Helpful tips on how to buy and sell domain names.
Anyone who has started an online business or researched starting one has had to ask themselves this question: “Where have all the good domain names gone?” And it is a very important question. After all, you don’t want to have to settle for “MyWidgetsarebetterthananyoneselses dot com” just because everything shorter has already been registered.
Unfortunately, all the very good domain names have been taken for a long time. The short and memorable ones became very valuable immediately. Names like Loans.com and Business.com sold for about a million dollars in 1999. Now those names are worth much more than that. The dot-com crash reduced domain name values for a brief period, but they began to rise again around 2003 and are now well above dot-com bubble levels.
It wasn’t long after that that all the words in the one-word dictionary had been recorded. At first, what was bought was mainly the dot com extension. Dot com is still king and is considered the most valuable, but other extensions are gaining ground. Of course now, all good domain names are registered in ALL extensions.
So how are these names used? Is everyone pointing to a business website? Why would someone register a name and not use it?
Most of the very good domain names are used for online business models. Domain names can be used to drive traffic to a parked site like DomainSpa.com DomainSpa allows advertisers to place ads, relevant to the domain name, on the pages they create for the name. When someone goes to your parked page and clicks on an ad, the advertiser pays DomainSpa for that lead and then DomainSpa splits that money with the domain owner. Lots of good domains are being used to monetize direct browsing traffic from parked pages.
The best of these are the ones you would naturally type into your browser’s navigation bar, rather than doing a search. If you were interested in finding information about “Widgets”, would you type it into your browser or do a search? What makes domain names really valuable are those that are so easy to remember that you would use direct navigation instead of a search.
The main reason for the direct method is that you are pretty sure that if you type “Widgets.com” you will end up on a site that has good information on widgets. If you do a search, who knows what you might find. We’ve all been there, you come up with a list of sites on Google or Yahoo and you say to yourself, what is all this crap? Did you notice that I wrote the dot com for the widgets? Why not dot net or something else? That’s why dot com is still considered more valuable, is what you automatically think. Dot com was the first widely used extension and was originally intended for “commercial” use. The net dot was for Internet type services, if I remember correctly, and the org dot was to be used for “Organizations”, mainly charities. Since then, ICANN, the organization that oversees the domain name process, has added dozens of extensions. To name just a few, .info, .biz, .name, .us, etc. The .us is considered a cctld “country code top-level domain” like .de for Germany and .fr for France.
So, as you can see, even with all those extra extensions, it’s hard to find good domain names. Unless you know where to look. You should already realize that a good domain name is a very valuable asset to your business. In some cases, it can make or break a business. If you have a domain name that is hard to spell or hard to remember, many of your customers will end up on a competitor’s website when they try to get to yours. You could also end up spending a lot of money on Google AdWords or Yahoo search ads to drive people to your website. It is a great benefit to have a domain name that is easy to remember and RELEVANT.
How do I get a good domain name? Now that you have a good idea of what makes a good domain name, let’s try to find one for you. Keep in mind that the cost of your domain names will likely be much higher than you originally thought. You can still find reasonably good names after the market (ones some already own, but are willing to sell) for as little as $500, on average good domain names are in the $1000-$10,000 range.
The best names go for tens to hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars. Vodka.com recently sold for $5,000,00.00 I believe. Also keep in mind that no matter how much you pay for a name, it’s likely to become one of your most valuable assets. The more you pay, the better the name (usually) and the more natural traffic you can get for free. Some very good names may not have much of a natural type in traffic, but they would still be a perfect fit for your business. If you primarily sell mystery books, GoodMysteryBooks.com would be a perfect name. This name may not get a lot of traffic, but it’s so easy to remember that it could easily be promoted.
Now, choose the name that most closely relates to your business. If it’s a short one-word name, it’s probably already in use. Try adding My,i,e,go or any short phrase that makes sense to the beginning of the name. When you have a selection of possible names, go to a registrar like GoDaddy.com, there are hundreds of these, where you can register names for as little as $8.99 Try the ones you’ve selected. If none are available, keep working on other combinations.
Remember, you want one that is easy to spell and remember. Once you’ve reached the point where you realize you’re not going to find an acceptable one to register, you’re faced with the reality that you’ll pay more for an aftermarket domain name (one that’s already registered but the owner is willing to sell). While you are still at the registrar, you can check the “Who is” information on the names you want most.
All registrars have a Whois link or you can go to Whois.net. Once you find the current registrants information, there should be an email link. Email them and ask if the name is for sale. If the registrant’s information is not available in Whois, that name is probably not for sale. Once you’ve gone through this process and still haven’t found a good name, try auction sites. Afternic.com has a large inventory of high-quality domain names on the secondary market. Most auction sites have a user-friendly interface with escrow services that protect the buyer and seller throughout the buying process. You can usually make a low offer on any name and start a negotiation process, or just pay the seller’s asking price (if you think it’s reasonable) and be done with it. There are also drop catcher sites like SnapNames.com that take expiring domains and auction them off to the highest bidder. Even eBay has gotten into the domain auction business, although I don’t see many quality names there.
Most of the very good domain names are still available for purchase. You just have to contact the current owner. It may take a bit of time and negotiation, but acquiring the perfect name for your business can be invaluable. Usually it will pay for itself many times over.
Some good resources for information on the value of domain names can be found at DNJournal.com This is the best NewsZine in the domain name industry and keeps up with all the domains sold week by week. You can get a good idea of the value of the different names and extensions on this site.