discuss Old Domain Sherpa shows, and what happened to the mentioned domains after the sale

[xynames]

As I mentioned here
https://www.namepros.com/threads/af...rpa-bids-farewell.1039471/page-4#post-6385401
I started listening to Domain Sherpa only this year, so most every old show, is new, to me!

This thread is about listening to old shows, and commenting on what happened to these domains that were sold in the old shows, for good sums of money. What happened to the domains post sale? Did they become viable internet businesses? Did they become parking lots? If re-sold, were they re-sold for more money, or less?

 

[xynames]

I’ll get this started with a review of the domains mentioned in the June 28, 2015, show, “$58,000 Profit Flipping 8 Domains in Under 60 Days – With Ali Zandi.” In this episode, Ali mentioned the following sales of his:

slowdown.com bought March 28, 2015, $4250. sold May 6, 2015 (namebio reports May 10th), $15K

bovine.com bought May 2, 2015 $4500. sold May 16, 2015, $11K

cultivation.com bought $8500. sold for $14K within less than a month

aus.com bought April 21, 2015 sold May 29, 2015, gross profit $24,098.

Ali talks about having an “instinct” for getting great domain names, how he feels a fire in his bowels when he views a great name.

Well, what happened to these “fire in the bowels” domain names that he sold in 2015?

slowdown.com – nothing. It’s a dead site. Has not been re-sold.

bovine.com – nothing. It’s a dead site. Has not been re-sold.

cultivation.com – redirects to a website that tries to sell other marijuana related domains.

aus.com Oh boy. This one resold for $345K on 8/14/16, and is now a company website.

(In the show, Ali claims his “fire in the bowels” told him that aus.com was worth $35K. Apparently not – it was worth ten times that.)

What my research shows, actually, is that 2015, was a banner year for domaining. I don’t think it had so much to do with any super sharp instinct that Ali possessed that year (I mean come on, bovine.com ? ) but that any domain in a rising market, is a good one. And then as far as aus.com, in the show he mentions that his instinct told him that it was worth $35K (but he sold it for less than that anyway), when it was in fact worth ten times that.

Now of course, hindsight always 50-50, but I think that at least 2017, has been quite slow compared to 2015. Now, I personally have been domaining as in direct involvement of sales and marketing, since only very beginning of 2017, and done very well this year (but not with oddball names like bovine.com !) However, I have been financing domainers, including my own domaining company which someone else was running for me, since 2002. So I have observed the ups and downs of this industry for some time now.

From William S. Burroughs:

A lot of people made quick easy money during the War and for several years after. Any business was good, just as any stock is good on a rising market. People thought they were sharp operators, when actually they were just riding a lucky streak. Now the Valley is in a losing streak and only the big operators can ride it out.

This could apply to domaining, today – where only the best and most quality domain names will be selling for top dollar – at least until the cycle shifts, the small fry and impatient newbies are weeded out, and domaining inevitably enters another boom cycle.

 

[xynames]

By the way, also, in this June 28, 2015, Domain Sherpa show, Ali talks about a "private investment fund...was called Go Time Ventures. Now it is called Perception.com" that he put together with OPM (other people's money) to buy and sell domain names.

Apparently this fund to buy and sell domains didn't go so well either, as the perception.com domain name itself now, doesn't have anything to do with buying and selling domain names anymore, rather it is a "coming soon" website, owned by Electronic Creations Corporation, a Colorado corporation (since 1999) doing business in Santa Rosa, California (since 2001). Electronic Creations Corp. also owns perceptiontradeamarks.com , and seems to be basically some kind of retail electronic parts store (not clear what the main corporation does, but nothing to do with domaining).

Reviewing waybackmachine, perception.com was a "premium domain name brokerage, [that] believes the future belongs to the businesses that master the power of perception" for only a matter of months, from about mid 2015 until the end of 2015, when it disappeared for website "remodelling" and then went completely dark by very early 2016, until the domain itself was sold to Electronic Creations Corp. in an unreported sale.... So this investment fund venture apparently didn't even last six months.

