.tv Is a 10k .tv sale something special?

[gr8trfoo]

This is a thread in response to an alleged report of 3 10k+ sales and more specifically the commentary therein that there is "no stopping .tv" and "naysayers are full of shit".

http://www.namepros.com/423232-report-tv-sales-here-32.html#post4302147

I just sold, Eyecare.tv and Medico.tv for $20,000 ($10,000 each name) Also, sold another .tv for mid-5 figure recently but NDA. Been in .tv since 2000 and the offers and sales are amazing. No stopping .tv and the "naysayers" are full of shit, they don't know what there talking about!

Well when it comes to certain popular opinions about .tv I'm one of those naysayers now. I didn't start out as one. In fact by 2008 I'd probably invested more money in the ext than most people here hope to make. I still hold a rather sizable portfolio (1000+ names) though I'm not accepting offers for the vast majority of those.

During the time I held a substantial .tv portfolio for sale I rarely recived an inquiry let alone made a sale. All the while my .com's did great (as usual). I do find it very interesting that so many reports of sales are vague and cant be fully disclosed due to "NDA". I've sold at least a thousand .com's and maybe only a handful of times was there a demand that there be no disclosure.

In my opinion a 10k sale is puny. It would hardly rate a mention in .com because sales like that happen all the time there. Here they are the rare exception and merit a vigorous round of crowing from the gallery.

It wasnt long ago that for about year you couldnt hardly even sell a .tv name. There's been a regular boom and bust cycle in this ext and right now it looks like we're in the boom again. Now some would say that its only UP from here and that would be great if its true. But I would strongly caution those considering investment to tread carefully and keep in mind that despite the present exuberance the most likely next step based on past results is not even more and greater sales but rather an extended period of low-to-no sales.

I think .tv is attractive to many who feel priced out of the .com market. They see an attractive single term .tv selling for much less than what a 2 or 3 term .com might go for and think "this could be a great bargain" and that if the market for these turns around or if the public starts adopting .tv then they'll stand to make a ton of money on the flip. Then reports like eyecare.tv come in and they say YeaHHHHHH! and jump in with both feet only to discover later that there one-term .tv is no eyecare and the offers arnt as amazing as they'd hoped.

Dont get me wrong - I do love .tv names! I wouldnt be holding on to so many if I didn't. Just not for resale.!! In my experience they are pitiful investments. They could be great if you have a need to brand something to do with video but other than that is a big speculation.

My best advice for those looking to make good $$ in domaining - look to the .com drops! Its really no secret anymore. There are tons of great names being dropped. And if you have a little bit more cash to spend and want to make an absolute killing - buy auction names off Sedo and NameJet!!! I have no problem picking up scores there every week and offers do roll in pretty regular. Just .com though! Ignore everything but the good .com's and I can practically guarantee you'll make 2-3 times as much money in half the time as you will screwing around with non-.com's of any kind. .me/.co/.tv/.etc these are all great if you have a need to build a site and want a different name, but companies with cash still want .com more than anything.

 

[bmugford]

I do find it very interesting that so many reports of sales are vague and cant be fully disclosed due to "NDA". I've sold at least a thousand .com's and maybe only a handful of times was there a demand that there be no disclosure.

I do find this somewhat amusing about .TV as well. It is interesting that so many great .TV sales are subject to NDA.

I have sold many domains and the topic rarely, if ever comes up.

Brad

 

[DU]

I do find this somewhat amusing about .TV as well. It is interesting that so many great .TV sales are subject to NDA.

I have sold many domains and the topic rarely, if ever comes up.

Brad

It's common practice to NDA Sedo sales. Many sales are NDA contractually. Many sales are NDA through just a broker's promise. Sometimes it's just like the military - don't ask, don't tell.

It's not unusual in non .TV land like in .COM

The reality is that .COM/.DE/.other sales FAR FAR outnumbers .TV for the most part so no on jumps up and down at the 50 XX,XXX sales they don't see because there are 20 XX,XXX sales they do see in DNJournal every week.

