This skeptical beginner needs your help!!

[Ryanie]

Hi..
i've just got started with this domaining business, and i would like to add that going thru godaddy and sedo,and seeing people getting cool bids on their domains enticed me to no end,to try my hands (or burn it..only time will tell ) So, i bought a couple of domains from godaddy and listed them in the 7 day auction with a featured listing upgrade. Its only been a day,so i may or may not get lucky,but in the meantime, i did a bit of research on the internet.And for some reasons, after reading replies of some people in forums, some of my enthusiasm has faded,and i'm treading a bit cautiously now.(I would think hard before registering more domains,than burn a hole in my pocket..:P)

I would be grateful,if you could help me out with a few questions, so that i get a better understanding of how things work.Some of the questions may seem noobish,n i hope, you'll bear with me..

So here they are...:P

1)Of godaddy and sedo,which one do you think gives better outcomes with successful listings? (i do know, that depends a lot on the domain as well, but lets just say, for a fairly good domain, which one of the two would you prefer?

2)Are the 7 day auctions better than the long (1-3 months offer/counteroffer) listings?

3)Are the upgrades like featured listings really worth it?

4)Finally, here are a few domains i have bought..i would be grateful, if the more experienced members here give me some advice on the quality of the domains..*Shamelessly asking for your expert appraisal for free..:P *
Here they are..
a) sellwheels.com
b) 7gamer.com
c) allpetstore.com
d) hirepriest.com
e) hotwallies.com
f) justseeme.com
g) lycrabra.com (lol!)
h) techclock.com

For the time being, i've listed allpetstore.com and techclock.com on godaddy 7day auction at $10 starting bid each,and 7gamer.com on a 3 month make/counteroffer listing (at an asking price of err..$20000 *ashamed* ) How much do you think, it is really worth?

Please help me out.. I dont want to go broke..your expert advice would definitely help me a lot to stay afloat..

Thanks in advance.

 

[Ryanie]

Anyone? I really need your help....

 

[Kirstin]

I wouldn't even pay reg fee for the domains, developing them seems to be your only option.

 

[metrisoft]

There is no "get rich quick" in domaining (especially with the current market conditions) unless you are extremely lucky. In the past 6 months I have immersed myself in the domaining world. I have invested about $18K and made back around $10K so far. Fortunately, I think I have learned how to make money now, but domaining is a risky business no matter how much experience you have. It takes time (and usually lost money) to learn how to be successful. Even then, navigating the waters can be extremely difficult. I agree with Kirstin that there is pretty much no value in your domains. And, development is not always the answer for poor quality names.

My advice is the same advice that you will get from most of the experienced domainers. If you want to resale domains (i.e. buy low, sell high), you should buy generic, keyword, .coms that are commercialized (i.e. products) and then work hard to find end-users. Of course, none of these types of domains are available for reg fee so you will probably have to invest a fair amount of money to obtain one. But, it is better to acquire one high-quality generic domain than to acquire hundreds of poor-quality domains.

For pure development (i.e. Pay-Per-Click) purposes, you can still reg some decent .nets/.orgs (perhaps even .coms with hyphens) that will still give you a search engine boost for the keywords you are looking for.

I haven't had ANY success with GoDaddy or Sedo.

Best of luck to you!

 

[Ryanie]

Thanks for your replies..

I do understand now that i have burned my fingers..probably like most beginners..
But, i was just thinking,the kind of domains that are getting bids on the marketplace auction at sedo (some of the domains which make absolutely no sense),is there any chance that i'll be able to sell any of these? Waht are my other options if it doesnt sell on sedo auction? Should i give Ebay a try if it doesnt sell on sedo?

I was particularly thinking that sellwheels.com (could be used by car resellers?),7gamer.com(because it is short) and allpetstore.com (for pet related stuff) were fairly good domain names out of the list..

i also have a few generic single english word domains with .cc and .me tlds.. will the TLD disadvantage be compensated if the generic keyword is of good value?

Thanks again! Waiting for your replies..

 

[Ross]

1) depends on the domain who's bidding in the auction. Sedo is geared towards end-users, where as GoDaddy tends to sell to domainers. In all reality it comes down to preference.

2) You are better off listing them for sale on namepros than those sites with those quality of names.

3) IMO, they are worthless. If you have a great domain it will sell itself.

