Domaining Like It's 2001
"It's too late to make big money in domaining… I wish I had been around in 1995, 2001 or 2005".
That's a very common complaint heard among today's domainers. Who wouldn't want to reach back through time and join the forefathers of domaining when they were just laying the foundation for their future domain empires?
In 1995, the Internet was just beginning to attract mainstream attention. In 2001, the dot com crash liberated tens of thousands of top domains. And as recently as late 2005, you could have registered tons of LLLL.com domains and sold them early this year for big bucks.
So, is it really too late?
Not at all. Just ask Michael B., a Bangkok-based Danish journalist, who snapped up the following LLL.com domains on Afternic last week:
ZLI.com - $500
PQT.com - $571
LLJ.com - $603
WJA.com - $735
RLU.com - $900
Michael paid a total of $3,309 for these domains. But their actual market value is in the mid five figures!
Who sold these domains at such a low price? iREIT, a "next-generation Internet media company that acquires, develops and monetizes high-quality domain names and web properties".
Last week, iREIT listed a small part (10,000+) of its portfolio on Afternic. NameBio reported on the fact this Monday, but by then most bargains were already gone.
Was iREIT aware of these LLL.com domains' market value? Probably not. Someone at iREIT for whatever reason made a decision to sell these domains (and quite a few others, such as say.org and gut.org) at a very low price.
That's not a one-time event. In fact, it happens all the time. Not everyone values their domains as much as domainers and potential end-users do. Many individuals, companies and even large corporations let valuable domains expire (or sell them for peanuts) simply because they no longer have any use for them.
As a domainer, you just have to be at the right place at the right time. That might be called "luck" by some, but in reality it boils down to hard work, actively working your market, keeping an eye on prices and trends, and having sufficient liquidity to make sure you can grab a bargain before someone else does.
It takes just a couple of deals like this to be able to retire. Michael could sell these five domains for $50,000 any day of the week. If he finds a few comparable deals in the future and keeps reinvesting his profits he'll be a domain millionaire in no time.
This is what I love to hear. ( I Heard on my local news last night a local guy sold pizza.com for over $2 million US I believe I heard. Now I'd like to get an idea of what the NLNN.com domains are worth. I mean Letters and Numbers that are memorable and have that "Brand Ability" we all talk about.. Some examples are 2CU4.com, 4G02.com, 4G04.com, 2G02.com. And I've others for sale that are a mix of numbers and letters that have meaning also, like 4U2XL.com, 2CNE1.com, I8It2.com, etc. etc. I can go on and on, but you get the idea. Most of those listed will be at the next Moniker auction.
Cheers4Now,
Brad
PS: Great site, I wish you had some digg and techno links for me to promo it more. I do have it listed on my blog though.
I'd be interested to read your reasons why these domains are worth $10,000 or so apiece .
For example, looking at the domain names above, I can imagine, Plumstead Quality and Training Services (pqt.net) wanting the pqt.com domain and maybe paying somewhat more than the auction price above. Also, the owner(s) of the PQT trademark may be interested. Whether the price would be 10,000 or more would be interesting to find out.
However, what would the value be behind the others - unless for example someone knows the wja.com domain is available and reverse engineers a company name to fit the acronym ? In which case they could just as easily look at any other name and save $10,000 plus.
You see some very unrealistic expectations from sellers on , for example sedo , where two 5 character words shoved together, with zero type-in traffic, have asking prices in the 5 or 6 figures.
I still hear people stating that it's "too late" to get into domaining - I can't argue that all the "widgets.com" are gone, but keyword phrase domain names are still widely available and at some point, manufacturers will realize the value of owning something like "reversekvmswitch.com".
Just my $.02
Monte , you know very little . period .
The value is what he could sell them for , and $50k is on the nose . If they were listed for sale that is what they would sell for combined.
Reverse engineering a company name to use a domain …… bla bla ..
fool
Their are still some great value generic directory domains available. Go get guys.
It's strange that iRate doesn't know what it sells.
Now after every blog featured it, it will probably never repeat.
There are many great keyword phrase domain names available. It is certainly not too late to get them.
I wonder how to estimate the actual market value of a domain.
