discuss It's time everyone raise their prices

[enterscope]

It has long been said that $2500 is the sweet spot for domain pricing, but that was 10+ years ago. It's pushing 2025 and average price should be around $5000 now. Heck, businesses drop $10k on websites every day, how much more for their brand?

With inflation, rising registration fees at domain registrars and other costs, etc. it only makes sense to raise prices.

That said, I wouldn't go pricing junk domains at $5k, but you might as well because chances are no one is going to buy it anyway.

 

[BaileyUK]

There's been plenty of talk from a couple of prominent members, (I don't think it's more than a couple) about keeping prices high but the reality is there has been lots of changes in the market over the last 10 or so years, that influence the current price. Just wishing for it isn't enough to necessarily justify it.

10 years ago, Social influence wasn't the billion dollar industry it is today. The advertising industry has far more outlets for its creative resources. 10 years ago the internet and its domain structure was be all and end all, Not so today.

It's easy to understand why a particular group are more impacted by this trend to the $2,000 dollar norm. A large, reasonably good inventory has taken years to build but prices are being squeezed on the resale end. Far more players with wide ranging abilities are also out there these days.

I think most have come to accept, the very top end, will stay but when you take a look at the market, it's amazing how diverse that has become over the last 10 years. There's some real curve-balls in that market today.

So how can we justify an increase in the bread and butter domains, I don't think we can apart from large inventory holders seeking to create a growing demand that really isn't there anymore. Trust me I still wish it was 2014. I hate to know I'm still selling the same value of domains for $2000 as I was 10 years ago. But when I up them to 4k or more, they don't sell. I further come to accept that maybe I just don't hold the inventory that I once had, yep all those past good sales, thinned me out.

 

[Kyle Tully]

It has long been said that $2500 is the sweet spot for domain pricing, but that was 10+ years ago. It's pushing 2025 and average price should be around $5000 now. Heck, businesses drop $10k on websites every day, how much more for their brand?

With inflation, rising registration fees at domain registrars and other costs, etc. it only makes sense to raise prices.

That said, I wouldn't go pricing junk domains at $5k, but you might as well because chances are no one is going to buy it anyway.

When you filter out wholesale sales, the average selling price of many good 2-word keyword names is over $4k. And this is for reported sales. Many of us are not reporting sales of our best keywords to keep competition somewhat at bay.

Averages get skewed by wholesale data, lower quality / 3-word names, and people who have priced their good names based on these misguided averages.

If you have good quality 2-word names you should be pricing accordingly. Market averages mean nothing to your personal portfolio.

I personally price around:

- 50% of my names at $4888.
- 15% at $2888 (lowest I will sell a .com for outside of liquidations before dropping.)
- 25% up to $25k
- 10% anywhere from 30k - 250k.

My average selling price is a fraction over $6k and average buy price of those names is just under $27. Most common sale price is $4888. STR right around 1%.

Would I sell more if I sold at $2500? Maybe. Would I sell 2-3X as much to make up for the difference? Not sure... but what I do know is good names are getting both harder to find and more expensive at wholesale so I'm not willing to let my names go for less.

 

[bmugford]

I think the sweet spot is just what it is.

Regardless of quality, there are not that many 5 figure buyers (or higher).

The sweet spot number might not change, but the average quality of domains in that sweet spot has gone down IMO.

Brad

 

[Kyle Tully]

The sweet spot number might not change, but the average quality of domains in that sweet spot has gone down IMO.

Definitely agree with this.

As an example of harder to find / more expensive, just a few months ago I could go through tomorrow's GD list and if I added 10 names to my watch list it would look something like this:

- 10 names added to watch list
- 5 names immediately bid up at auction beyond what I want to pay
- 3 names bid up in the last 5 mins beyond what i want to pay
- 2 names go to closeouts and maybe 1 of them gets to 5/11 which is where I would grab it

Today those numbers look like this:

- 10 names added to watch list
- 10 names immediately bid up at auction beyond what I want to pay

 

[BaileyUK]

May I add an awareness and certainly from my own perspective is true. 10 to 25 years ago, Domains were my life, Pretty much every waken moment, had searches, sales, even outbound was serving me quite well. I wonder how many of us have switched-off but still hold reasonably sized portfolios.