4) Not to burst your bubble, the domains are worthless. We can go over this all day blah blah blah but the fact is you will be looking for an end-user forever with these names. Better off developing them and then trying to sell the whole site.

My advice, look around read everything you can before you go buying again. There are plenty of good names to be had in this market even hand regs. It takes research and determination to sell a domain for a good profit. Yes luck has a part of domaining but its almost like playing the lottery. Bettering you chances at profit would be to develop the names you have and earn some passive income while you do research on the domaining industry. As a side note, Sedo.com bids/sales are kind of bullish, there are a lot of shill bids and non-payers. So if you see a crap domain in your opinion sell for a lot it could be fake.

As metrisoft said, "There is no "get rich quick" in domaining (especially with the current market conditions) unless you are extremely lucky."

 

[Traveler]

This is a tough time to be jumping into the domain name market. The economy is really hurting domain names sales imho. Don't feel bad about the money you have spent already, at least you are asking the right questions early on. Many people, including myself spent a lot more money learning things the hard way.

From reading your posts it looks like you are not one of those "I'm gonna get rich quick" guys. You are asking the right questions and open to the answers, that to me says you have the potential to make some profit at domaining. I could go on and try to answer all of the questions you posted, but trust me, if you do a search for just about any question you have, you will find all the answers you need.

Best of luck to you!

 

[Jennifer]

Kristin, Matt & Ross pretty much summed things up... but I think you want to know "why" these names are not worth as much as you thought... so I'll try and help with that...

a) sellwheels.com
When you choose a generic domain name, you should always think about it as developed... and if it were developed... who would want to own it, who would want to go there... how would they find it. With sellwheels.com - people looking to buy a car, are not searching for "sell wheels" - this term doesn't even have an Overture score... which probably means not many, if any people are looking for this search term.

b) 7gamer.com
Sure, short domain names are great... but short, just for the sake of being short isn't always good. You might have some success with development and branding... but names like this are a dime a dozen... why not pick up 8gamer.com, 9gamer.com, 27gamer.com, 101gamer.com... it's just not worth it.

c) allpetstore.com
Adding the "all" here is a bit redundant and pointless, hence the fact that it was available.

d) hirepriest.com
Not good format. Why not just get HireAPriest.com, which is available. I'm not saying get it... but just curious as to why you'd go with "hire priest" - Just tossing a couple of words together doesn't make a good domain name.

e) hotwallies.com
? You have a potential trademark issue on your hands here. Watch out not to violate tm's.

f) justseeme.com
maybe good for a cam site... another dime a dozen type of name. Nothing special about it, and it seems wordy and easy to forget.

g) lycrabra.com (lol!)
Another trademark violation - lycra is a registered tm. avoid tm's

h) techclock.com
I don't even know what this is, or what it could be used for. Did you have something in mind?

Use tools, do research, spend hours upon hours reading what other people have to say before registering your next domain name(s)

Although it may not seem like it... domain name investors have a method to their madness. Some focus on certain generic niches, while others go for brandable, while others go for geographical... some focus on traffic domain names... there's most certainly always a reason behind a registration.

Good luck to you

 

[hawkeye]

Yeah, I'd take the auto-renew feature off those names. If you want to be a domainer selling and buying names, it's good to know what sells, and what will never sell. Look at completed sales on DNJournal.com, NameBio.com and a few others that keep track of sales and see what names, and types of names, are selling and for how much. Check the various forums, see what people are selling, for how much, and at the bids they are or aren't recieving. You're going to hear 'read, read, read' if you want to learn domaining, and that is what you're going to have to do if you want to be successful in it. Forums, blogs, books, etc. 'Read, read, read!' Owning a domain doesn't mean it will sell. Though owning a name that others would want, increases the chances it will!!

 

[johname]

sellwheels.com is your best name in my opinion. It would be selling the tires and/or rims.

 

[Ryanie]

As a side note, Sedo.com bids/sales are kind of bullish, there are a lot of shill bids and non-payers. So if you see a crap domain in your opinion sell for a lot it could be fake.

Thanks for the indepth reply,Ross. As a beginner,that really helped me learn a few more things, as i keep gathering bucketfuls of information from this never ending ocean of domaining business.