.TV doesn't get enough reported sales volume to mask or hide the NDA sales so when people bring it up automatically discredits the sale somehow. Why people even mention prices on a NDA I find odd though.

The annoying part of .TV is due in part to the pumpers who claim Cheeseburger.TV turned down $25K and StockExchange.TV was a 7 figure sale, and even that Golf.TV was $600K. Every non .com has it's Cheeseburger (.CO has Robert Cline, the Fake Robert Cline, the Real Robert Cline..etc)

There are just as many anomolies in .com but just not noticed due to volume unless they get really weird and noticeable.

PrivateJet.com anyone?

It doesn't matter anyway. People still look to DN Journal as "the source" when it barely scratches the outer veneer of the surface of what is happening in the world of domains. This surface shows lots of .com sales but few .TV sales and that leads to the disparate number of NDA claims, imho.

---------- Post added at 12:37 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:24 PM ----------

i do still belive that .tv's can make for useful brands and intend to eventually employ my holdings as such. i've never wavered from that stance. it still might be another couple of years before i get it going or maybe another 10.

What happened to saving the world?

You're a very interesting person mr Finster and one I would think would be a blast to hang out and shoot the breeze with.

I hope the tide turns in your favor and .TV becomes the new...... .in?

 

[carob]

It's common practice to NDA Sedo sales.

Somewhere recently Sedo gave a figure for what % of sales there are NDA - I think it was prompted by the talk about Sedo including escrow only sales in their figures. Can anyone find the figure? They do charge the escrow-only transactions a fee for privacy like that.

 

[ThreeD]

Just a little note..

i'm just saying that the *real* money to be made in domaining is not in .tv (or .me/.info/.co/etc)

I doubt Rick Schwartz, Michael Berkens or Ammar Kubba believe you. Does Meet.me ring any bells?

 

[gr8trfoo]

What happened to saving the world?

saving the world needs a brand!

my original thought was simply using local geos as brands to attract local audiences and then using audience as a bully pulpit. easier said than done. success involves a number of rather complex process all coming together. so far the only real progress i've made is the wholesale acquisition of names. that in itself would have been a practically impossible feat in .com and i do like .tv becasue they they say "new/fresh/diff".

so here i am, undoubtably the largest geo .tv holder by a country mile and what gnaws on me isnt the money spent and whatever likelyhood i may or may not have to recoup that. i could care less. no what really gets me is that i simply may not succeed in "saving the world" and will have to bear witness in the worst ways to the consequence of my failure.

You're a very interesting person mr Finster and one I would think would be a blast to hang out and shoot the breeze with.

haha. thanks default. one of these days for sure.


anyway, i have to knuckledown and get a lot of backed up work done. wont be able to reply to things here for at least a couple days. till then, peace out.

 

[freedom30]

...http://www.domainnamelife.com/2012/05/02/there-goes-the-neighborhood-com-domainer-feeling-the-pinch/

my thoughts...

 

[Kate]

The fact of the matter, though, is that the greatest enemy that .com has is time, the 20th century fades as does the strength of the com extension and the next century develops new ideas, technology and a new generation that is less concerned about the letters to the right of the dot.The younger users of cyberspace could care less about a dot com, dot tv or dot anything else.

Yes, .com is dying, .biz and .co (and the .tv of course) are the future.
The younger users are indeed completely indifferent to URLs. Everybody is launching sites on extensions they couldn't pinpoint on a map nowadays.
Thanks for the insight. You're the Alvin Toffler of domain names we've been waiting for :blink:

More seriously, trying to bank on a shift of Internet trends is speculation.

The only way to succeed in this business it to invest in what works today. You need to make a profit now in order to get the ball rolling, not buy a lottery ticket for the next decade. The odds are that you will make the wrong guess.
That's what many newbies fail to realize.

That being said, .com has to share the throne with the genuine ccTLDs that have a genuine local market.
The vanity and rebranded gTLDs are just distraction :talk:

Interestingly there seems to be no middle ground in .tv. People are either making impressive sales or no sales at all.
Don't say that the skeptics are too tough on the TLD.
.tv is not run like a normal extension. Never has been.