We haven't lost interest but find a better life balance in just maintaining what we have. I know I'm not so driven by sales price anymore, most of these names I've held for many a year but they still sell, at the rate of a couple each year. I'm just wondering how many of the old hands have adopted, A sale is a sale mentality rather than keep up-to-date with all aspects of the market.

I guess we would have to pull apart the registration date history and change of ownership. (If any) I think there is still a large proportion of people that got in reasonably early but may have different priorities today, hence a inclination to take any reasonably good offer

 

[bmugford]

May I add an awareness and certainly from my own perspective is true. 10 to 25 years ago, Domains were my life, Pretty much every waken moment, had searches, sales, even outbound was serving me quite well. I wonder how many of us have switched-off but still hold reasonably sized portfolios.

We haven't lost interest but find a better life balance in just maintaining what we have. I know I'm not so driven by sales price anymore, most of these names I've held for many a year but they still sell, at the rate of a couple each year. I'm just wondering how many of the old hands have adopted, A sale is a sale mentality rather than keep up-to-date with all aspects of the market.

I guess we would have to pull apart the registration date history and change of ownership. (If any) I think there is still a large proportion of people that got in reasonably early but may have different priorities today, hence a inclination to take any reasonably good offer

Me. My business is largely on auto-pilot with some sales and new buys.

I don't spend nearly the amount of time now that I did years ago.

Mainly, because I don't see as many appealing opportunities as in the past on the buy side.

Brad

 

[URL Stream]

When you filter out wholesale sales, the average selling price of many good 2-word keyword names is over $4k. And this is for reported sales. Many of us are not reporting sales of our best keywords to keep competition somewhat at bay.

Averages get skewed by wholesale data, lower quality / 3-word names, and people who have priced their good names based on these misguided averages.

I think the sweet spot is just what it is.

Regardless of quality, there are not that many 5 figure buyers (or higher).

A quick look at NB using the filters: dictionary (2 words) and venue-private (which assumes retail) for the most recent 100 sales shows an average sale price of just below $3,000. Removing the top three five-figure sales from the equation brings the average price down to $2,500. Feel free to double-check my math and formula. Maybe Bob can chime in, this is one of the many areas at which he shines.

 

[Kyle Tully]

A quick look at NB using the filters: dictionary (2 words) and venue-private (which assumes retail) for the most recent 100 sales shows an average sale price of just below $3,000. Removing the top three five-figure sales from the equation brings the average price down to $2,500. Feel free to double-check my math and formula. Maybe Bob can chime in, this is one of the many areas at which he shines.

Yes if you are looking at any random two word combo the average is going to be lower.

I don't buy random two word names.

I have specific keywords I target based on data, businesses, and trends that I have specific industry knowledge of.

Using any of my top keywords as a filter and looking at Afternic, Private, Sedo, and Domain Market sales the average is anywhere from 3800 to 7000ish.

 

[URL Stream]

Yes if you are looking at any random two word combo the average is going to be lower.

I don't buy random two word names.

I have specific keywords I target based on data, businesses, and trends that I have specific industry knowledge of.

Using any of my top keywords as a filter and looking at Afternic, Private, Sedo, and Domain Market sales the average is anywhere from 3800 to 7000ish.

I think the sweet spot is just what it is (my addition: OP wrote $2,500).

personally price around:

- 50% of my names at $4888.
- 15% at $2888 (lowest I will sell a .com for outside of liquidations before dropping.)
- 25% up to $25k
- 10% anywhere from 30k - 250k.

My average selling price is a fraction over $6k and average buy price of those names is just under $27. Most common sale price is $4888. STR right around 1%.

Kudos to you for making your strategy work! This is a great reminder that curating an above-average portfolio can deliver an above-average ROI for the same investment!

 

[alcy]

brilliant. sales are 80percent down for most so let's make higher prices to sell more

I'm in

not

 

[enterscope]

brilliant. sales are 80percent down for most so let's make higher prices to sell more

I'm in

not

Been the best year for us, highest sell-through rate and highest sale prices.

Maybe 80% of domainers are doing it wrong....

 

[alcy]

Been the best year for us, highest sell-through rate and highest sale prices.

Maybe 80% of domainers are doing it wrong....

it's not about doing it wrong it's about doing it same way as before and having worse results

 

[enterscope]

it's not about doing it wrong it's about doing it same way as before and having worse results

I looked at your names and they are all make offer so not sure how this applies to you?