One thing that you said really got me thinking,and i've quoted it above.I was thinking that sedo's certification process made it hard for fake bidding,but now i understand why those below par domains, that i mentioned in my first post, seem to get into the $x,xxx range sometimes. Is there anything sedo do, apart from terminating an account,in case of a fake bid? I mean, it would really be hard to trace international fake bidders.And the law of say, US or EU certainly cannot get to the guys from other parts of the world.
Doesnt it make the whole process seem phoney? I mean for every 1 genuine sale, there could be 10 or more fake bids that end up in no sale.
What does sedo do,if the domain is not sold because of a fraudulent bid? Do they list it again for auction?What if the first bid that set off the auction itself was fake?Does the domain holder wait again for eternity for someone to bid and push it to auction again? Shouldnt the domain holder be covered in case of a fake starting bid,and allowed to auction without going thru the whole process again? I mean, thats something to think about..

One more thing you said is to develop the not so good domains to try and sell the whole package.Maybe then it'll attract some attention.I totally agree with you on that.But as it happens,i'm a graphic designer by profession.So i can surely take care of the graphics part of the development,but i suck at coding.I could handle html, but php is alien to me.

So what are my options? (price : lowest first (lol!) ) To develop a quick minisite or something based on wordpress?Any particular place you would suggest me to head to for cheap development,as the sole intention for developing the site is to sell the domain.So i'd like to add moderately enough value as far as content goes to sell off the domain,rather than developing a full on bling bling website, which i may rather keep and rake in the adsense income from it. But obviously,that is a much longer process and could take years.

Would love to have your suggestions on these points..

As a side note, Sedo.com bids/sales are kind of bullish, there are a lot of shill bids and non-payers. So if you see a crap domain in your opinion sell for a lot it could be fake.

Thanks for the indepth reply,Ross. As a beginner,that really helped me learn a few more things, as i keep gathering bucketfuls of information from this never ending ocean of domaining business.

One thing that you said really got me thinking,and i've quoted it above.I was thinking that sedo's certification process made it hard for fake bidding,but now i understand why those below par domains, that i mentioned in my first post, seem to get into the $x,xxx range sometimes. Is there anything sedo does, apart from terminating an account,in case of a fake bid? I mean, it would really be hard to trace international fake bidders.And the law of say, US or EU certainly cannot get to the guys from other parts of the world.
Doesnt it make the whole process seem phoney? I mean for every 1 genuine sale, there could be 10 or more fake bids that end up in no sale.
What does sedo do,if the domain is not sold because of a fraudulent bid? Do they list it again for auction?What if the first bid that set off the auction itself was fake?Does the domain holder wait again for eternity for someone to bid and push it to auction again? Shouldnt the domain holder be covered in case of a fake starting bid,and allowed to auction without going thru the whole process again? I mean, thats something to think about..

One more thing you said is to develop the not so good domains to try and sell the whole package.Maybe then it'll attract some attention.I totally agree with you on that.But as it happens,i'm a graphic designer by profession.So i can surely take care of the graphics part of the development,but i suck at coding.I could handle html, but php is alien to me.

So what are my options? (price : lowest first (lol!) ) To develop a quick minisite or something based on wordpress?Any particular place you would suggest me to head to for cheap development,as the sole intention for developing the site is to sell the domain.So i'd like to add moderately enough value as far as content goes to sell off the domain,rather than developing a full on bling bling website, which i may rather keep and rake in the adsense income from it. But obviously,that is a much longer process and could take years.

Would love to have your suggestions on these points..

 

[johname]

you can take your best name and develop it into a mini site or better and have fun, like a hobby. As you do this keep reading here and other places, and then maybe the site can get good enough to sell and by then you should have the knowlege to buy some names that are winners

 

[metrisoft]

As I said previously, development is not always the answer. How do you plan to drive quality traffic to these sites? And, once you get traffic, what kind of content will you develop so that you get clicks? You can't just put up a mini-site with adsense and expect to make money. It can take months to get listed on the 1st page of Google search results even with non-competitive keywords (especially if your new site ends up in the "sandbox"). You must have a strategy, regardless of whether you develop or resale domains. My advice: figure out a profitable niche and then start working on it. In a few months it might pay off.

 

[Ryanie]

Don't feel bad about the money you have spent already, at least you are asking the right questions early on. Many people, including myself spent a lot more money learning things the hard way.

From reading your posts it looks like you are not one of those "I'm gonna get rich quick" guys. You are asking the right questions and open to the answers, that to me says you have the potential to make some profit at domaining. I could go on and try to answer all of the questions you posted, but trust me, if you do a search for just about any question you have, you will find all the answers you need.

Best of luck to you!

