You Domainers are CRAZY!

[Billy!]

I can't believe I am writing this, but as some of you may have been aware, last night I offered to sell approximately 150 of my Domain Names at $60 each, the only catch was if buyers were interested, they had to make the offer via Sedo.com and then I would send the name of their choice to Sedo's Public Domain Name Auction... with the hope of maybe someone else or other domain name investors counter bidding on the chosen domain names and selling the name for a higher price, like $100, or maybe even $1000 or more.

I honestly believe that I have a nice portfolio of domain names, e.g. motokros.com, feet.biz, glamourqueen.com, immobilisers.com, rucksackers.com and all the rest. And I admit I also have some very average domain names.

I have been in the domaining industry for approximately 9 years now, and I have spent alot of money buying my domain names off other sellers and buying them through sedo.com.

Some of those names I have bought have been in the mid $xxx to low $xxxx range.

Last night I was questioning myself should I take the risk of losing alot of the money I have invested in my domain names by listing this "crazy sale", my heart was beating a million miles an hour as I was writing up the details and even more so as I hit the submit button at each domain name forum I listed the sale at.

Even right now as I write this post, knowing that I have 2 hours left* of the "crazy sale" to go, knowing that this is a chance someone is going to make a $60 bid on one of my good domain names, such as glamourqueen.com which I paid alot of money for. *Updated: Sale Over

But I am an honest person, and I will stick by my promise and accept the offer and watch it possibly sell to someone for $60 and possibly see that domain name investor sell it in the $xxxx to $xx,xxx range in the future. And obviously that would hurt as I have been there and done that on both sides of the domain name game.

But with two hours to go, I doubt it, and I am quite amazed that out of the 150 or so domain names, only 4 have been bid on, afl.info, rudephotos.com, qeeh.com and meetdates.com.

I ask myself ... Why?

Is because domainers do not want to go through the trouble of it being put into an auction and escrow?

Is it because domainers are wary of these type of sales?

Is because domainers are financially unable to afford $60 for a name could potentially make them $xxxx in the future?

Is it because when I listed the sale at one of the forums, a stupid domainer reported the thread as inappropiate and the thread was closed by a Moderator?

Is it because of the global financial crisis?

Is it because some domainers are just crazy?

Maybe my promotion techniques were not so good, I am not a famous domainer or blogger and the only way I could get word out was by creating threads at domain name forums ... hell I even used stumpleupon.com on my blog and I even used digg.com to promote this sale ... and received quite a few hits to the sale.

Or maybe is it because it sounds just too good to be true?

But how can a serious domain name investor miss out on an opportunity that I just offered over the last 24 hours?

Or maybe it is just me? I am definitely not a scammer, but I myself have been scammed before... thats another story

But knowone knows me, apart from my 1000 plus posts at the two top domain name forums on the internet, therefore given me some kind of reputation as a good domainer?

This is what I stated in my threads I created at the domain name forums:

I am taking a huge risk with my Domain Name Portfolio, some of the below names I have been offered $3000 usd and I knocked back, because I believe they were or are worth more than that, some names below I paid over $1000 for, some I have hand-regged and some I have snapped up.
I was not lying about that, I have put up three photos of domain names I lost due to me being a bit greedy (yes I admit to pushing my limits when I get offers) or when I have cancelled the negotiations when I believe that my name is worth more than their offer.

Such names as LoveAlerts.com - I once recieved a few serious sedo bids on this name and I worked negotiated all the way up to a $3000 bid and I counter offered $3500 and the buyer cancelled negotiations, or when someone offer me $850 for heathridge.com and I cancelled the negotiations.

Another name once I got an offer for was textaddicts.com and that offer was 800 Euro, I accept and sent it to auction, but the buyer never paid. That name was listed on my "crazy sale"

Oh and just one more name I offered ... you've all heard of Nadya Suleman well not too long ago I won octuplets.org at a sedo auction and an interested party missed the auction and wanted me to flip the domain name over and I would of made a nice flip profit, I refused ... and yet I offered that name on my sale, a name that has great blogging potential.

