spend X amount each 6 months.
This is very important. As you will know, development cost alot if you don't do it right. EVen if you develop a domain right, you're done. And can't sell it.

Experience guys know, but they will tell you its hard for them too.

So how can it be easy for you?
Its not.

Ask yourself this question. What if you blew $5 on buy 2 names, and can't sell it? Or force to sell it for losses? Like loss of $3k in 6 months.

Ask your yourself that. If you are okay with it.
Prepare for losses.

 

[NLP]

Rather than picking arbitrary investments (although CVCV .coms are a pretty good bet, and you could probably get one for about $4k), choose a subject area you have an interest in, or know a lot of people in. Any name will be easier to sell with a list of qualified contacts.

So do what you know - you probably have a few interests outside of domaining, so if it's computers, buy a couple of great computer names, or if you have a medical background, or business....you get the drift.

Or just scan lists of names for sale and pick the ones you have a "gut feeling" you could sell.

 

[tech4]

NLP is advice is half good.

1. You might or might not be able to sell your cvcv. Why is that?
For one, you only buy 1.
2. CVCV are known in domainer's world. If you purchase from a domainer (Most likely) you are not going to sell back and make a profit in this market. Even if the market improves. You need an end user
3. Again, your pick may not be the best because you are not experienced.

Its like, I have 150K what should I do? Buy 1 thing and hope it will sell to make my money? SlIM to NONE.

Unless you are lucky.

Its like investing in 1 thing and hoping to be rich.

Anyway.
My advice is to start out smaller,
Limit your losses by having a plan on how much to spend each quarter (3 months)
Learn first.

If you buy 1 cvcv....chances are you have 0% of selling it to anyone. Except for domainer, which might have to sell at a loss.

So what's the point?
Everyone starting out will fail, that's where they will learn.

Learning curve is longer for newbie. <---you must learn gradually like everyone else.
No matter how successful you are in other fields.

 

[allboeing]

I agree with tech4 one thing wont get you anywhere look at zuckerberg he had some other sites before facebook but then he hit jackpot now don't interpret that as you will make a facebook highly unlikely.
However when dealing with Domainers make sure there not over-selling because a lot of people do this now e.g they buy a domain for 2k its worth say 2.5k and then they sell it to a newbie with money for 5k if you fall for that loss is inevitable again another point I agree with tech4 on hes right you'll make a loss if your not extremely careful but your doubtful to get anything good from hand-reg try using drop-catchers you'll get better names and your money will go further.

 

[tech4]

Thanks.

Drop catcher might be good, since its an indication of other's interest in the same domain name.

But spread out, have a plan to spend. Don't spend it all on 1 purchase.

 

[allboeing]

Thanks.

Drop catcher might be good, since its an indication of other's interest in the same domain name.

But spread out, have a plan to spend. Don't spend it all on 1 purchase.

Exactly nothing lasts forever and not every domain is good

 

[verbster]

No offense (seriously), but If you don't know domains well enough to know which are liquid and/or price stable, why would you speculate in them with your hard eaned cash and not something a little more tangible that you are comfortable with?

 

[tech4]

To reply to verbster: even though I think he's talking to the the OP

Everyone has to start out somewhere, its not like you came into a field with full knowledge of what to do and what not. The point is learning.

You can't succeed if you don't try. If you try, you will fail, unless you are lucky, but failure is part of life, therefore you will fail in something.

 

[NLP]

No offense (seriously), but If you don't know domains well enough to know which are liquid and/or price stable, why would you speculate in them with your hard eaned cash and not something a little more tangible that you are comfortable with?

Verbster has a good point. If you haven't gone through the learning curve that is inevitable in domaining, I wouldn't plan on spending the entire $5k. Maybe set aside $500 or $1000, and see what you can do with it. Save the rest.

It really takes a while to hone that sense of what will sell, and it's not an exact science. I wouldn't say I'm "there yet," but there is a MASSIVE difference in the quality of names I'm registering and purchasing nowadays compared to 1-2 years ago.

Even if this is disposable money to you, it's not a wise investment unless you really know what you're doing. This can be accomplished through:

1. Reading as much as you can on the boards
2. Buy some lower-priced names and attempt to sell them, see what sort of response you get from end users
3. Ask for appraisals from real people (a number of domain brokers offer this service, I don't mean Estibot or Valuate)

Once you find something that sells, register more of that same thing.

Keep us posted about what you plan to do! Sounds exciting.

