discuss It has come to my attention

[Want2learn]

The consensus is stop hand registering names! I just read 99% of hand regs are worthless. Even if that is hyperbole, the broader point is most are not valuable. I have no issues with that sentiment or opinion. I probably would agree that hand regs from recent times are not all that valuable!

I wanted to start a discussion though about the topic. I am about 7g in. Not all hand regs!! That is a lot of money. If I could go back to 12/04/16 I would have bought 10 names or so from aftermarket! Fortunately I am an educator so my livelihood does not depend on this. From my perspective, I made several critical mistakes early on. I will say I registered for 2 years almost 100 domains. I probably added privacy to about 50-75 of them. That alone is probably close to an additional 1100ish dollars. Complete waste. As a newbie then and now, it does irk me that GoDaddy would allow me to register names that are clearly trademark concerns, though I had no idea that was an issue with domains . . . And then when I go to list them for sale they reject them bc of trademark concerns. GoDaddy is wrong for that.

If I posted my domains today, regardless of what you think . . .they would be 100x worse without you all here at NamePros, and that is a fact! I can't go back I can only go forward. I can learn from my mistakes. I will say this, and I mean no disrespect to the Pros that do this well and make money. No disrespect to anyone, but especially those Pros. I think that some times there is a lack of imagination and creativity here. And by here, I mean with domainers broadly. I have some terrible names. Where I probably differ with most here, is I see a lot of improvement in my names. If I mess up and hand reg 100 names and they all suck, like really suck, that is a loss of $599 with eWallhost. That isn't nothing! If I take that same $599, I can buy 1-2 nice 4L. And they are liquid, so lets say I purchased 2 4Ls for 599, I think chances are a year from then I am safely in the 500-600 range minimum. So it is either no loss or -100 . . . and in year 2 it is $12 to renew! With those hand regs worse case scenario that is realistic is they all drop and I'm out 599. That is a big hit. And if say 20 are decent now, 80 drop and renew 20 at 120, so I'm 719 in. Since Im completely speculating here I won't say 20 sold for 100 and I live happily ever after. Lets say 5 sell for 100 a piece. That almost recoups first year.

Anyways, I just wanted to say that at the least that has been my thought process. So like last night I was excited as hell to reg BikeCosts.com. I could not believe it was available. I picked up a few other bike related domains. Shocked. Today I picked up cash4smartphones.com. Im not saying I am selling all of these for XXXX or even high XXX. And maybe for you all, it isn't worth your time if you can't make XXXX or XXXXX on a domain. For me I would be disappointed for 1XX for the domains I mentioned above. I think 4-5XX is where I feel like a success on those specific names. 3xx eh. less than 3xx, still a profit, but disappointed!

Have I made sense, even if you think Im nuts?

 

[garptrader]

What attracts many to domaining is the perception that one can easily make huge returns compared to other investments. Yes, handregs do occasionally sell for hundreds or even thousands of dollars, but most handregs do not work out very well. If you handreg 500 domains at $10 each and sell one for $300 net of commissions, you cannot get too excited - especially when next year's renewals approach. Do you spend another $5k to renew those 499 domains or drop them all to contain your losses? That is when you realize that handregs and new TLDs and Chinese domains are not so cheap after all. If you continue to renew low-quality domains for several years, that money could have been better utilized to obtain a small number of quality domains which do not cost much to renew and wait for the right buyer.

Learn to be picky about your domain investments and quickly identify your mistakes. Renewing bad domains will quickly end your domaining career as you can only lose so much capital before there is nothing left to pay renewals.

 

[Want2learn]

I have yet to renew one of my own crappy hand regs

 

[Hemanttilotia]

I regged FlexiBudget.com yesterday. I don't know what it's worth but still regging domains once in a while.
Else I am damn active on Godaddy auctions and NameJet.

 

[larryscott2559]

The consensus is stop hand registering names! I just read 99% of hand regs are worthless. Even if that is hyperbole, the broader point is most are not valuable. I have no issues with that sentiment or opinion. I probably would agree that hand regs from recent times are not all that valuable!

I wanted to start a discussion though about the topic. I am about 7g in. Not all hand regs!! That is a lot of money. If I could go back to 12/04/16 I would have bought 10 names or so from aftermarket! Fortunately I am an educator so my livelihood does not depend on this. From my perspective, I made several critical mistakes early on. I will say I registered for 2 years almost 100 domains. I probably added privacy to about 50-75 of them. That alone is probably close to an additional 1100ish dollars. Complete waste. As a newbie then and now, it does irk me that GoDaddy would allow me to register names that are clearly trademark concerns, though I had no idea that was an issue with domains . . . And then when I go to list them for sale they reject them bc of trademark concerns. GoDaddy is wrong for that.

