domain Please Appraise MiamiOH.com

[Chad_6]

I've been approached by the University of Miami OH to purchase this domain from me.

I would like to hear thoughts from experts on a reasonable starting point to begin negotiations.

I know they are eager, and being a fairly large University I know this name will be a profitable acquisition for them.

My company currently uses the domain to sell team apparel & tickets.

I appreciate any feedback.

 

[Bannen]

When you approach an end user and solicit them to buy a domain, it's etiquette and common sense to have a price in mind to tell them, if they show interest;

However, since they initiated contact with you, the ball's in their court if you want it to be. A common and honest tactic can be to say that you are using this domain and hadn't really considered a selling price, and to please make an offer in the budget they were considering.

In the meantime, decide on what you think is a realistic price that would make you happy, below which you would not sell the name. Take into it all factors, like any traffic and income you make from the name, other possible buyers, exact search numbers for both 'miami oh' and 'miami ohio', other extensions taken (miamiohio is taken in a few ext, yours is only in dot.com), and other combinations that this buyer might buy at reg fee if your price is too high (interestingly, miami-oh is taken in com/net, while miami-ohio, which gets many more searches, is available to reg). They can also reg MiamiOhU.com or MiamiOhioU.com or UofMiamiOh.com... which are a little longer, but if it's a savings of many thousands of dollars, they might do something like that instead, since it's just another letter or 2

Personally, for your domain I'd ask them to make an offer.
If you would rather set a price yourself, I'd probably ask $3500 but settle for 2500 if they counter offer.

That's just me. I think that's the 'sweet spot' area, for this size of a university. Ask much more than that and I think they'd look at other possibilities.

But who knows? Maybe they'd pay much more... or maybe they were only thinking of $500, you never can tell until you open negotiations.

GL, and congrats on having an end user approach you for a buy

 

[johname]

The problem here is i would bet the college is the only big thing in miami ohio (mod randy p should know) So your dealing with probably the only company that will give you a great payday for this name. But on the other hand there not going to dump their main web domain and use yours. They either want it for a special project or more likely just want to take it off the table.
(was thinking mid xxxx or even more until i saw the following) :
Ok I checked the full spelled out miamiohio.com and it redirects to the college

Now i see your who is and two things jump out to me

Registrant:
College Sports, Inc.

and that i assume you owned it since 2003 They had to have inquired about this name in the past! Did they?

Next I checked and see you sell the university logo merchandise on the domain name.

Saying: "MiamiOH.com is not affiliated with or endorsed by Miami OH University" is not enough to stop them from trying to take the domain away from you.

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Bottomline. The college can show through the name of the registrant, that you own this domain for it's sport use(the college is the only major team there) and that your selling only their sports team logo merchandise at the domain. This would probably be enough for them to take the domain away from you without you getting a penny. So you might want to sell it to them for a price that would make it easyer for them to buy it from you then the hassle of trying to take it from you. I believe it cost about 1400 to file, I would tack about a grand to that and ask 2500. This is all in my opinion. Your milage may vary, Goodluck

---------- Post added at 06:13 PM ---------- Previous post was at 05:41 PM ----------

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ottawasens.com

ever have problems owning names like:

marshallherd.com
bigeastsports.com
pactensports.com
cubsgear.com
torontoleafs.com
ottawasens.com

I know for sure the pacten goes after people, there 12 now lol

 

[hopkism]

My gut reaction was to milk it for all it is worth to sell them the domain name since they are a university and would be willing to pay big. However taking into account the economy in Ohio and how over budget universities are they probably do not have a high budget for the name.

However as Johname has so well suggested, they may have grounds for acquiring it without a sale. There is definitely evidence to suggest that.

My advice would be to be as friendly as possible with them. Is this a new PR campaign they are putting together?

Do you have an idea of what threshold you need to sell it for in order to make up for all of your costs of the domain, website and merchandise as well as future merchandise you would sell? I would use that as a starting basis point for valuation and work from there.

Best of luck!

 

[DU]

My gut reaction was to milk it for all it is worth to sell them the domain name since they are a university and would be willing to pay big.

Hardly. Most Universities have no discretionary budget left at all. If it's not football it's nothing.
Now MiamiOH.com might be for their football team but reality?

They have the .edu as their main site. They have some other sites. This one isn't that important (though it matches Miami(OH) which is how they are listed.)

Is the .com really worth it? Necessary?

Question - Who at the University is buying it? Or is it just the system admin? Someone who works there? I would expect this to come from their legal department/counsel/marketing department with a PHONE NUMBER.

I would CALL THEM at that number.

However as Johname has so well suggested, they may have grounds for acquiring it without a sale. There is definitely evidence to suggest that.

MiamiOH is not going to be a trademark. The goods are all licensed for resale (allegedly) and I presume the owner is licensed for resale - otherwise you have infringement. They won't even bother with UDRP, imho, they'd file charges of illegal resale and shut it down. (or file UDRP but might try to get others to file one major one against all his sites).

They'd lose a UDRP if everything is licensed on the grounds of legitimate use (which might be questionable as the site promises more than it delivers).

My advice would be to be as friendly as possible with them. Is this a new PR campaign they are putting together?

I'd tell them (if I didn't call them - as mentioned earlier):
"It's not really for sale. I've received offers before that I've rejected, some in the thousands for this city domain. If you are still interested let me know."

If they want it they'd come back with an offer. It's not a brandable, it's a real asset.

Either that or ask whatever you think it's worth. If you get it you got what its worth, if you didn't then you still have something worth what you think it is.

Then I'd move the hell out of Ohio to a real state .... yeah, I'd leave Miami Oh for Miami Fl in the time it takes King LeDouche to miss a winning shot in the playoffs.

---------- Post added at 05:36 PM ---------- Previous post was at 05:29 PM ----------

ever have problems owning names like:

marshallherd.com
bigeastsports.com
pactensports.com
cubsgear.com
torontoleafs.com
ottawasens.com

I know for sure the pacten goes after people, there 12 now lol

It just shows that he lies on his sites about his fondness for teams..lol

Oh and he doesn't have to leave Cleveland - he's from Jax (according to the about).

 

[Chad_6]

Thanks for all of the feedback everyone - some real good tips.

No, this is the first time they have solicited the domain.

I'm not concerned about them trying to take it, b/c as someone pointed out it's also a city domain which can't be trademarked. If receiving a C&D letter I would simply switch to a local Miami OH site.

I've had no problems with my other team specific domains. At this point most all have put money into branding another domain, so they seem to have moved on. My intentions for the sites are genuine, but also of course monetarily based - after all I'm a non non-profit, so like most I'd like to make a few bucks for my time. But overall I'm doing nothing nefarious - not using for libelous reasons or re-directing to some unrelated p word site. I'm selling licensed products, which promotes the team in the end. I figured that's the way the institutions are looking at it - they have bigger / more detrimental domain fish to fry - in fact Stanford all but told me as much.

The offer came from "Director, Network Engineering and Telecommunications". He said the last domain acquisition was for $1,150; which was likely not as valuable of a domain - but who knows.

My business does make revenue from the site - would you recommend disclosing the annual amount, and asking for roughly 5 years value -- or should I stay away from offering any income numbers?

Thanks again. You guys seem to know your stuff.