I make money and learn with three things. I go through every domain auction house and scan names. I go through all the sales of the previous day here. And I follow the portfolios of domain investors I respect. One of those is Rick Schwartz. Here are ten things I found interesting about his portfolio and his recent aquisitions
1. He is buying gTLDs in big numbers. Rick bought hundreds of domain in gTLDs such as .bargains, .watch, .vacations, .center, .systems, .photo, .tips, .management, .contractors, .limo, .support, .directory, .graphics, .ninja, .construction, .florist, .domains, .lighting, .repair, .recipes, .institute, and many more.
2. When Rick registers new gTLDs he tend to stick to common keywords to the left and register those keywords in multiple new gTLDs. For instance he registered the following keywords in multiple gTLDS. Bargain, ASAP, 24hour, action, crappy, bullshit, cheapest, fastest, fabulous, greatest (lots of these), lousy, ripoff, scam. You get the point. It also shows he likes the negative domains.
3. He is REALLY into custom made things. In 2014 Rick went on a custommadeFILLINPRODUCTHERE.com hand registration kick. Lots of them. In a world of mass produced it makes sense
4. He felt pretty confident that Justin Bieber was going down. He hand regged BieberDeath.com BeiberCrash.com, BeiberRehab, and BeiberTrial and a few more.
5. There is a TON of meat still left to sell in his portfolio. Millions and millions of dollars left in sales. Ass.com, Bitch.com , Booty.com, Cheapest.com, Luv.com, SOB.com, Queen.com, Widgets.com, Dept.com, DelRay.com and I could go on for quite a while.
6. Rick owns dot Asia names. But only is name and nickname
7. He keeps most of his names parked at Voodoo. A few are at Domain Name Sales but less than 300
8. Early in 2015 Rick was looking for a new name for his show so he registered names including and related to. DomainInvestorConference.com, WorldDomainConference.com, GlobalDomainConference.com,
9. Rick is very concerned with the well being and rehab of cats. Because he hand regged PussyRehab.com
10. Rick is sitting on a goldmine of short numerics. He is going to kill it with these. 238.com, 239.com, 243.com, 346.com, 348.com, 750.com, 7500.com, 399.com, 1012.com, 1027.com, 1962.com, 8181.com, 969.com, 975.com, 977.com. And there are a BUNCH more.
There is a reason his name is the DomainKing. Self given or not, he got where he is by dabbling in a little bit of everything. He’s made millions selling keyword names and he will make millions selling numerics as well. He could very well make them in new gTLDs. To question his strategy now you would have to be blind to his past. And if he loses every penny in his new investments it won’t make a hill of beans.
All data found using DomainIQ
Rick Schwartz is the Michael Jordan of Domaining. His combined foresight and success in regards to this industry is unparalleled. It is a damn shame that he no longer contributes to the Domain Sherpa show, but I respect his decision to take it easy. He has definitely earned that.
Great post Shane.
Looking at his DomainInvestorConference.com, WorldDomainConference.com, and GlobalDomainConference.com tells me that three-word domain names are acceptable to Rick as long as they make sense.
KC,
Those names were only registered to protect a possible new domain conference. I take it as he only registers three word if he has to or they are cheap hand regs. 3 words have dropped like a rock in value in the last 24 months.
I’m sure Rick was against all new gtlds claiming they were doomed to fail and ONLY .com will be at the forefront. Why waste money Registering all those gtlds.
Maybe he knows something.
Well maybe he is planning for the next $20 Years again !
I read many of his articles and really surprised that he is buying any of new gTLDs.
He is the a .com king .??!!1
I can see why he’s concerned with the well-being of cats, look at all the cat videos, cat memes…too funny.
Rick can’t help it. He is just doing his thing. He makes some very good choices with good timing.
Like some of us, he is a compulsive domain investor and developer. New opportunities and another 20 year plan? Let’s make it a ten year plan this time. 🙂
I am impressed with his investment strategy, but not at all surprised that he would invest in some of the new gTLDs. He knows its a long term play to hedge his bets in other investments. Nicely done.
It’s such a small investment probably like .01 percent or smaller of what he is worth.
So it is worth the tiny risk. He is well worth over 100 million if you look at his whole portfolio.
He is the man.
DonnyM
He is taking a gamble on these new tlds. Investors take risks and that’s what he does.
Even if all of his new tlds fail, it’ll be a small loss to him.
maybe the pussy rehab is for sex addick!
Interesting, looks like Rick may have had a change of mind?
I recall very vividly how he was downtalking the new dTDL’s before their roll-out, saying that he thought they were a waste of money, that they would fail, that only .com had real value, that he would not get involved with them, etc., etc…
From what you wrote he now seems rather heavily invested in gTDL’s now (“buying in big numbers”, “hundreds”).
So he was either BS-ing all along in his comments before the new gTDL roll-out or he realized they may not be that that bad after all (or he is just as clueless and simply speculating like most domainers…).
Chris,
His few hundred gTLDs is a very very small percentage of his portfolio. It is like placing a $1000 bet when you have tens of millions in the bank. Big for me and you, nothing but a little play for him. I wouldn’t read into it and think he’s had a change of heart
) Good read, I like Rick Schwartz’s reverse psychology, or maybe he did change minds? Hey were all aloud to do that.
I can just picture him on sherpa running them into the ground lol, great stuff. Going to miss Rick on there.