Selling Keyword Domains to Endusers

[krx]

I’m trying to find a simple way of communicating to endusers why a good keyword domain that is relevant to its product would be worth purchasing.

For example, why would a business that sells sofas from its own site, say, www . johnsonsofas . com want to buy a domain like sleepersofas.com or leathersofas.com or discountsofas.com?

How would you explain it?

 

[cache]

Those people that know Johnson already have his phone number or address. There is no point to advertise to those people because they already have the store info. The key word domains are for other people who don't know Johnson but are interested in sofas.

 

[alien51]

Maybe just tell them how much traffic your keyword domains are getting. They will just redirect all that traffic to their johnsonsofas website.

And tell them why your asking price is justified for that traffic.

But if you're asking me to pay a steep price, and still spend effort to develop your keyword domain to get traffic, i'd rather just develop my own johnsonsofas brand.

 

[krx]

The prices i'm asking are not steep - low to mid xxx. But there are lots of good keyword domains that don't get much traffic. I have some that show up to 40,000 exact search (on google keyword tool, not SERP) but get almost no traffic. So people are searching the phrase but not typing it directly in the address bar. I also see people selling names like this all the time to endusers - even names with just one good keyword and then something like "source" or "outlet" or "shop", etc, which don't get much of any direct traffic. Trying to get a handle on what makes these valuable to an enduser, especially when it's not being used for the main site but as a redirect, etc.

 

[nielsencl]

never mind.

 

[alien51]

I'm an enduser myself, and i get domain sales pitches like this all the time.

Usually, they try to offer you variations of the domains you already own, or keywords that may be related to the business your are running on your website.

However, i feel like if i already have a strong brand and website, i really don't need anymore redundant domains-- especially those domains being peddled that are nice, but don't have traffic. Why do i need to develop yet another zero-traffic keyword domain, when my own brand is already doing strong?

I would think these zero-traffic keyword domains can be a best fit for endusers who do not have domains/websites yet, or maybe their own sites are not doing well and some keyword exact match domains might help boost their search ratings.

 

[infosec3]

It is good to remind Endusers that Books.com and Book.com redirect you to Barnes & Noble and Rum.com takes you to Captain Morgan. Just two examples of how companies want to make their brand become a synonym of the product they are selling.

 

[krx]

It is good to remind Endusers that Books.com and Book.com redirect you to Barnes & Noble and Rum.com takes you to Captain Morgan. Just two examples of how companies want to make their brand become a synonym of the product they are selling.

True except that these examples also bring direct traffic to their main sites. So the argument could be that they buy these domains for the traffic, not the brand value. My question has to do with the argument for why an enduser would want good keyword domains relevant to their product that don't necessarily have much traffic.

 

[Name Trader]

I agree with alien51. If they don't have traffic (isn't that the whole point of keyword domains... natural traffic) why would an end user pay you anything for them and then have to do all the heavy lifting themselves to get traffic to the domains. It seems to me you want to charge them for value that isn't there yet. If they only redirect the domains to their existing websites, why do they need them if there is no traffic?

 

[krx]

If they only redirect the domains to their existing websites, why do they need them if there is no traffic?

Good question - exactly what I'm trying to figure out. Look at these sales, pulled from the current page of the "completed sales thread" ..

icn.com 60000 USD
local360.com 51000 USD
newyorkapartmentsforsale.com 42000 USD
ma.de 25000 USD
astora.com 16000 USD
gold.biz 16000 EUR
kritiken.de 15000 EUR
gobuild.com 14100 USD
himovie.com 14000 USD
mortgage-calculator.co.uk 12500 GBP
broadband.org 12500 USD
dotank.com 11500 EUR
discountglasses.com 11000 USD
ecommerce.eu 11000 EUR
dopo.com 10000 USD
fleetworks.com 10000 USD
treo.ca 10000 USD
restplatzboerse.com 10000 EUR
traveldoo.de 10000 EUR
CoffeeBoxes(dot)com $299
neomobile.com 58500 USD
yolo.com 29000 USD
clubclass.com 16000 USD
sexonthebeach.com 15000 USD
amse.com 12888 USD
wiggle.ru 12000 EUR
oqpy.com 10500 USD
tuhogar.com 10000 EUR
zabel.com 10000 USD
hotelnetwork.com 10000 USD
paydayloans.info 10000 USD
blackvue.com 10000 USD
HotSexLink dot com for $450

There are a lot of nice sales here of domains that are probably not bringing in much type-in traffic. Hotsexlink? coffee boxes? hotel network? just to name a few...

I don't know who's buying them of course. Maybe these are all for primary sites. But then how do you find someone who wants to build a site on coffee boxes or hotel network if they don't already have a similar site ???

 

[Wendigo]

It all comes down to this: if you can demonstrate the end-user exactly how he will profit from your domain (more than he will pay for it), it sells itself. Remember that most end-users are not tech-savvy.

Just saying how much POTENTIAL it has (such as monthly searches) is not likely to get you anywhere, IMO.