Domainers still have chance to make big domain. The actress of "Lust & Caution" names Tangwei. After the film, the price of domain name "www.tangwei.com" increased from 500RMB to 8000RMB (60USD$ to 1000USD$). Once it is sold out, the domainer will earn a lot.
OK…so this explains why I can't register new domains if I want to use a very short domain name…they are already reserved to be sold with high price! Oh man…
I think that it depends on what it is you want to sell or represent with that short domain name. You may be better off with a longer domain name with 2 or 3 "key" words in it. This is why many websites out there have 2 or 3 domain names pointing to the same website. One they advertise because it's memorable and and/or short and the others have the keywords that help in (SEO) search results.
I agree with Dam and Monty. I think iRate knew excactly what was doing. They own many domains and of course they keep the good ones for them selfs.
Why these domain would cost 50000?
Because they have 3 letters?
When was the last time you visited a site with a LLL domain and you remember that domain?Do you see big sites or companies with domains like dgr.com zlrk.com or whatever?
Let's see now… Hmmm.. ok I remember CVS.com & IBM.com & QVC.com & HSN.com & ummmm.. It doesn't matter, I also still remember RebateMom.com & 2CNE1.com & JocksWear.com and a list of others. So long or short I think we all agree it has to mean something, be the initials for something and be memorable..!!
Brad
I feel the best kept secret is to search the .com extension for clever branding of keyword ideas rather than buy keyword ideas at all the other extensions.
I have always felt there will be a big shift of money from the other extensions into the .com extension. Also it is my personal opinion that anything you want to accomplish can be done better in the .com extension. The iphone and others will bring tremendous amounts of traffic into the .com space. THINK .COM Jeff Schneider
I think you are right on Jeff - and their are still good domains in .com
I agree also, like I have been saying all along. It really has nothing to do with the number of letters or characters in the domain name. If it's 1 or 2 words and a phrase that people are interested in and are looking for. It will not only receive type-in "direct navigational" traffic, but will also be memorable for marketing and branding purposes.
Brad
Spot on Brad -
Just to cap I wanted a domain to enhance my directory of auto sites.
AutoGlassAndRepairs.com was available so I bought it as well as AutoGlassNRepairs.com (N) I think they are both good directory domains for searching the bar as well as search engines.
Hey Gene,
Do you have AutoGlassRepair.com (Non-Plural) and/or AutoGlassRepairs.com without the and or N..? I guess the name with a dash would also be good for search engines.. ex. AutoGlass-Repairs.com Auto-GlassRepairs.com, Auto-Glass-Repairs.com, you could go on and on with that, but it depends on the stats and which ones get the most type in traffic (including Search engines hits) without any marketing efforts. I just typed in a bunch of domain names on the subject off the top of my head and some are developed and others have shoddy parked pages. The subject matter is like a bottomless pit, it can either be a small niche market or something as massive as auto glass. Unreal how many potential names are still out there unregistered..!!
Brad
No Brad I do not have that - a quick who is says a guy in Victoria here in Aussie has it.
I tend to like the (and) and (N) I think people will search that way - I am not so keen on dashes, in fact I do not have any.
I think the net will all be directory domains in the near future it is well under way now, many owners as I see it are just sitting and waiting to develop. I think the question of buying and selling for massive gain is not the intention of most, I have some for sale just like people have many houses, to move on and expand the network.
As you say - still out there unregistered..!! it amazes me.
Hey Gene,
I'll post an email addy for you that I rarely use, just to trade regular email addresses. I don't have any dashes in my portfolio either and I agree with you when you comment about the way the net is moving in relation to directory domains. I have a program called name maker and it has spit out many domains with autoglass in them that are available.. I'm not posting them here.. But send an email to bobbyvans.
Brad
Domain Names are very similar to seeds. Certain seeds will grow into redwoods. Domain Names are separate one of a kind creations. You never know what you will get until you plant them.
What I am wondering is how domainers choose domain name. What are the factors to be considered when they choose and invest in domain name purchase?
73 years old, stroke impaired man commits, an exchange of information is in order. After reading this letter, you will understand my reluctance.
Shortly before my stroke in June 2004, I had become a URL re-seller through Enom in Bellevue Washington. I, a carpenter, knew nothing about the business, other than the obvious, you can’t sell something that you don’t have, thus I began creating an inventory, and was soon the proud owner of several hundred names.