Thanks for the reply,Neo. Lol, i have my feet firmly planted on the ground.
But i must confess that when i saw those domains going for $xxxx on sedo and godaddy,along with the great marketing on those sites to lure unsuspecting beginners like me,i was like, this could be my next big thing! Lol..but just a few searches on google and couple of hours later,reading blogs and replies on forums,i came back to mother earth..

Like many others here,I have been into all sorts of 'net business',and have burned a lot of money and time in all of them.affiliate marketing,selling on ebay,making loads of minisites for adsense income and all that.And beyond the rosy picture of $$$$$s that those so called gurus paint in front of you in those obscenely overblown sales pages for their inferior ebooks,i've learnt it the hard way that there is no such get rich quick system on the internet. We are only making those morons richer and burning a hole in our own pockets. Ultimately ending up broke rather than earning even a single penny of their business ideas.
Of all these,i've only been able to successfully make some money on ebay.nothing else has worked for me as of yet.But yeah,ebay is a lot of repetitive work and gets on the nerves sometimes.But atleast you know what you are doing, and what you are going to earn.Nothing is inflated there,as against the affiliate business.

So yeah, i was treading cautiously from the beginning, when i started testing the waters in this domaining business.And thats the reason i mentioned it in the title of the thread..'Skeptical beginner'..lol! And i've not even got my toe wet properly yet.So yeah, there is a lot to learn.And i'm happy to have found this great resource here and friendly members who are ready to help beginners like me.Thank you so much.

Yeah, I'd take the auto-renew feature off those names. If you want to be a domainer selling and buying names, it's good to know what sells, and what will never sell. Look at completed sales on DNJournal.com, NameBio.com and a few others that keep track of sales and see what names, and types of names, are selling and for how much. Check the various forums, see what people are selling, for how much, and at the bids they are or aren't recieving. You're going to hear 'read, read, read' if you want to learn domaining, and that is what you're going to have to do if you want to be successful in it. Forums, blogs, books, etc. 'Read, read, read!' Owning a domain doesn't mean it will sell. Though owning a name that others would want, increases the chances it will!!

I'll take the autorenew off right away... Those are some really good resources you have named there,hawkeye.Would definitely check them out.As far as reading goes, i love to read a lot.So yeah,i'd start right away.Its better to start early the right way than having to do it the hard way from the beginning again, after a lot of wasted cash which is always in low reserve.
Thanks for those great suggestions.

sellwheels.com is your best name in my opinion. It would be selling the tires and/or rims.

Thanks,Johname..I'd start looking around for some tyre companies online who might be interested.Even if i make $80-100 of it, it'll cover the cost of the money wasted on the rest of the domains listed..:P

you can take your best name and develop it into a mini site or better and have fun, like a hobby. As you do this keep reading here and other places, and then maybe the site can get good enough to sell and by then you should have the knowlege to buy some names that are winners

Thats a nice idea.Of all these, there are only two that i can probably develop into something that might sell.Rest would need some thinking.
I could make a wallpapers site out of hotwallies.com.Something like interfacelift.Though thats too damn big a site, but yeah,something like that,maybe?

And maybe justseeme.com! Have a modelling portfolio site or maybe a pro photography site.I'll get the content for these two sites,as i'm from the graphics industry.

Rest..erm..i cant think of anything to make of the rest.:P Because, i dont sell wheels,not a big gamer,dont know anything about petstores and hiring priests..lol! and lycra...well,as mentioned above,i'd not touch a TM again..:P

but yeah, i get the point now..From now on,i'll have to think hard before i buy or hand reg a domain name.So that if its not good anough to sell outright, i'll atleast be able to develop it into a good site,rather than just buying randomly regged domains,just because no one thought of it, and there is a DOTCOM available for that name...

As I said previously, development is not always the answer. How do you plan to drive quality traffic to these sites? And, once you get traffic, what kind of content will you develop so that you get clicks? You can't just put up a mini-site with adsense and expect to make money. It can take months to get listed on the 1st page of Google search results even with non-competitive keywords (especially if your new site ends up in the "sandbox"). You must have a strategy, regardless of whether you develop or resale domains. My advice: figure out a profitable niche and then start working on it. In a few months it might pay off.

You are right there,metrisoft..and thats what i'll be thinking hard from now on..like i said above, of these,i can only think of developing two domains that i'm comfortable with.Rest i'll have to try hard to find a buyer for.. no point in developing something around a random domain name, that may not get me traffic and more importantly,adsense clicks..I get your point..