 

[DU]

The only way to succeed in this business it to invest in what works today.

What works best is cybersquatting, property blackmail, front running, shill bidding, identity faking, cheating advertisers and generally taking advantage of people. Then .com, ccTLD and then .TV/.me and everything else.

I should write a handbook.

 

[carob]

It's common practice to NDA Sedo sales.

What Sedo say is this about their sales in 2011:

The total sales volume was $84,431,965, although 80% of sales revenue consisted of confidential sales.

http://sedo.com/fileadmin/documents/pressdownload/Q4_2011_DomainMarketStudy_US.pdf

On page 8 of that report you get a graph and this:

The chart to the right is a good indicator of the preferred price points for
both end users and domain investors. A massive 47% of traded domain
names during 2011 were sold at prices at or under $500. Domains in this
category typically consist of at least two keywords, though the keyword
language does not always match the associated TLD. A majority of names
in this price category are listed at Buy Now prices, which increases the
chance of selling a domain name. This also accounts for why many sellers
are choosing to use Buy Now prices for their domain portfolio.
Domains between $500 and $2,500 (38%) are frequently shorter, and
often with more exotic TLDs, such as nex.tv (€2,500). With just 8% of the
premium or generic and are frequently .com or other top-selling TLDs. As a
more significant investment, it is unsurprising that this price range appeals
to small-to-medium businesses and individual investors.
Any larger business may also choose to develop their domain name
portfolio with top, premium, keyword-rich domains, however at a higher
price point. From $10,000 and up—just 6% of the market—these purchases
are often by big brands or companies looking to expand online.

BTW the TLD graph on page 4 does not include .tv any more so it accounts for less than 1% of sales at Sedo - it used to appear in those graphs, so it used to hit at least 1%, maybe 1.5%, you could check the old annual reports still on Sedo's site if you really want to know.

 

[freedom30]

Yes, .com is dying, .biz and .co (and the .tv of course) are the future.
The younger users are indeed completely indifferent to URLs. Everybody is launching sites on extensions they couldn't pinpoint on a map nowadays.
Thanks for the insight. You're the Alvin Toffler of domain names we've been waiting for :blink:

More seriously, trying to bank on a shift of Internet trends is speculation.

The only way to succeed in this business it to invest in what works today. You need to make a profit now in order to get the ball rolling, not buy a lottery ticket for the next decade. The odds are that you will make the wrong guess.
That's what many newbies fail to realize.

That being said, .com has to share the throne with the genuine ccTLDs that have a genuine local market.
The vanity and rebranded gTLDs are just distraction :talk:

Interestingly there seems to be no middle ground in .tv. People are either making impressive sales or no sales at all.
Don't say that the skeptics are too tough on the TLD.
.tv is not run like a normal extension. Never has been.

...now say that in English without the smilies, it dilutes the message...if you can't that's ok as well...

 

[Dave]

I suppose it depends on whether $10k means a lot to the seller and what the seller's objectives were at the time of the sale.

The only way to succeed in this business it to invest in what works today. You need to make a profit now in order to get the ball rolling, not buy a lottery ticket for the next decade. The odds are that you will make the wrong guess.
That's what many newbies fail to realize.

I do agree with this to some degree. On one hand trends come and go so buying and selling domains in sync with the trends will yield profit. On the other hand there will always be certain keywords that will hold value now and in 10 years time assuming the market for said tld hasn't died out.

Sometimes it's all about taking risks, eh?

 

[DnEbook]

Do you know how much cheap beer i could buy in the Philippines with 10k

 

[*AllThings.tv*]

Guys I personally think there is money to be made in any extension HOWEVER I do agree with Fin up to a point lets be honest some of the .TV sales I have seen are quite suspicious with the NDA bla bbla.domains still parked bla bla not in use .(Not mentioning anyone )

Just remember the same could be said of any extension especially where there are 100X more that could theoretically be made. Some say this thinking could apply equally if not more so to new extensions and old, like .co, .com, .mobi.