 

[dordomai]

I think Zandi is still successful. Sold freedom.com a while back and has a new brokerage called Starfire holdings.

 

[xynames]

I hope Ali is doing well and wish him and everyone in domaining great success. However, according to his twitter account he has been stepping back from domaining and dealing with health issues.

Anyway, this thread isn't so much about what happened to him as what happened to the domains and domaining ventures mentioned in past Sherpa shows.

 

[briguy]

Great research, thanks for the time and effort that you put into it!

 

[xynames]

Marc Ostrofsky show from April 2011. In this Domain Sherpa show Ostrofksy, who bought business.com for $150K in 1995, and sold it for $7.5M in 1999 (landing him in the Guinness Book of World Records as the most expensive domain name ever sold), discusses his successes with internet businesses (substantial!). He reveals that on the same day, he sold ebusiness.com for $10M!

There is an amusing story about a guy who was able to register ebusiness.com at register.com right in the midst of this $10M sale. Turns out that the registration was a mistake, and it was quickly reversed.
https://www.wired.com/1999/12/youre-out-of-e-business-com/

1) business.com was re-sold in 2007 for $345M
The site is active, although I'm not exactly sure how it is generating revenue. Seems to be a sort of free advice type site, although it does appear to also direct you to affiliates.

2) ebusiness.com is dark Nothing there. I took a look back at it over the years with waybackmachine, and it was apparently never much more than a sponsored links page....

 

[xynames]

August 2017 show, "$146,000 Gross Profit in 3 Months"
Domainer Richard Dynas:

May 28, 2017, sold hatred.com to author Milo Yiannopoulus for $150K, using outbound marketing. It redirects to Milo's book “Dangerous” being sold on amazon.com
Pretty interesting! buying a domain name solely for redirect. Not unheard of by any means, but interesting.

Purchased March 22, 2017, for $4000.

Dynas mentions that he got nowhere trying to sell on namepros
https://www.namepros.com/threads/everybody-has-a-client.934569/page-2#post-6403895

His outbound marketing emails (offers) used the subject line of the domain name only, and were short and to the point.
https://www.namepros.com/threads/well-hasnt-this-year-been.1044110/page-2#post-6386455
he stuck to his guns and did not keep lowering his offers when he received rejections.\

He used an app called Clearbit, and Google to find leads. He jumped on the writer Milo when he noticed that the guy wrote books that were in line with the keyword of hatred, and had recently received $12M in funding! Good job.

 

[ben pedri]

Whats your take on the sale of MyWorld.com for 1.2 million ,how do these transactions happen ,does larry fisher go out and find buyers or does he just start and stay high , I'm thinking if I owned this I would have sold it for 5-10 grand, wtf is going on ,,,,, I don't get it

 

[xynames]

When I get an offer or price inquiry, I look at comparables, both closed sales and current offerings, and I do a google search to see if I missed anything, such as a business or celebrity that might want the domain. I have had instances of domains I have sold for five figures where absent research I might have asked for less, but I would have asked for more than 5000 - 10000 for myworld.com still I agree with you it would not have occurred to me to ask for over a million!

I do agree that the price you ask for depends on your buyer. For example in that Richard Dynas sale of hatred.com he mentions how he offered it for mid five figures to other potential buyers, who said NO, until he decided to offer it for a quarter million and settled at $150K from the author Milo Yiannopoulus. He asked for that much from the author because he read that the guy had just received millions in funding for marketing.

Let's see what happens to the myworld site. The current WhoIs is United Trademark International
https://www.kompany.com/p/mt/c 46561
but I haven't done any research to see who or what that entity is.

As I mention above ebusiness.com was sold for $10M in 1999, and never became more than a PPC parking site, and is dark now.

 

[wwwweb]

By the way, also, in this June 28, 2015, Domain Sherpa show, Ali talks about a "private investment fund...was called Go Time Ventures. Now it is called Perception.com" that he put together with OPM (other people's money) to buy and sell domain names.

