poll Will a buyer buy your .CO? Let's discuss

[abstractdomainer]

Unless your .CO domain is too good, do you think a buyer has the probability of buying it from you at $2,000 to $10,000 or so?
I don't think so. Here is why:

The buyer has too many options

Imagine how many domain name investors would buy the $120 .CO domains which are decent to really good. Not many, I would suppose (an assumption here, given that one can buy like 12 .COMs or a decent 4-letter .COM for that price).
So, if you buy a $1 .CO domain now, thinking that a buyer may snap it up for $999 or so, things may be tricky here. The buyer has many options with the $120 names that he can buy instead of buying your .CO domain. That's where my doubt comes in.

Although I did book close to 200 .CO domains recently, there is always the factor of having the choice to book 20 .COMs instead. A difficult choice indeed. But given that .CO is so enticing, I could hardly resist the urge.

I think I picked up a couple of decent names. However, the time will tell.

What do you think of your recent .CO acquisitions of $1 each?

 

[D Haynes]

He is fantastic. We also have @DNGear for .xyz and @Federer for .eu .uk etc.

That's right I couldn't think of the .xyz seller but yeah they did come to mind and Federer of course. Good shout.

 

[Nikul Sanghvi]

Another example why @Nikul Sanghvi is the man when it comes to .co https://namebio.com/syzygy.co

Congrats on the sale

Thanks @equity78 ! It's an awesome word and a cool meaning - plus quite a few endusers.
Had planned to push a bit harder but I only had it for 2 months so took the quick flip.

And thank you @D Haynes, @Samer and @Recons.Com for your kind words.

 

[kaposzta]

I had been a .com only (and brandable only) guy for years, but now my portfolio consists of 90%+ .co.

My reasons:
- .co is cheap to register (usually cheaper than .com and $1-$2-$3 promos are very frequent)
- there are plenty .co domains available for handreg (I managed to register 250+ nice .co domains in the last 10 months, even if domaining is just a hobby for me, and I don't spend much time registering domains, maybe 20 minutes a week on average)
- startups, small businesses, and even huge organizations seems to like the extension - it is very similar to .com, and thanks to us, domainers, it is very affordable
- SH accepts .co (I'm not sure about other platforms), and based on sales reports sales are quite frequent (of course .com is king and I think there are more .io sales at the moment) - e.g. today one of my few .co domains was sold on SH for a decent amount ($1.6k gross), I'll post the sale as soon as I get the payment
- renewal is expensive, but if you follow a churn-and-burn method, it's $0 (and you can re-register some of your expired .co domains for a couple of bucks* if those showed some traffic during the 1 year)
- the learning curve is gentle, so after registering a few bad .co domains and reading a few helpful posts on Namepros, you can reach a positive ROI quite easily - without spending a shitload of money on .coms in vain (a thing I did back in 2008-2011).

*unless .co registry decides that your domain is a premium one, then your tactics didn't work

TL;DR: because of the points above, ROI is high.
I cannot back it scientifically, but in my opinion it's higher than the ROI of handregged .com domains. Of course, high ROI requires some hard work, many failed attempts, and some luck. I wouldn't hold a 100% .co domain portfolio, because I would leave a lot of money on the table, but I'm very content with my results ($900 invested, $3500 net sales, and half of my .co domains have more than 6 months until expiration).

Yeah, I almost forgot the most important thing: don't register crap, even if it's only $0.99

 

[WarpedMind]

I bought lots of $1 .co domains. And I'm dumping lots of $1 .co domains. But I've sold probably half a dozen, each of which has put me way in the black, even if I was to dump the rest. So, $1 .co is a beautiful thing. Not always... but you only need one good one to cover a $1 buying frenzy.

 

[steven55]

My selection criteria means that nearly everything I would want to buy in .CO is now premium.
This is unfortunate as now I don't really buy many domains using the coupons or discounts

Really appreciate all your posts related to .co domains.
They are really full of wisdom, thanks !

Do you buy the premium .co domains at the new reg prices of $100+ and continue to get a decent ROI ?

 

[Nikul Sanghvi]

Really appreciate all your posts related to .co domains.
They are really full of wisdom, thanks !

Do you buy the premium .co domains at the new reg prices of $100+ and continue to get a decent ROI ?

Thanks @steven55 ! I do buy some premium .co domains but only a few each month. They are still profitable for me but have a high holding cost because I don't normally drop them.
When I'm evaluating a $100ish purchase, I ask myself if the domain is worth $200/$250 (the purchase price plus 5 years hold time)?

 

[steven55]

Thanks a lot @Nikul Sanghvi, really appreciate it !

 

[blogspotter]

I purchased around 200 .co after reading Nikul's posts in July this year
I would be out of the red even if 2 were sold for 99 right?

So I set a Bin of 99 for the worst of the lot and 1 got binned within weeks of purchase.

I regged them in a hurry and I think about 50% are a waste of bandwidth, but I plan to reduce the BIN on the better lot and see.

Good thing about reg premium, it warms up a buyer to the 99-999 price point I guess.

 

[steven55]

I purchased around 200 .co after reading Nikul's posts in July this year
I would be out of the red even if 2 were sold for 99 right?

So I set a Bin of 99 for the worst of the lot and 1 got binned within weeks of purchase.

I regged them in a hurry and I think about 50% are a waste of bandwidth, but I plan to reduce the BIN on the better lot and see.

Good thing about reg premium, it warms up a buyer to the 99-999 price point I guess.

Nice, interesting..

Did you list them at Afternic and one of them got binned ?

 

[blogspotter]

Nice, interesting..

Did you list them at Afternic and one of them got binned ?

I list them everywhere. DAN, Afternic, Uniregistry, Epik, Dynadot some even squadhelp.. This one was on SAV.

 

[steven55]

I list them everywhere. DAN, Afternic, Uniregistry, Epik, Dynadot some even squadhelp.. This one was on SAV.

Thanks!
You listed them with BIN at all these places ?

 

[blogspotter]

Thanks!
You listed them with BIN at all these places ?

yes