If I posted my domains today, regardless of what you think . . .they would be 100x worse without you all here at NamePros, and that is a fact! I can't go back I can only go forward. I can learn from my mistakes. I will say this, and I mean no disrespect to the Pros that do this well and make money. No disrespect to anyone, but especially those Pros. I think that some times there is a lack of imagination and creativity here. And by here, I mean with domainers broadly. I have some terrible names. Where I probably differ with most here, is I see a lot of improvement in my names. If I mess up and hand reg 100 names and they all suck, like really suck, that is a loss of $599 with eWallhost. That isn't nothing! If I take that same $599, I can buy 1-2 nice 4L. And they are liquid, so lets say I purchased 2 4Ls for 599, I think chances are a year from then I am safely in the 500-600 range minimum. So it is either no loss or -100 . . . and in year 2 it is $12 to renew! With those hand regs worse case scenario that is realistic is they all drop and I'm out 599. That is a big hit. And if say 20 are decent now, 80 drop and renew 20 at 120, so I'm 719 in. Since Im completely speculating here I won't say 20 sold for 100 and I live happily ever after. Lets say 5 sell for 100 a piece. That almost recoups first year.

Anyways, I just wanted to say that at the least that has been my thought process. So like last night I was excited as hell to reg BikeCosts.com. I could not believe it was available. I picked up a few other bike related domains. Shocked. Today I picked up cash4smartphones.com. Im not saying I am selling all of these for XXXX or even high XXX. And maybe for you all, it isn't worth your time if you can't make XXXX or XXXXX on a domain. For me I would be disappointed for 1XX for the domains I mentioned above. I think 4-5XX is where I feel like a success on those specific names. 3xx eh. less than 3xx, still a profit, but disappointed!

Have I made sense, even if you think Im nuts?

I don't know 6 domain names I dropped that were hand regs were picked up by HugeDomains 4 other were also snapped up. 1 redirected to a business, 1 a domain investor used to display his domain portfolio, 1 a domain company were selling as a brand and the other i forget. Many more domains I had are being redirected to Uniregistry. All of these were hand regs.

 

[maksimfa]

Thanks for your post and I do appreciate you sharing your experience.

I too have wasted money, but it was primarily my fault. I did pick GOOD names, I just did not sell them to the end users and some just let lapse. Part of it was buying into the new tld BS... fortunately, it was not more than $2k overall.

I think the biggest mistake "domainers" have is that they have no freaking clue about what the eventual end user will do with it. Half of the domains, okay, more than half of the domains here on auction or fixed price are not worth more than $5.... yet folks bid them up.

... yet, I picked up a gem here for less than $5.

The most important part with buying a domain, is selling the domain.

If you buy right, you don't need to wish for a lottery ticket to bail out all of your old bad decisions.

Buy a hand reg for $10.... send out an email blast to potential user base, sell it for $50. I promise you, most of the people who would spam your email.... would think twice and wold likely buy it.

Same name you ask $500? No way, unless end user is desperate.

If you register it right, and have a plan for BEFORE you register it... you will do well.

And have a plan....

I always think to myself from the perspective of... "What can I develop this name into?"

If you have to think more than 10 seconds... it is likely a garbage name.

 

[maksimfa]

Also, I would say the most important part.... don't be lazy and do what 99% of the other domainers will NEVER do.

Pick up the phone and sell the domain to potential end users.

Unless you have money growing on trees, you cannot afford to wait for users to come to you.

 

[maksimfa]

... and the effort we discussed about the MainStreetGuns, that is what you have to think about for EVERY name.

1. Do I know the potential end users?
2. Can I reach them efficiently to offer the domain?
3. Would they buy it?
4. If they don't buy it, can I afford to keep it for a while?
5. Worst case, can I develop it?
6. If I can't, would someone else be stupid enough to buy it from me?

If the answer to all of those questions is yes.... register it.

 

[Marc Riccio]

My thinking is a little different from the senior people here. There is no such thing as a bad name. Just as there is a car for every taste, a dish for every palate, there is someone who is looking for your name. Go on Pinterest and see the names bloggers use.... iloveparsley.com, eatmorebeets.com. .... who in his right mind wants to spend thousands for gwtr.com instead of $100 for mybigfatcarrot.com

The trick is to look around your town, talk to people, talk to your librarian.