And finally one more just to prove to you that domainers must be stupid, not long ago at sedo I got an offer of $200 for ioew.com, but I cancelled negotiations because I believed the name was worth more than that, and I still do .... yet I listed that name on the "crazy sale"

I have made some mistakes in the past with my greed, trying to get high domain name sales, and in the past my greed has worked for me, names like textsingles.com I hand regged for $10 and sold for $2500 ... many more.

So thats why I decided to do this domain name experiment last night, and offer a bargain which would be too good to turn down, but it was turned down, why I don't know and will go to bed tonight pondering that thought, and I will also go to bed to night with alot of relief, because I love my domain name portfolio, I love domaining, and thank god, I still have some good domain names left.

I wish those people who bid on the following names goodluck and congratulations on winning a fantastic bargain of a domain name!

MeetDates.com
AFL.info
QEEH.com
RudePhotos.com

endnote: I do not plan on doing any more of these "crazy sales" in the near future, for now I will just sit back and wait for the end-users to come knocking on my door at sedo!

Visit my Domaining link in my signature to see the screenshots of previous offers of the domain names which I listed in this sale. - Not promoting my blog, but it will explain things a bit more clearly.

Thanks guys!

PS: Awaiting positive feedback and also the usual negative feedback

 

[-REECE-]

The market has fallen quite a bit on everything, especially on the more speculative segments/extensions and on multi-word domains. Some of those domains aren't bad, however most people (including domainers) are being much more cautious today than they were 12 months ago about what they buy and for how much. I can't say I'm really surprised to be honest.

 

[hawkeye]

I don't know why you feel the whole world was supposed to be so grateful that you were actually selling these names, the exact same names they've been craving for, and in this exact 24 hour period!?!?!! Seems pretty egotistical (or naive), to be sounding off that 'Domainers are Crazy' because you didn't get the desired responses to your names so quickly. Perhaps they're only great names ...to you! If they were worth selling, and you really wanted to sell them this way, you'd give them more time than 24 hours to be seen and considered. We all spend a lot of money on names, and think we have great names, but the truth is in the pudding, and how much those names are worth to people willing to actually pay for them. Not what those staring at them daily think they're worth!

 

[Billy!]

I don't know why you feel the whole world was supposed to be so grateful that you were actually selling these names, the exact same names they've been craving for, and in this exact 24 hour period!?!?!! Seems pretty egotistical (or naive), to be sounding off that 'Domainers are Crazy' because you didn't get the desired responses to your names so quickly. Perhaps they're only great names ...to you! If they were worth selling, and you really wanted to sell them this way, you'd give them more time than 24 hours to be seen and considered. We all spend a lot of money on names, and think we have great names, but the truth is in the pudding, and how much those names are worth to people willing to actually pay for them. Not what those staring at them daily think they're worth!

As I stated at another forum

Hey I am not mad at all that I did not sell these names, just curious to others opinions.

I am also somewhat relieved I did not sell some of these names, because it was a big gamble for me to take, and I was seriously nervous about losing some of my names at such low prices. But thats what domaining is all about - taking risks.

I understand that we value our names on our personal opinions of each name, otherwise we would not buy or register them

I also understand that there are thousands of posts created on this site every day, and it is very easy for domainers to miss posts of interest.

I ran the thread for 24 hours, because thats all the levels anxiety and stress I could cope with knowing I was selling or offering my names at prices I believe were way too cheap and risky.

:imho:

 

[mntor]

Billy - A few reasons i could think off

1. You listed it in "make offer" -> "At Sedo" section which i believe is not the the section which gets maximum attention. Hardly 50 odd people would have seen it within 24hrs

2. 24hrs is too little time

3. listing 150 names - not sure how many of those visitors would have carefully examined the names

4. Offer through sedo turns off many.

5. Yea the obvious - market sucks big time.

:imho:

 

[r3born]

Billy, personally I scanned your list of 150 domains and I didn't see a name I liked.
We all have different preferences and opinions, a name worth $$$$ to you might be worth 0 to others and vice versa.
I think the 4/150 conversion rate is not very bad.

 

[Billy!]

Billy - A few reasons i could think off

1. You listed it in "make offer" -> "At Sedo" section which i believe is not the the section which gets maximum attention. Hardly 50 odd people would have seen it within 24hrs

2. 24hrs is too little time

3. listing 150 names - not sure how many of those visitors would have carefully examined the names

4. Offer through sedo turns off many.

5. Yea the obvious - market sucks big time.

:imho:

Thank you so much for your positve reply, thats an answer what I was after, an opinon on the current domain name market, sedo and my time frame.

