My first ten rules seemed to go over well so I’ll move on to my next 10. These aren’t rules but tips that have worked for me over the years. There are thousands of these types of lists but I will add my own personal thoughts (Imagine that). I’m not a millionaire domainer but a person that makes an extra $20-$50K each year that allows me have a little extra spending money and more importantly, build a investment portfolio that possibly could make me a millionaire domainer down the road. In no particular order here are my second 10 tips.
11. If you get a bid on Sedo during the weekend and decide to send it to auction, wait. Wait until 9 o’clock central time during the week to push it to the auction. Especially during the summer, people travel and go out during the weekend. Nine o’clock is before the east coast goes to bed and after the west coast gets home from work. It allows the most people to be part of the frenzy at the end. Some may say it doesn’t matter, that any time during the week is good , but I would certainly avoid weekends.
12. Wait until the very last minute to place a bid on Namejet which is 11 o’clock Eastern. People that don’t use auction tools just browse names with bids. Don’t let yours be part of that list. Remember some of the backorders on Namejet are just “an expression of interest for a domain name” and if there is not enough interest may never be sent to auction so if you really want it you may bid a little higher initially to let them know you’re willing to pay a bit extra. You can also withdraw your back order if you do it before the close. It’s not good practice but helpful if you are drunk back ordering.
13. Paying $200 for a sticky post at the top of the forum in DnForum is a great place to advertise. There are plenty of great places to advertise your wares in domaining but this location is a great deal for your money. You get a whole month and a catchy title draws a lot of attention. I’m not a shill for dnforum, just a man that respects marketing value.
14. Don’t spam the comment sections of domain blogs. Comment sections are not a place for you to sell your domains. The “I notice you just did an article on domains, I have poorqualitydomain.us for sale” comments usually get erased but it’s not a good practice. There are plenty of other ways to promote your domain
15. Use the extra line of your address in your WhoIs and put “This Quality Domain is Now for Sale’ I like using “Now” because it makes it seem like it just came up for sale. Makes it sound more elusive and expensive. If you want to insure you get no offers, keep the privacy on.
16. Other people’s “pigeon shit” is your cash flow. There are plenty of other niches of domains besides generics. The 3 letter dot com,net, org domains as well as the 4L dot comes have their own world. They are great for flipping and have great liquidity on the auction sites of sedo and namejet. I know people that specialize in LLN and LNL dot coms and make an extra grand a month flipping them. Reece Berg used to do a great job of analyzing LLLL dot com values and it taught me that they are almost like commodities and have predetermined values depending on their letter content and layout. CVCV have more value and repeating letters had their own as well. I still pay attention to that and come up with my own price guide to 4L and 5Ls that I use to buy names. Do the same with your niche.
17. When people that have plenty of money are auctioning domain names, be careful. They are unloading their junk on you. Then again their junk may be your best name
18. Take all your domain names, put them on a spreadsheet with all their info (registrars, password, how much you paid, expiration) and burn it on a CD or flashdrive. Give it to your spouse or person you will leave it to in case something happens to you. Update it yearly or twice a year. Our portfolios are valuable and should be part of a will , but make it easy on the person. Let them know where they are so they can do what they need to with them. You would hate for them to expire and have them lose them. You are probably like me and have names in several places. Which lead me to
19. Try and get all your names in one place. It takes effort to do but it is so much easier to manage this way.
20. Try landing pages. If you aren’t making money parking try a one page lander telling the visitor how great the name is. I also like to add a sedo offer button. Sedo often makes people feel more comfortable and I don’t mind sending a name to auction at a lower price and letting the community decide the value every once in a while. The landing pages should also point to your other names. If it does go to auction it gets a lot of attention. People are curious and they like to know a little more about the names up for auction. Let them find out all about you and your names.
Another great set of tips Shane – thanks for sharing!
My favorite is #14 – it always scares me to think that this is actually how some people think they should sell a domain.
As a blogger it is also annoying to see a post I’ve put a lot of time and energy into get a comment that is nothing more than someone who didn’t read the article and is just trying to post a sales listing.
Keep em’ coming Shane, these are great tips!!