 

[G_C]

Howdy folks,

Thanks a bunch for the feedback so far - and please do keep it coming. The option I'm looking at the most right now is purchasing relatively valuable expiring domain names, rather than falling into the "handreg and flip for profit" mentality. I'm mostly looking at meaningful two-word .com domains potentially valuable to end users and resellers alike.

Regarding my experience - I did sell a few domains back in the day, so I wouldn't say that domaining is an entirely new field of work for me (in fact, that's how I started out online - talk about coming a full circle!) I intentionally left the question open-ended to get as much diverse feedback as possible and see if there's any idea I missed.

 

[networkguy]

Howdy folks,

I recently came into possession of a chunk of cash and am looking to reinvest that into domain names. To this end, I'm wondering - how would you invest $5,000 in this business to ensure maximum liquidity (and, by that, I mean fast turnover?) I'm prepared to sacrifice some of the lucrative margins associated with holding onto a domain name for a long period of time to find the right end user.

Looking forward to your feedback,
George

invest in NNNN.com's :imho: only going up in value.

 

[classicsjunky]

I would take 1k and buy a decent domain and develop it. The amount of time you spend buying then trying to sell a domain (maybe for a profit) you could develop a nice quality site. Actually you don't even need a decent domain, you could take a seemingly worthless domain and put good useful content on it and it will make you money.

 

[G_C]

I would take 1k and buy a decent domain and develop it. The amount of time you spend buying then trying to sell a domain (maybe for a profit) you could develop a nice quality site. Actually you don't even need a decent domain, you could take a seemingly worthless domain and put good useful content on it and it will make you money.

This is actually a very interesting idea - can you name a few examples?

 

[syncvb]

As already pointed out,Never put all the 5000 dollars in one basket.You should divide the money into following chucks apart from normal buying and selling IMHO-

01.Revenue domains (which can give a decent revenue on parking).I know that domain parking is not what is used to be some time before,but it gives you something back every month.

02.Domain Development: Buy a domain and put quality content to get some good PPC earnings.If you are completely new to this and it takes time then go for buying established and earning websites.

Before investing you must have in mind that you should have some resources from where you can recover,if everything fails.The above are just two ways to get some money back if normal buying and selling fails.

As a complete and DUMB newbie I have invested almost $5k (before any research and reading) and thus finding it very hard to recover.So if you a complete new to domain world ,please spend some quality time on NP and some domaining blogs before touching that $5000. Just two cents from a n00b.

 

[classicsjunky]

This is actually a very interesting idea - can you name a few examples?

I would first suggest you choose a topic that you won't loose interest in. You are going to need to put in some time developing and promoting your site everyday so if you enjoy the topic it will be much easier.
As far as how to develop there are many ways. The easiest and least expensive would be affiliate marketing or blogging.
I would choose your topic, then research what that niche is missing, then research if there is a market for it, then head in that direction if it looks promising.

 

[r3born]

I would build a network of sites around 2-3 topics that you like.
Outsource the content creation and link-building, work on domain selection and purchase existing sites within these niches. Optimize monetization. Interlink the sites in an intelligent way to dominate the search engines.

Doing this will provide you with a better annual return than any bank account can offer.

If you are interested, we can discuss this more in details. BTW, I'm planning to move to Geneva in a few years

 

[tech4]

Minisite -waste of time and money. Unless yours is a great domain with type in traffic, that will help, all other cases, waste.

 

[soggyindo]

Hi George,
I'd suggest talking to folks already making money in this business, state your aims, and work out a deal.

Any percentage you would pay them (for a site, domain, advice, etc) would be far less than the 'trial and error' tax from learning it yourself.

 

[richrf]

Howdy folks,

I recently came into possession of a chunk of cash and am looking to reinvest that into domain names. To this end, I'm wondering - how would you invest $5,000 in this business to ensure maximum liquidity (and, by that, I mean fast turnover?) I'm prepared to sacrifice some of the lucrative margins associated with holding onto a domain name for a long period of time to find the right end user.

Looking forward to your feedback,
George

Hi George,

Sounds like you want to speculate not invest. If you speculate, you can probably say good-bye to your money. If you want to invest, then take you time and understand what you wish to invest in. However, I can honestly say that there is very little investment opportunities anymore anywhere nowadays - be it housing, stocks, bonds, etc. It is all speculation for the foreseeable future - except for the people who have inside knowledge.