Billy, personally I scanned your list of 150 domains and I didn't see a name I liked.
We all have different preferences and opinions, a name worth $$$$ to you might be worth 0 to others and vice versa.
I think the 4/150 conversion rate is not very bad.

Thanks r3born

 

[Jeff]

Indeed, 24 hours was too short a time period, I agree ... and I just perused your list of domains for the first time in your other Namepros Discussion Forum™ thread - none jumping out at me for potential high dollar valuations / expectations, at first blush IMHO.

Question: You had stated in that thread, that "some of the names below I have paid 2k plus and kinocked back offers of 3k plus. There are names below which I paid a combined total of 10k for" ... could you please specify which domains you're referencing (although the one you "knocked back" was, I believe, "LoveAlerts.com")? :blink:
For instance, which ones did you pay $2,000+ for, how was the combined $10K comprised? :gl:

Thanks for any insight.
-Jeff

 

[mjbenterprises]

I hate to be rude, but I don't think those names are that great at all.. I have sold way better names on ebay for very low prices.......If I put Lovealerts.com on ebay, I very honestly would expect no more than $5 for that domain, on a good day...

 

[Michelle]

I visit daily as much as I can and have not seen the origional post so for me at least I would say 24 hours was not long enough. I will go and take a look at the thread now

Then market is down and most domainers are more careful now with their $.

May I just ask why the quick need to sell.. Are you too trying to flip out names quickly now or was you just testing the waters??

 

[Sam]

Example:

meet dates
2,400

1,600

Not impressive, I have hand regges getting higher then that. IMHO, I wouldnt bid $60 on that, not when I can pay $8.

So you've recieved $XXXX offers on $XX worth domains. Me too. and I gambled, and now I wish i sold some of my names for the bids they recieved. Doesn't mean a reseller is ever gonna buy it for "cheap". End users vs Resellers doesn't make sense.

immobilisers - 3000 Google search. Not impressive IMO. Not worth $60 for a knowledgeable registrant.

I advise you to contact your sedo agent and see if he can negotiate a price with past bidders, has been done before, I just finished a 2k sale doing that. I would take 3k in a heart beat. Greed is GOOD to a CERTAIN point or else you'll never make money.

cheers.

 

[srisri24]

1. I think may be no one is interested in auction process for those names.
2. Not many are in invest mode as of now.

 

[CoMp1eX]

I went through this before, so hopefully you can learn from my mistakes.

Your domains aren't that good/special as you think they are... Especially to investors.

You do have some great brandable domains that can become something more with some added content and development, but until then they really aren't even worth the $60 your listing them for.

 

[VisionEdger]

Such names as LoveAlerts.com - I once recieved a few serious sedo bids on this name and I worked negotiated all the way up to a $3000 bid and I counter offered $3500 and the buyer cancelled negotiations, or when someone offer me $850 for heathridge.com and I cancelled the negotiations.

You turned down $3000 for this domain and lost it for your greedy $500 counter offer. That imho is your error. man alive you lost $3000 for this domain name that maybe a handfull of people worldwide would even consider. Serves u right mate on this one! You felt your domain was the end all to be all and u looked a gift horse in the mouth and were bit.

Me thinks u r in ned of cash desperatley and r now in the panic mode. Big no-no but hey good luck. U seem to know what u want and hve nee around this domain business so why would u turn down a solid offer like this? your negotiatiosn bit u in the buttski and now u want out. cant blame u but we r all in the same boat now, so sad

 

[labrocca]

I looked over that list last night. Not one was worth $60 to me.

I have been in the domaining industry for approximately 9 years now, and I have spent alot of money buying my domain names off other sellers and buying them through sedo.com.

Sounds like lots of buying but what about selling? Most of your examples are lost sales.

my heart was beating a million miles an hour as I was writing up the details and even more so as I hit the submit button

Selling shouldn't be that hard.

wanted me to flip the domain name over and I would of made a nice flip profit, I refused

LoveAlerts.com - I once recieved a few serious sedo bids on this name and I worked negotiated all the way up to a $3000 bid and I counter offered $3500 and the buyer cancelled negotiations

not long ago at sedo I got an offer of $200 for ioew.com, but I cancelled negotiations because I believed the name was worth more than that

I have made some mistakes in the past with my greed

Just highlighting some of your own words.