Apparently this fund to buy and sell domains didn't go so well either, as the perception.com domain name itself now, doesn't have anything to do with buying and selling domain names anymore, rather it is a "coming soon" website, owned by Electronic Creations Corporation, a Colorado corporation (since 1999) doing business in Santa Rosa, California (since 2001). Electronic Creations Corp. also owns perceptiontradeamarks.com , and seems to be basically some kind of retail electronic parts store (not clear what the main corporation does, but nothing to do with domaining).

Reviewing waybackmachine, perception.com was a "premium domain name brokerage, [that] believes the future belongs to the businesses that master the power of perception" for only a matter of months, from about mid 2015 until the end of 2015, when it disappeared for website "remodelling" and then went completely dark by very early 2016, until the domain itself was sold to Electronic Creations Corp. in an unreported sale.... So this investment fund venture apparently didn't even last six months.

Godaddy had an issue with Go Time, and he changed it before it became a legal matter I believe.

 

[xynames]

Right. Whatever it was called - the Ali Zandi investment fund for domains folded within six months of launch it seems.

 

[wwwweb]

Right. Whatever it was called - the Ali Zandi investment fund for domains folded within six months of launch it seems.

I think the current one is branded under Starfire Holdings

 

[xynames]

That’s something entirely different from the one he tried to start before, and was already mentioned above, but as I also pointed out above, Ali’s latest twitter posts state that he is stepping back from domaining due to health issues. I wish him the best.

 

[ben pedri]

When I get an offer or price inquiry, I look at comparables, both closed sales and current offerings, and I do a google search to see if I missed anything, such as a business or celebrity that might want the domain. I have had instances of domains I have sold for five figures where absent research I might have asked for less, but I would have asked for more than 5000 - 10000 for myworld.com still I agree with you it would not have occurred to me to ask for over a million!

I do agree that the price you ask for depends on your buyer. For example in that Richard Dynas sale of hatred.com he mentions how he offered it for mid five figures to other potential buyers, who said NO, until he decided to offer it for a quarter million and settled at $150K from the author Milo Yiannopoulus. He asked for that much from the author because he read that the guy had just received millions in funding for marketing.

Let's see what happens to the myworld site. The current WhoIs is United Trademark International
https://www.kompany.com/p/mt/c 46561
but I haven't done any research to see who or what that entity is.

As I mention above ebusiness.com was sold for $10M in 1999, and never became more than a PPC parking site, and is dark now.

I heard that interview ,I think on Sherpa ,I think ebusiness was bought for protection

 

[xynames]

ebusiness was up for a while, dark now. From Domain Sherpa:

"eBusiness.com sold to the competitor of eCompanies, the company that acquired Business.com"

You have to sift through that sentence, but it means
(1) eCompanies is the company that acquired Business.com
(2) eBusiness was sold to a competitor of Business.com

Also from the interview itself:

"Marc: Well, it was under nondisclosure at the time, I don’t know today if that’s still applicable or it makes a difference but I sold Business.com the same very day I sold eBusiness.com to their competitor."

So, no, ebusiness.com was not bought for protection, was bought to compete with business.com And failed, $10M down the drain, so far.

 

[Bros]

Was there ever an episode were Michael was himself one of the sherpa's or his portfolio was evaluated? He always seemed so modest, that I had no idea about some of the gems he had.

 

[Ategy]

(In the show, Ali claims his “fire in the bowels” told him that aus.com was worth $35K. Apparently not – it was worth ten times that.)
... And then as far as aus.com, in the show he mentions that his instinct told him that it was worth $35K (but

Hmmn .. I think you might want to relisten to the show .. I don't recall at any point him saying aus.com was worth $35. I'm not sure of the exact sale price, but I think it was very high $xx,xxx after a fraudulant $xxx,xxx was taken back. The whole "fire" thing was in regards to SlowDown.com.

However, according to his twitter account he has been stepping back from domaining and dealing with health issues.