It is a rumor with no fact. I have seen NDAs, I have even seen screenshots from Escrow.com of a 6 figure sale. Could someone go to great length to fabricate something? Definitely, but it is unlikely that multiple people would conspire with each other without communicating directly about their intent. Unless of course you want to argue that people are conspiring or colluding to prop up the .tv extension in which case...why now? Why not 10 years ago?

Perhaps it is just that we are seeing awareness of extensions beyond .com take root and .TV's logical fit with the Internet is just coming into focus at the present time for a much larger audience. It doesn't hurt that demand for .com is high and supply is low. I will continue to say if all extensions were launched as if the Internet started today, .TV would be in the top 5 and we wouldn't even be having this discussion. In the long run, .TV wins. The issue is that nobody knows when the long run comes to fruition whereas .COM is touted as a great bet for both the short and long term.

---------- Post added at 06:25 PM ---------- Previous post was at 05:58 PM ----------

i think the facts are plain for anyone to see that there is more money in .com and less in tv.

Spell it out Fin. Tell me the names you invested in .COM and how much of a return you generated on your investment. I think .COM has its place and I realize that the # of domainers consuming domains can absorb a lot of supply. Are you buying and selling for 10, 20, 30, 50%? Who are you selling these to? Other domainers? Who often are you buying and selling?

I think you can eek out a living in domaining but it is tough to do much more. That is why we don't see a lot of people doing it but it appears to be a good hobby for the rest who enjoy making some side cash.

what i've said is that i personaly have lost a lot in .tv specualtion. and i no longer do any serious speculating.

Perhaps, you may be sensitive because you have lost a lot in .TV speculation and you feel the need to discourage others from investing in the extension altogether even though you, by your own admission "should have invested in the ones that have traffic" when someone in this thread said, "fin you just invested in the wrong tv names."

when i see obvious attempts at boosterism i like to remind people that a lot of what gets said about .tv being great comes from self-interested parties who stand to benefit if more people will think .tv is valuable and that there is another side to it.

In the same way you argue that those who speak about their .TV experiences stand to gain by alleged attempts at so-called boosterism, the same argument can be made against you in that you stand to gain if you are invested in .com and you dissuade people from investing in .TV.

If you believe a few parties have enough influence to manipulate the market for .TV names, then I'd like to know what facts you base your conclusion. In so far as this argument has been made in the past, no evidence has come to light, leaving it a rumor that gets pushed out there at least once a year by those who generally have lost money in the extension.

i am not speculating on .tv - not in any way a domainer would respect or appreciate. i do still engage in some domain speculation but only in .com names and lot less of that than ever before.

Since when is speculation not speculation? If it is not guaranteed, then it is speculation. Plain and simple.

Speculation is a financial action that does not promise safety of capital investment along with the return on the principal sum.

And if a domainer would not respect or appreciate what you are doing, then it sounds illegal or a bad idea, or possibly both.

i continue to buy certain specific .tv names for an ongoing idea that i have. i do not foresee ever being able to sell these names profitably and in fact have no plans to ever sell them at all. i'm sure that if i tried to sell these now i would lose the majority of money that was spent on them. if this project were more speculation than i would have to count my total losses quite a bit higher that than mere couple hundred k that i do now.

Well, I am not really a domainer. I am more of a developer/investor. It sounds like what you are doing is a bad idea and that you will continue to lose money in .TV following such a path. But that is my opinion and I respect that people find new ways to make money from completely asinine ideas or ideas already done by others who come before them.

anythings possible. gee is it possible that you and others continue to promote .tv as solid money maker so that you can sell your holdings for more? (or sell them at all for that matter?).

WOW?!?!? Really? I mean please provide me with a link where i am the one promoting propaganda that claims you can make solid money in .TV. It does not exist.

however i'm not aware that i'm specifically seeking out "desperate" sellers. in fact i mostly buy from auctions becasue thats where the "great domains", the same ones that would-be .tv millionaires who wanted "a lot" for their properties, most often wind up once the real commercial realities set in. but we can talk more about that on your forum in the thread you started for the topic. i already left my initial reply there.