You can't be a domainer without liquid and capital. Reg fees will kill you. Whenever you get a serious offer you should carefully consider it. If you have a couple hundred domains and sell just one every 3 months that can often be enough to earn money, pay reg fees, and buy more domains. But you have to sell something. Even if it's below what you really feel is the value.

Maybe you have learned a lesson from this. And your thread title of "You Domainers are CRAZY!" should be "I am CRAZY!" because I think the craziness is on your end for refusing some decent offers then expecting domainers to pay you for your scraps.

 

[HuntingMoon]

lol, nice way to market your names. threads like this work well to generate interest.

in the future- take the offers and take a profit. these days- accept all offers that have a profit margin in them...

 

[Electric-Shadow]

I know where your coming from on this one, even on some of my best domains which I know are worth a decent ammount i've struggled to get any offers on them but posting on forums or sedo may not always find you that willing end user, it's been a bit of a long time coming but since the market is so slow just now i've started putting in more of an effort in finding end users via other means other than forums, such as emailing them, hopefully it will pay of eventually I have little choice really now imo, im not going to get very many decent sales from forums or autction sites at the moment.

 

[garptrader]

Selling to end users is not easy and most portfolios only turn a small percentage of their domains annually. Parking revenue doesn't pay the bills if you started domaining in the last several years so development is the only real solution. After spending two months marketing to end users, I concluded they just don't see the value in descriptive generic domains. So I recently developed a Spanish wedding dress site (not .COM) and was looking to see if the .COM was developed. It is a minisite which appears on page three of Google whereas my site just got indexed so it may take a while to appear in the rankings. But I checked on SEDO and found that the .COM registrant has the domain for sale for $5000. OK I can somewhat understand why my alternate extension domain has a more difficult time getting offers but the wedding dress industry is HUGE. Check out a bridal magazine and see how many ads there are for wedding dresses. Dresses can run from a few hundred to thousands and not one designer has tried to acquire the industry-defining .COM domain for $5 grand (which with a little more development would probably make it to page 2)? Schwartz has said, "They just don't get it." So domainers have to be really cautious about acquiring domains because the odds of a sale are slim.

 

[labrocca]

Nice garp with the development of a net where the com is minisite or parked. I love that route personally and it's been successful for me. Dot Com will always be most desired by domainers but those that are willing to mine the gold themselves instead of selling shovels might just strike it rich. Sites build value while domains parked do nothing to add value.

In 2-3 years your net might be worth $xx,xxx while the com will still only be trying to get $5k.

 

[bmugford]

I sell descriptive domains to end users frequently. The reason it is not working could be a number of factors -

1.) The domains you are offering to end users might not be as valuable to them, as you think they are.
2.) The prices might to be too high.
3.) The approach itself might need work.
4.) You might be approaching the wrong potential end users.

But I do know several other people on here who sell domains to end users. Maybe not in the $XX,XXX, but in the high $XXX - Low $X,XXX range.

Brad

Selling to end users is not easy and most portfolios only turn a small percentage of their domains annually. Parking revenue doesn't pay the bills if you started domaining in the last several years so development is the only real solution. After spending two months marketing to end users, I concluded they just don't see the value in descriptive generic domains. So I recently developed a Spanish wedding dress site (not .COM) and was looking to see if the .COM was developed. It is a minisite which appears on page three of Google whereas my site just got indexed so it may take a while to appear in the rankings. But I checked on SEDO and found that the .COM registrant has the domain for sale for $5000. OK I can somewhat understand why my alternate extension domain has a more difficult time getting offers but the wedding dress industry is HUGE. Check out a bridal magazine and see how many ads there are for wedding dresses. Dresses can run from a few hundred to thousands and not one designer has tried to acquire the industry-defining .COM domain for $5 grand (which with a little more development would probably make it to page 2)? Schwartz has said, "They just don't get it." So domainers have to be really cautious about acquiring domains because the odds of a sale are slim.