Make offer is only necessary for Top Tier domains like one word com or very good one word .ai, .io, etc. Because anything less than $100k should have a price. You're missing out on sales because your domains aren't showing in search results.

I think sales are down for most because of all the low-priced options out there. I see domains sell all the time for $1999 that are easily $5-10k domains. I acquire domains at wholesale almost every day, and the first thing I do is double or triple the retail price.

Many investors will register junk and price it at $199 or $599 but chances are those domains will never sell anyway. And the ones that do sell, buyer would have paid more. Or, domainers will get impatient, run out of capital and need funds then liquidate their quality domains cheap.

There is nothing to lose pricing your domains higher, because a company that really wants the domain will reach out and make an offer. You might miss out on 1 or 2 impulsive BIN buys here and there, but it would be better to get double or triple on a sale in my opinion.

 

[URL Stream]

Maybe 80% of domainers are doing it wrong....

Enlighten us—show us the way! We’re always eager to learn and grow.

 

[Kyle Tully]

Enlighten us—show us the way! We’re always eager to learn and grow.

As a start, look at all the people complaining about declining sales... don't listen to their advice

Study reported domain sales and see what's selling. Everything (or at least a lot) is right out there in the open if you look.

 

[The Durfer]

yes, but the more readily a supply is available the more the price goes down.

 

[Kyle Tully]

yes, but the more readily a supply is available the more the price goes down.

Luckily domains are unique assets and therefore always a 1-of-1.

 

[DomainNature]

I have dropped my prices after I migrated my domains to Afternic, which caused 2 low lucky sales, but it did not help further, it was possible a short lived window, increasing prices can have good result for others, because people will run from us and go to your domains, you never know in who's favor it will work.

 

[BaileyUK]

We may as well stick with the realities of the current market and accept that's the way it's going to stay, at least for the foreseeable future. Wishful thinking by some portfolio holders that they can encourage a mass reset is not going to happen. I appreciate that domain sales reporting has come a long way in the last 10 to 15 years, but that shows how encouragingly diverse the market has become.

Can you imagine any other business (apart from bitcoin) where the market has opened up to so many new players, diversity of choice and amount of availability on that market that continues to grow for 30 years. With the base cost of that product actually decreasing in real terms

It's a simple case of supply and demand economics that gives us the situation that we are at. If anything I would anticipate prices being squeezed further.

Yes I can safely foresee more 'dislikes' as a safe bet for just stating things as they are.

 

[phaethon]

HD price many of their domains just under 2.5K.
That's also my average sale price.
I haven't had a single sale since July that I had two sales for 5.5K.
I raised my prices after the sales, but received only enquiries.
Now, I'm back to normal prices. I had sales over the last two Q4s, but nothing this Q4 till now..

Portfolio size is around 500 names, I'm around 0.8% STR this year..

 

[Kyle Tully]

HD price many of their domains just under 2.5K.

HD also have a ton of veeeeery average names. The majority of their names that I would personally buy are priced 3500-15000ish.

It all comes down to knowing your own strategy, the names that fit, and who those buyers are.

 

[phaethon]

HD also have a ton of veeeeery average names. The majority of their names that I would personally buy are priced 3500-15000ish.

It all comes down to knowing your own strategy, the names that fit, and who those buyers are.

”One man's trash is another man's treasure”​

 

[HotKey]

Why do random accounts with no way to link anything to them think they can set precedents?

 

[Joe drake]

It has long been said that $2500 is the sweet spot for domain pricing, but that was 10+ years ago. It's pushing 2025 and average price should be around $5000 now. Heck, businesses drop $10k on websites every day, how much more for their brand?

With inflation, rising registration fees at domain registrars and other costs, etc. it only makes sense to raise prices.

That said, I wouldn't go pricing junk domains at $5k, but you might as well because chances are no one is going to buy it anyway.

Thing is the types of domains that are selling for 2500 are a dime a dozen ,and are still hard to sell ,put a price tag of 5k on all of them ,and guess what 'no ones gonna buy them ,and your gonna have to drop em anyway. Until the population quadruples these are easy to buy,if a domainer had a 5k domain that he priced accidently drop,Chances are he would not redeem that domain for 80 bucks