Look with new eyes.

All names have value. Maybe not to a grizzled domainer with 20 years in, but someone out there likes kumquatsarecool.com and will pay you $$$ for. Sell a couple every week and you can go to a nice place on your next vacation instead of your back yard.

The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes.
Marcel Proust

 

[maxtorz]

"The consensus is stop hand registering names! I just read 99% of hand regs are worthless."


L/I/M/E/R/I/X .com hand reg 6 days ago....got an offer 48hrs latter
cnc-s/e/r/v/i/c/e/s.com hand reg 11 days ago...got 2 inquiries since
my list goes ON and ON


Lol, I am glad that's the consensus!
More names availability for me to hand register!
Yep, hand registering names is a waste if You don't know what to BUY.

 

[Want2learn]

... and the effort we discussed about the MainStreetGuns, that is what you have to think about for EVERY name.

1. Do I know the potential end users?
2. Can I reach them efficiently to offer the domain?
3. Would they buy it?
4. If they don't buy it, can I afford to keep it for a while?
5. Worst case, can I develop it?
6. If I can't, would someone else be stupid enough to buy it from me?

If the answer to all of those questions is yes.... register it.

I appreciate your feedback in general, and past few posts! I can promise you I am not sitting around waiting for calls or emails! You sent me the list, and I tried to go through it. I then went to google and hacked away at the main street gun owners on main street. I emailed a bunch of them. Then you separated the 18 names for me! Well it looks like I am going to call all of them except the two that said no thanks. I had to change my cell number bc freaking India kept calling because of WHOIS. I have since put a Google number there, and if legit calls come in I will listen to their messages. But I inverted numbers, for example instead of 577 I put 755. I caught my error 25 emails in. Sheesh. Honestly Im like crap. Im not going to re email them. So calls it will be!

Maybe Ill have better luck!

 

[maksimfa]

I appreciate your feedback in general, and past few posts! I can promise you I am not sitting around waiting for calls or emails! You sent me the list, and I tried to go through it. I then went to google and hacked away at the main street gun owners on main street. I emailed a bunch of them. Then you separated the 18 names for me! Well it looks like I am going to call all of them except the two that said no thanks. I had to change my cell number bc freaking India kept calling because of WHOIS. I have since put a Google number there, and if legit calls come in I will listen to their messages. But I inverted numbers, for example instead of 577 I put 755. I caught my error 25 emails in. Sheesh. Honestly Im like crap. Im not going to re email them. So calls it will be!

Maybe Ill have better luck!

Awesome, congrats.

Again, I am not a domainer per say, only sold a few domains that I owned, but I do look at it from the business owner perspective.

Am currently going through a few domains and same as you, sent out the email lists and next up is the phone calls.

For some industries, guns in particular, it is all about the phone call, and folks will be happy to talk to you, just an easy convo.

This way you know if no one wants it... you at least got answers.

Worst case, you can go through the list I sent you, find the stores on main street.

or really, just go back through and offer it for $75.... still more than 7x return on your investment.... and it will easily sell.

 

[Want2learn]

"The consensus is stop hand registering names! I just read 99% of hand regs are worthless."


L/I/M/E/R/I/X .com hand reg 6 days ago....got an offer 48hrs latter
cnc-s/e/r/v/i/c/e/s.com hand reg 11 days ago...got 2 inquiries since
my list goes ON and ON


Lol, I am glad that's the consensus!
More names availability for me to hand register!
Yep, hand registering names is a waste if You don't know what to BUY.

To be fair, and there has been great counsel and advice for me here, I always say Im not a domainer, I think differently. Not better not worse, differently. And because of that I will go down roads that others will not. And I am okay with that. I still want to sharpen my craft with domaining so to speak. I have already concluded if I couldn't be successful at all with hand regs, Id probably stop domaining. But and this is a big but, I want to refocus my energy and attention in such a way that I don't need that "lotto" to bail me out. I want to find and create better names

 

[Want2learn]

Awesome, congrats.

Again, I am not a domainer per say, only sold a few domains that I owned, but I do look at it from the business owner perspective.

Am currently going through a few domains and same as you, sent out the email lists and next up is the phone calls.

For some industries, guns in particular, it is all about the phone call, and folks will be happy to talk to you, just an easy convo.

This way you know if no one wants it... you at least got answers.

