Made an offer - Domainer let the domain expire!

[MapleDots]

So a year ago I made an offer of $250 via email and via godaddy for a .ca domain name that really only made sense for my business motto. I specialize in Maple Domains and this was a two word domain with the first word being maple.

Now it truly had very little value to anyone else unless they wanted to put it to a specific use.

I got a response back asking for around 1.2k and I politely declined saying it was something where I figured if I could pick it up on the cheap I would.

So the .ca's go to TBR (to be released) and anyone can pick them up before they get deleted.

The domainer had all my information and he decided to let the domain expire instead of contacting me to claim his $250 dollars. Obviously he did not record my information or the offer, instead he let the domain expire without attempting to complete our original negotiations.

So I did pick up the domain and I hired a company to get it for me ahead of the crowd and my final costs after taxes was around 69 bucks.

Why Why Why do some domainers not properly record their inquiries????

I would have given him the $250 had he re-contacted me.

I CANNOT STRESS AGAIN THE IMPORTANCE OF A PROPER SPREADSHEET WHERE ONE RECORDS OFFERS AND CONTACT INFORMATION.

Please people do not leave money on the table.

PS. Mods please do not put this in the ccTLD forum, it is a post which has merit in any extension.

 

[MapleDots]

I don't get out of bed for $500 much less a $100!"

Very nice to be at that point in life but flawed nonetheless. I am fortunate enough running a number of businesses that my children will never worry about money but I am also smart enough to never have that type of attitude.

$250 for a couple minutes (lets even say 5 minutes) work to push a domain translates to $3000 per hour if you were to apply it to 12 domains. So if you had a large portfolio and were about to drop 12 domains you had inquiries from why not push them out at $250 each? That would be a net gain of $3000 for an hours work.

I am a numbers guy and my domains are tightly monitored for expenses and profit margins and regardless of how much I make or not I will make the decision based on business instead of my ability to get out of bed.

Last point is..... I know this domainer, I know he drops a lot of domains because he cannot afford renewals. It is so unfortunate that he does not have better record keeping. I would very much love for him to be more successful and in a roundabout way I am hoping he sees this post because it may get him to be a bit more profitable.

I am always happy when a fellow domainer gets a sale and I am always a bit sad when I see them struggle. I will give freely of my time if I think I can help and I think in this case the domainer needed the wake up call.

 

[anantj]

I have a custom spreadsheets and I track every inquiry, all the costs, every phone call and anything when there is any change to a domain. I then combine that with my google analytics which is very easy, all domains forward to the lander and it shows me the referral typed into the address bar.

Four fields then export automatically to my website which shows my active domains. I have a separate hidden category for domains I do not want to show on the website.

If you ever contacted me or typed the domain in the address bar I have a record of it and if I ever consider dropping the domain I will look at those statistics first to see if I can recoup at least some of my costs before considering a drop.

Seems like a very useful and good system. You should write more about it (assuming it is not too much of a trade secret )

 

[DN Playbook]

Very nice to be at that point in life but flawed nonetheless. I am fortunate enough running a number of businesses that my children will never worry about money but I am also smart enough to never have that type of attitude.

$250 for a couple minutes (lets even say 5 minutes) work to push a domain translates to $3000 per hour if you were to apply it to 12 domains. So if you had a large portfolio and were about to drop 12 domains you had inquiries from why not push them out at $250 each? That would be a net gain of $3000 for an hours work.

I agree with you. I had an offer for an ngTLD of $300. Counter offer was not accepted. Number of months went by and did not receive any other offers. I did not want to pay the $20+ for renewal. So I sent him a quick email if he was still interested. He was. He paid the money and received the domain in minutes.

It was very quick because I did not have to spend time looking for the original offer. Using the domain marketing platform, DMP, (see my sig below) it was very easy to find. (Sorry for the shameless plug but it is in the context of this thread).

For literally few minutes of work, you can't beat $300. Domainers are leaving a lot of money on the table by not following up on leads for domains they'd drop anyways. They seem to rather try selling them on NP for $$. Does not compute.

 

[Optimal Names]

I have witnessed this situation on several occasions. But I don't think this is always due to poor record-keeping practices.
Some domainers have an official policy of not accepting offers less than 4 figures, so they don't want to set a precedent or 'lose face' by coming back to you and accepting your lowish offer. An offer which may no longer be valid by the way, people move on and settle for another domain name. Maybe the other party will sense desperation and offer only half of their initial offer or they just are less motivated now. At some point it's not worth the hassle of trying to salvage a sale.

The other unfortunate possibility is that the domain holder passed away. Or that he relies on the renewal notices from the registrar. Domainers must keep a list of domains they own with anniversary dates. If you don't - you will eventually lose domains.

I lost domains while in the hospital 8 years ago (this month actually). The stay lasted 6 months, on and off, usually about week at a time but the initial stay was 21 days.

There were many inquiries lost, domains lost, etc. At the time I didnt really care and I had been domaining for 10 years already. I was fighting for my life and the fact that I got to see a new day break, through the windows of the hospital room, was joy enough for me each day. But it was silly for me to not have thought about the "what-if" of life and contingencies..

In addition to having a list, I think its also very important to have a trusted person that you can at least give direction to. Drop this one, Renew that one, etc. My fiance at the time would have had no idea what to do if I asked her to negotiate and process a sale, renew a name, or ever how to log in, where to log in, and so on.

Now the business is part of my will. I have two people as backups, after my wife, to take care of things in case I am incapacitated. I quickly learned that anything can happen to us at any time, bad things dont just happen to other folks.