And..figuring out a profitable niche...well, here comes the hard part..:P Nearly all niches that i can think of,are heavily populated with loads of good sites..:PThat doesnt mean there arent any untapped niches..just that,i'll have to spend months into research to find the right one that clicks for me..:P
Maybe you could suggest me one to get me thinking..i'd be grateful. If not here, then you can PM me..
Thanks again for everything.

Kristin, Matt & Ross pretty much summed things up... but I think you want to know "why" these names are not worth as much as you thought... so I'll try and help with that...

a) sellwheels.com
When you choose a generic domain name, you should always think about it as developed... and if it were developed... who would want to own it, who would want to go there... how would they find it. With sellwheels.com - people looking to buy a car, are not searching for "sell wheels" - this term doesn't even have an Overture score... which probably means not many, if any people are looking for this search term.

b) 7gamer.com
Sure, short domain names are great... but short, just for the sake of being short isn't always good. You might have some success with development and branding... but names like this are a dime a dozen... why not pick up 8gamer.com, 9gamer.com, 27gamer.com, 101gamer.com... it's just not worth it.

c) allpetstore.com
Adding the "all" here is a bit redundant and pointless, hence the fact that it was available.

d) hirepriest.com
Not good format. Why not just get HireAPriest.com, which is available. I'm not saying get it... but just curious as to why you'd go with "hire priest" - Just tossing a couple of words together doesn't make a good domain name.

e) hotwallies.com
? You have a potential trademark issue on your hands here. Watch out not to violate tm's.

f) justseeme.com
maybe good for a cam site... another dime a dozen type of name. Nothing special about it, and it seems wordy and easy to forget.

g) lycrabra.com (lol!)
Another trademark violation - lycra is a registered tm. avoid tm's

h) techclock.com
I don't even know what this is, or what it could be used for. Did you have something in mind?

Use tools, do research, spend hours upon hours reading what other people have to say before registering your next domain name(s)

Although it may not seem like it... domain name investors have a method to their madness. Some focus on certain generic niches, while others go for brandable, while others go for geographical... some focus on traffic domain names... there's most certainly always a reason behind a registration.

Good luck to you

A special thanks to you for taking out the time, and explaining specifically for each of the domains,Jennifer. That'll indeed help me a lot the next time i register a domain..

As for hirepriest..i,infact had thought of hireApriest.com before i registered this one.But to keep the letter count to minimum,i tried to get rid off the 'A' in there..

And techclock.com...err..i dont know myself! :P I was trying to find something to do with 'time'..so i kept guessing, and all the searches ended up with domains taken..so this one came up randomly out of nowhere,and lol..it was available.At that moment,i thought, how did anyone miss this? Now i know why..doesnt make any sense...
I'll make sure my domains make sense from next time onwards..

Thanks again for the great input.It surely helped me a lot!

 

[zachary0611]

when i see sellwheels.com i think of hot wheels maybe something there i agree with the rest of the guys but i have seen worst names sell of a couple hundred bucks so dont give up

 

[Ryanie]

^Lol..thats what i had in mind when i registered sellwheels.. But i didnt even try to find if hotwheels was available or not..Its a TM..

Btw, estibot appraised sellwheels.com at a value of $100.. rest are all reg fee.. Hope,i can sell it for $100 or so..

Btw,i just learned that i can ask godaddy for a refund, if the domain i recently registered with them is not of much value, or if it violates a TM.
Can anyone help me here, as to how i should approach them for a refund for domain(s)? I cannot find much info on their support page..:S
Thanks.

 

[mdamin76]

What a tough question. BTW, I hope you'll success on your domaining business one day.

 

[Semtex]

This is a tough time to be jumping into the domain name market.

It is only tough if you are selling. If you want to get nice names for cheap, look around for premium LLLL.coms - They are selling for half price right now and you will be sure to make money on them in the next few years. Find names with good acronym potential that a business would be looking for.

premium LLLL names consist of A,B,C,D,E,F,G,H,I,L,M,N,O,P,R,S,T - If you can find LLLL names with these letters, there will always be buyers for them.

Also 5 letter pronounceable names are worth registering. Look around in the 5 letter forums and see what people are buying. Don't go crazy with them, but maybe buy a few nice ones from members on Namepros. There are some really nice names for $10-$30 in this category.