Regarding @Ali .. I'm pretty sure he's back after a break for "personal reasons" late last year into early this year. Seems he's recently had a health thing .. but I didn't see anywhere that he was taking another break from domaining.

Apparently this fund to buy and sell domains didn't go so well either, as the perception.com domain name itself now, doesn't have anything to do with buying and selling domain names anymore ...

Where did you get this information? As far as I know from listening to all the Sherpa podcasts he's participated in there was no indication that Perception was a failure. He did some decent flips there amplified by an extreme turnaround. Maybe they ended because of health reasons, or maybe he wanted to do his own thing, or maybe one of the investors needed the money for another project. If you listen to one of the later shows I'm pretty sure Ali mentions the sale of Perception.com itself (not sure if he said what actually happened with the fund).


Anyhow .. glad to see people take an interest in the old @DomainSherpa shows .. they really are a wealth of information!

 

[xynames]

Hi Ategy. I notice that you are Canadian. In the U.S., "K" means thousand. The $35K I mention is the same as the XX,XXX you mention.

Anyway, Zandi sold aus.com as follows:
aus.com bought April 21, 2015 sold May 29, 2015, gross profit $24,098.
aus.com was resold for $345K on 8/14/16, and is now a company website - my point being that his instinct undervalued it. General point being that that time period 2015 was an on-fire period for domain sales, and that this quote applies to that time period, moreso than that any one person was an expert or exceptionally sharp:

A lot of people made quick easy money during the War and for several years after. Any business was good, just as any stock is good on a rising market. People thought they were sharp operators, when actually they were just riding a lucky streak. Now the Valley is in a losing streak and only the big operators can ride it out.

As far as Perception, all indications are that it folded. I don't believe that time period, second half of 2015, had anything to do with Zandi's health problems, which are more recent. The indication that it folded was the rapidity with which it went away. From waybackmachine, the website disappeared within six months with a notice that is was remodelling, and then disappeared entirely, never came back from "remodelling" - went dark. Viable businesses don't disappear that quickly, nor do they post remodelling notices and then never come back at all.

As far a Starfire, which two have mentioned, this is not an investment fund as Perception was. Starfire is a domain name and brokerage firm. I mean, my company www.xynames.com is a domain name and brokerage firm, I have a lot of cash, but I am not an investment fund.

Investment funds for domains were a thing of that on-fire period, 2015, where any domain was good on a rising market. You're not going to see that sort of thing these days, but perhaps again in the future.

Another example of an investment fund that went nowhere is
https://www.namepros.com/blog/exclu...in-investment-fund.912489/page-7#post-6388979
but at least Perception did exist for some months while this $20M fund was all talk never came into being at all. Interestingly, this $20M fund was announced in January 2016, right at the time that Perception folded.

 

[Ali]

@xynames misinformed much?

1. I said Aus.com was worth $350k - not $35k. If it was worth $35k why would I have bought it for about $60k?

2. The fund did great, and all the domain names were sold. Including Perception.com. The investors wanted quick flips, I wanted long term. So we ended the fund after all the names moved. Some of the names made great profits (highest was around $45k on one name) and others made great ROI's (as high as 7,500%). We did well. Most names sold within 60 days of acquiring them.

3. Starfire Holdings is not an investment fund, it's a brokerage, and we are well on our way to setting a record for most seven figure names sold in a year. NDA's aside, we're doing quite well.

I didn't read every post - don't spew nonsense without facts.

 

[xynames]

Right, as I posted "As far as Starfire, which two have mentioned, this is not an investment fund as Perception was. Starfire is a domain name and brokerage firm."

But, with all due respect, however you want to spin it, a website business that goes from claiming that it is a "premium domain name brokerage, [that] believes the future belongs to the businesses that master the power of perception" to one word on an otherwise broken website, "Remodelling," to dark completely after only six months, is a product of the high flying year 2015 and not continued future success in the filed of domain investment funds. If there had been such a "future" in investment funds for domains, it would not have folded so quickly. And anyway, what I posted was not a slight on you whatsoever, it was a commentary on that 2015 was a banner year for domains, and that investment funds were a byproduct of that sort of enthusiasm in that year, that apparently could not carry through past that high flying year.