Hmm, well, I am not a .tv millionaire and I doubt there will be any in the near future.

the best propaganda is the truth. you may question my motives but can you poke holes in the truth? can you show ANY evidence that .tv is overall a better source of income and profit than .com?

See that is the classic response when your argument has been weakened. I never said .TV is overall a better source of income and profit than .com. I don't think the jury is out on that one, but I know that I believe there is more opportunity in .COM especially since public awareness of the extension still increases.

how about the truth that the market for .tv has regularly been a boom-to-bust cycle and that we are in the high end of the latest one?

The market for .TV domains fluctuates just like .COM. Both are also affected by the economy. So to imply that the fluctuations seen in .TV are primary caused by the nature of the extension isn't completely accurate in the slightest and is quite misleading.

i personally havnt been keeping records for this but i suspect that you have or know someone who has. maybe you could show us that there isnt such a thing a sharp and prolonged market bottom for .tv?

I don't really understand your question. Would you mind rephrasing it?

 

[DnEbook]

Has finster become Snoopy's evil twin ???

.....we may never know !

 

[DU]

Do you know how much cheap beer i could buy in the Philippines with 10k

Too much. You'd be better of buying good beer, imho.

 

[DnEbook]

Too much. You'd be better of buying good beer, imho.

San Miguel .......oh how i miss thee

 

[*AllThings.tv*]

Has finster become Snoopy's evil twin ???

.....we may never know !

Snoopy has a tag along...isn't it Woodstock?

 

[DnEbook]

Snoopy has a tag along...isn't it Woodstock?

Ha HA Ha

 

[RPK]

Wanted to weigh in on this issue. I'm reading Finster a bit differently then others it seems. Although I am not a huge player in the extension I have been consistently active for the last 5-6 years and have great relationships with everyone.

I also have made my mistakes with the extension and have learned that it is not the same as other extensions. It is more of a niche and the costs are higher to play. I see .com as the $5 Black Jack Table and .TV as the $20 Table. I have been profitable in .TV every year since I started investing. At one point I owned about 900 .tv domains and sold hundreds of them and dropped hundreds more. I quickly adapted to the extension and thank G-d have been doing well.

I must admit that I don't invest in any other extension besides .tv (with the exception of maybe 10 .com's)since I believe in sticking to a niche and working with what you know. I do believe there is a ton of money to be made in .com, but I'd rather be at the top of the .tv game (maybe top 50 .tv domainers) then to be one of tens of thousands in the .com game.

Speculation is different between .com and .tv and I think that is really what Finster was pointing out. If you are a newbie and you read about some great .tv sales it could cause you to go out and reg 10-20 .tv names that may be great if they were a .com, but not so great if it was a .tv. Knowing which names to register in .tv comes with experience. The more experience you have the better you will do.

I have seen many people over the years register really horrible .tv names that I know they are wasting their money on. I used to PM people and privately give them my thoughts, but I stopped that years ago since most people couldn't accept my criticism even though it was coming from a good place.

There is one guy who I am close with in this extension that is doing really, really well now and I remember when he got started he was reging anything and everything. He learned from his mistakes and is now looked at as one of the leaders in the .tv extension.

But if you are one of the tens of thousands of .com investors that don't make any money with domaining and you read a $10k sale of a .tv they may be the type to go and spend good money after bad domains.

The NDA VS/ Non NDA issue is something else entirely. I must have sold about 500 .tv names (most for under $200 back in 2006-2007)and maybe only 10% of the time I am asked to keep it quiet.

Most of the people on AllThings.tv and the veterans of NP's .TV forums know what we are doing, it's the newbies to the extension that I am also worried about.

I keep a list of about 400 available .tv names that I know would all sell for a profit in the .com, but I have to keep myself from registering them since I know it is not as simple in .tv.

Just my 2 cents

 

[*AllThings.tv*]

Great analysis and critique of .TV investing.