The stroke temporarily addled my thinking, while taking my equilibrium and income, thus any means of financing a sales campaign. Though I have managed to maintain about seventy names, most have expired.
My business model has since changed from sales, to the creation of a category registry, and URL rental around the term “Attention,” as in: attentionseniors.com. To this end I have registered both attentiongrabbingurls.com and attentiongrabbingdomains.com
I am a 73 year old man, and will appreciate any advice or opinions. Also, I visted, interacted, with and departed the domainembark site with less than a favorable impression. Any comments? Wendall Dennis
I'd love to get at least one 3letter .com myself but I don't have the funds for that yet. So I'm starting small and be contented with keyword rich domains for now.
i just started domaining myself. Good to know people can still make some good profit doing this in these times.
Geez, I hope I could snap up those 3-4 letters domain. Might not make you a millionaire but it will turn out to be a good retirement investment!
Sometimes you must to check any availabling domain name by reference to your own business. You can short your long name business into 3-4 characters as your domain name. Its very helpful to find short domain name.
Wow all those domain names for just over 3k! Thats incredible.
Damn that is pretty sweet. 3k… wow, need a minute to take it in.
Forget the past. Today is the only day you can make money, and today will be past tomorrow. Domains are still hot, you have to create and follow your own plan on what to buy and sell.
The domain-flipping business, is now being killed by the Domain Sharks.
They have the financial capacity to keep all the good domains for themselves for years and years, and pass on the garbage to you pathetic domain rookies and cheapskates by auctioning them off at 5x their original price tag.
We need to come to grips with the reality that good domain names that are still in non-private equity hands, will keep increasing in value as they get passed from one owner to another, while waiting for that end-user in a shining armor to show up one day and buy the domain that he will ACTUALLY USE in a more sensible real-world business (which means he must be willing to pay the seller's expensive price at that time).
Which brings to the point about DOMAIN HOARDING. If you will compute the mathematics behind it, sooner or later the "good" domains will eventually run out - or perhaps they have changed hands so often for so many years the price tag must really be skyrocketing already. For example, would anyone buy Porn.com for $200 million now or a few years from now? The buck stops there. And so will other good names, eventually.
The only way for this vicious business cycle to stop, is for the web browsers to launch an all-new browser technology, MINUS the direct address typing field. Which means, a user will have to type the keywords into the Search Engine form field itself. As a result, those domains that actually HAVE great meaningfull content will show up in the search results. Parked domains will die a natural death. If that happens, then all these so-called Premium Domain names will also crash in value. That's because evenif your domain is named auto23geeklover.net, but your CONTENT is superior and actually serves the needs of target consumers, then you will be ranked way up there at the top. Premium Domain names that are simply parked with no meaningful content, will never show up. That's an area I can see where Microsoft can change the battlefield in this ridiculous domaining business, since they own almost 80% of the browser market. You have to shift the business model towards CONTENT, and not just domain names. In fact, in the future, I see domain names becoming IRRELEVANT. In the future, you can have your website tagged with just a serial number. As long as it has great valuable CONTENT, the Search Engines will find it and rank it at the top. The consumer can bookmark the serial number, and just add any description to it to label your webpage.
Death to domainers is coming soon.
Just LOL!
How can you say that this domains are 5 figures the day after they went for 3 figures?
Do you know something called the market?
I am rather sure that the appraised value of many domains is over evaluated, and not a little. Domainers typically buy and sell some domains to each other and create an artificial market to sustain high value hope.
But I am pretty sure, the pure domain estate economy will get hurt severely one day or the another. Just think that a small software addon for fiferox or Ie can cause a huge drop in typo traffic or direct traffic.
You can certainly find out 10 or 20 millions domains for sale at 5 figures. But can you imagine so many business willing to buy such a domain?
Their has never been a better opportunity for the owners of generic directory domains to build directories with them, a domain can be considered worth a $1k or $1M the real value is in the actual generic directory name and the potential it has for search engines and (the domain bar eliminating the need of search engines)
- top level generic directory domains have the advantage of generic email and web page addresses that are unique -
this brings the generic directory domain into a category of their own in pricing - $$$$$
How do you valuate the name like : gshared.com ?
Well Sultan, it's 2010 and it doesn't seem as if the domainers and parked pages are dying the death you predicted.