I stand by my claim that 2015 was a high flying year for domains, which is why investment funds appeared that year, and not lately.

So you sold aus.com for about $84K then apparently. (Bought $60K sold for about $24K profit.) In 2015.

Thanks for coming on here to clear some things up. This thread is not just about you, it is about a lot of Domain Sherpa shows.

 

[Ategy]

Hi Ategy. I notice that you are Canadian. In the U.S., "K" means thousand. The $35K I mention is the same as the XX,XXX you mention.

lol .. K means thousand here as well .. but again you conveniently leave out key facts .. I didn't just say $xx,xxx .. I said "Very high $xx,xxx" .. which here in Canada means over $80 at least. (Maybe in the US very high XX means anything over 30? lol) .. I think you need to take a step back and stop posting and presenting your "opinions" as facts before you get all the information. Above you posted things that were very clearly wrong or out of context, maybe listen/read things a second time to make sure you understand the facts.

As for the flip of aus.com, @Ali VERY clearly stated the reason he didn't wait to get more is because of the agreement he had with investors to focus on quicker flipping. I seem to recall he sold it in about a month. That's a huge return if you pro-rate it annually. Given that he could use those funds to acquire more domains to flip just as quickly then one could say it's actually more profitable to sell it for $24K profit in a couple months than to wait much longer to chance getting more. There are many different strategies in domaining .. and there isn't a single "right" answer sometimes. Your conclusion that Perception was not "viable" in not only completely unfounded, but actually goes against many of the facts presented in the very Domain Sherpa show you're discussing.

You keep returning to your wartime quote painting a picture that people who made money in 2015 were just lucky. But the truth is that some made much more than others .. and some still lost money. I don't have access to @Ali's books .. but I thikn it's safe to say that he's more successful now in 2017. Same holds true for @MediaOptions based on the early 2017 Sherpa Review discussions .. Andrew stated a couple of times that 2017 was the best year they had seen to that point.

Anyhow .. don't really want to start a big thing here .. you're entitled to your opinion .. but my opinion is that you should take the time better understand the actual facts before saying people weren't successful or viable.

 

[xynames]

What the thread is most about is...what happened to the domains that were sold. Take a look, see, and comment. There is absolutely not one single domain I posted about that I am inaccurate about what happened to that domain, after its sale as mentioned during the Domain Sherpa show.

You're going off on a tangent, which I still stand by what I said: Perception.com folded in just six months, don't care how he wants to spin it. Who folds a business like that, posting "remodelling" and then just disappearing? You go down to your neighborhood Electronics shop and six months later it has a sign that says remodeling, and a month later it is abandoned with no forwarding address. Who folds a business that is making money? Which is funny because the domain perception.com was eventually sold to an electronic parts store of some kind, not exactly sold to IBM.

Anyway, the point of mentioning perception.com was more about "what happened to the domain name" than anything else, which again - is the point of this thread. What happened to the domain names mentioned in the old Domain Sherpa shows?

 

[Ategy]

Was there ever an episode were Michael was himself one of the sherpa's or his portfolio was evaluated? He always seemed so modest, that I had no idea about some of the gems he had.

In early 2015 they did 3 back-to-back Sherpa Reviews with 3 of the Sherpas portfolios (Andrew's, @Domain Shane's and "that other one") .. I don't think they ever did @Michael Cyger's though.

That being said .. I know I've "seen" his portfolio before. Check the "getting started" video's at Efty .. I thikn it might be there where he demos a portfolio import with his own portfolio. Or it might be on the 2nd part of the Sherpa Show he did with @Doron Vermaat (also of Efty). I usually listened to the shows in audio format walking my dog .. so I'm not 100% sure .. but I know it's there somewhere!