As a test I decided to use Sedo’s featured listing to see whether it helped offers or sales, it’s quite apparent they are not a broker in the sense that they would seek out a buyer for premium domains however they are the only real shop window so worth a test I felt.

I don’t have a great deal of domains for sale, most are for development in one form or another but chose TVs.co.uk which Sedo had previously appraised at £22,000 for this test, 2 weeks ago I paid the €39 for a featured listing.

When you order a Featured Listing for €39 your domain listing will rotate between the Sedo homepage and featured listings page for 30 days. Thirteen randomly selected Featured Listing domains are displayed on the Sedo homepage each hour while the remaining domains are displayed on the Featured Listings page.

Half way through my 30 day listing and the stats are as follows:
893 visits to the sale page
2 bids on the domain

I have to say both bids were for $100, so unless it’s a really crappy domain, which I don’t believe then it would suggest this premium is likely a waste of money, Sedo upgraded the domain to a ‘Top Domain’ which probably accounts for the larger amount of page views on the sale page.

What strikes me is why on earth would people low ball to the extent that they do on Sedo when making offers, I have had it numerous times on domains, offers like $50/$100 on domains clearly worth 4 figures, it’s not like most people using such a specific service as a domain marketplace would be blind to the value of their domains, maybe sending emails to owners but on a domain marketplace? If you can’t make a serious opening offer then your unlikely to get a serious counter bid.

If there is one lesson I have learnt and one thing I would do differently it would be to do whatever it took at the start to acquire the prime generic domain for my niche.

Having the generic domain holds a lot of value in itself, value that increases year upon year, add that to developed website and you become more than the sum of your parts, a successful site on a prime generic domain is not the sort of thing you see on Sitepoint often as they are private deals done by big players.

Why did cruises.co.uk sell for over half a million pounds?
- Not only is it a prime generic but it was part developed and ranked number one for what is a very affluent keyword, selling the domain without that ranking/traffic would probably have brought the price down to possibly around £50k - £120k.

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Company websites are great for information and ideas for reg fee domains-
When I was researching genomics I checked out genome.com – an actual site, on their homepage it says “Functional Genomic Fingerprinting”

I checked and both these were available….
FunctionalGenomicFingerprinting.com
GenomicFingerprinting.com

Now they could be worth quite a lot come time! (more…)

Spring is on the horizon here in the UK and my spring cleaning is long overdue!

I think I have used the phrase “I am not a domainer” many times but my domain list is starting to bulge and I have to question more and more the reason for what I am holding. There are certainly some long term plays in my list like ledbulbs.co.uk but I also have a lot of domains that I bought at the start or gathered on the way that were just nice domains/words and I have no long term plans for.

So I have recently grabbed the bull by the horns and plan to sell some off, I will still struggle to keep my total numbers down as I have gathered another 13 domains this month so far, my problem being I like to drill down and own a topic as much as possible if I find something I like. (more…)

It has been an interesting week for me so far, I was feeding my daughter Eve and with no warning she managed to throw up her milk all across my keyboard, there was no saving it so I had to do some research for a new one, I wanted something that was ergonomic after last year when I changed to a vertical mouse which helped a slight RSI.

With that in mind I opted for a Microsoft Natural Ergonomic Keyboard 4000 which is a split keyboard, it arrived this morning and I have to admit I am finding it tough at the start to adjust so I’ll be a man of few words today until I get used to it. (more…)

Surely you can’t make tens of thousands if not 6 figures with only a limited budget of say $1k?

Well I firmly believe that you can, each and every person reading this post has the potential to do it within the next few years, no question, if you have $1000 and time it can be achieved and it is exactly what I will be doing myself, if that sounds incredible then the fact that I am also about to tell you how to do it should also seem pretty incredible!

When I sold ledlightbulbs for £10k that was a good domain sale, I didn’t sell ledbulbs.co.uk for £30k as that domain has so much value being ranked at the top of a market that has yet to peak, so rightly or wrongly, I will wait. (more…)

Happy days indeed, I mentioned on Friday’s roundup that I sold a domain and had to travel to do the deal, I have to say that although I am not a domainer and prefer to buy domains to develop thus greatly increasing their value, I did enjoy this experience!

For those long time readers you may remember last July when I commented on my discover of led bulbs from the New Scientist in a post about getting ahead of the game. The fact of the matter is that even when you come across future technology chances are someone had reg’d the domains before you, which they had. (more…)

Out of interest and seeing as I have never used an appraisal service for many years I decided to pay for a SEDO appraisal for the newly purchased TVs.co.uk which is one of my better domains - the valuation that SEDO make would not be something I would put a whole lot of weight on, at the end of the day a motivated buyer dictates a sale price and that can vary greatly dependant on whether the seller is motivated to sell.

Still, out of curiosity and as an experiment I spent the $29 on a basic valuation report and thought it may be of interest to some of you, you get to see the various aspects and considerations that SEDO use when coming to the value of a domain.

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We all know the value of a good domain can really bring rich rewards, I have a few good one’s I intend to develop for maximum gains so I haven’t really had a big sale to feel the fruits of my labour so far. No fear I am happy with the way things are progressing.

What I do know from speaking to various potential sellers is that they can be very wary of emails out of the blue for domains they own or use, it is so incredibly important to get off on a good foot and build trust as quickly as possible. The real cherries are not for sale, you go out and find them but then you are approaching domain owners out of the blue and this is an awkward position, any wrong move can get them to clam up and ignore you or rebuff your advances in an instant.

Immediately the owners who get approached will make assumptions

- Are you going to buy the domain to sell it for profit
- Are you a competitor
- If they sell it, whatever they sell for will be too cheap

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Share dealing websites can be good resources for inspiration and emerging technology, the large sites like ii.co.uk have discussions, articles and news, the discussions can be really interesting, obviously with shares people are trying to buy ahead of the curve so with companies like Ceres Power Holdings, the discussions help inform you as to the potential of such companies as they bring new products to market.

Ceres manufacture fuel cells which they feel will allow people to generate their own power in the home within the next few years, their main product is called a ‘fuel cell boiler’ and they have recently signed up a large deal for distribution – the .co.uk was reg’d yesterday on the 15^th January (not by me as I found it too late).

It strikes me that shares and domains share a lot of similarities looking for popular future products that we can therefore benefit financially from foresight and risk, if you read the news and discussions on share dealing sites there is no question you will get the heads up on some products of which the domains will be available or one’s that you could buy now at a very good price.