Worst case, you can go through the list I sent you, find the stores on main street.

or really, just go back through and offer it for $75.... still more than 7x return on your investment.... and it will easily sell.

7x return on investment is money in the bank in any industry! But does it make sense to you that for me, on a heart level, it would hurt to sell it for $75? I don't mean I won't sell it. I don't mean I am attached to it. I will say that I have an infatuation with it, and think it is one of my better names. I mean I sold lovesmiled.com and I freaking kick myself for letting it go for 100. If you are primarily analytical, I just did some crazy talk! Eh . . .

 

[maksimfa]

7x return on investment is money in the bank in any industry! But does it make sense to you that for me, on a heart level, it would hurt to sell it for $75? I don't mean I won't sell it. I don't mean I am attached to it. I will say that I have an infatuation with it, and think it is one of my better names. I mean I sold lovesmiled.com and I freaking kick myself for letting it go for 100. If you are primarily analytical, I just did some crazy talk! Eh . . .

A bird in the hand is better than two in a bush.

You can be either looking for continual profits, or.... invest A LOT more money trying to find someone who is willing to spend more.

I would rather take some money and profits and move on to more names.
Rinse... Repeat.

 

[Kuffy]

Lets start to call them "mind regs" instead of "hand regs", Mind regs are a great way for new domainers to test the water without spending too much money. Lets face it, if you can't make money with mind regs, you won't make money buying registered names.

 

[frank-germany]

I can buy 1-2 nice 4L. And they are liquid, so lets say I purchased 2 4Ls for 599, I think chances are a year from then I am safely in the 500-600 range minimum. So it is either no loss or -100 . . . and in year 2 it is $12 to renew! With those hand regs worse case scenario that is realistic is they all drop and I'm out 599. That is a big hit. And if say 20 are decent now, 80 drop and renew 20 at 120, so I'm 719 in. Since Im completely speculating here I won't say 20 sold for 100 and I live happily ever after. Lets say 5 sell for 100 a piece. That almost recoups first year.

if you get good 4l.com they may sell for $x.xxx USD
if you wait long enough, which you should do

your handregs each could make $488 to $4.888 USD each
just you have to add that price tag
and wait long enough

and yes they should be .com
and usefull for somebody

 

[frank-germany]

it's not like you can find gems using your brains like you could in 1996.

I highly doubt that

its same as in 1996

in 1996 nobody knew
what would be valuable in 2017

so they took a heavy risk

now today your risk is actually lower
as you do know domains are selling
they didn't know that for sure in 1996

and even in 1996
you needed a lot of phantasy
to imagine what would become valuable eventually


use your brain
and take some risks

 

[frank-germany]

But I do think BikeCosts regardless of the past is valuable.

at least my bike doesn't cost anything ....

 

[frank-germany]

@iwanttolearn, Let me help you save some money with your handregging. I'll set you up at dotWhateverDomains.com with $9 registrations. That will help cut down on some regging expenses. LMK if you'd like to do so.

epik $8.49 usd

 

[Kuffy]

Lets start to call them "mind regs" instead of "hand regs", Mind regs are a great way for new domainers to test the water without spending too much money. Lets face it, if you can't make money with mind regs, you won't make money buying registered names.

 

[Want2learn]

at least my bike doesn't cost anything ....

Wait till you need a new tire or chain! I will say I laughed when I read your post here! It was refreshing to see a sense of humor around here

 

[Want2learn]

epik $8.49 usd

eWallhost 5.99!

 

[Federer]

I have personally hand registered 3800 .COM domain names (at low promo prices) since Jan '17-Feb '17 and have already sold $23K worth in 4-5 months.
You need to pick the right types of domains (HugeDomains/Mike Mann/BuyDomains have done this on a massive scale - especially HD). The key is > the ones that do sell need to cover the many that do not (in the course of any given year). The sales (1-1.5% if you know what you are doing) need to cover renewals and provide you with reasonable profits.
You also need patience, determination and a fast eagle-eye when going over lists of hundreds of thousands of names.

 

[frank-germany]

Lets start to call them "mind regs" instead of "hand regs", Mind regs are a great way for new domainers to test the water without spending too much money. Lets face it, if you can't make money with mind regs, you won't make money buying registered names.

thats like papertrading

stocks

that won't help you

 

[frank-germany]

eWallhost 5.99!

as far as I know the registrar has to pay 7.73 USD or so
I would avoid a company offering a lower price