Selling domain names via email is OK. Doing the following three things is not.
If you own a handful of domains, you’ve surely received an email from someone offering to sell a domain name that is similar to one in your portfolio.
This isn’t a problem in and of itself. I’ve occasionally done it. Elliot does a great job sending highly targeted emails.
That said, there are three mistakes I think some people make when sending domain name sales emails.
1. Sending more than one email to the same email address.
There are a few mass emailers out there that make a business out of emailing potential domain buyers. Some of them make a mistake by not limiting their emails to one per address.
If you own a number of domains, you’re likely to receive multiple emails from the same seller for different domains they’re trying to sell. Emailers should track email addresses and only try to sell one domain to each email address. This isn’t hard to do technically.
2. Sending email to owners of parked domains.
When it comes to selling domains, the best buyers are end users who have already created a website in the business segment related to the domain. To me, simply emailing someone that owns a parked domain related to the domain you’re selling isn’t actually that targeted. It’s not targeted because there’s a good chance the domain owner is a domainer, and isn’t really in the same business as the domain indicates.
3. Poor targeting.
This is probably the biggest issue, and it sends my spam alert off. It shows that the solicitation isn’t part of a mass email campaign. I’m sure you’ve all received an email that said something like “I see that you own BasketballStuff.com. Would you be interested in the related domain ComputerParts…com?
Ian says
I would also add:
Offering a domain in a lesser extension which they don’t own or is about to expire for a .com you own.
Offering an available domain. This domain can be yours for only $34.95…
Over use of exclamation points. We have great news!! This is truly an awesome opportunity!! Etc…
Lengthy emails explaining everything they think you need to know about domains in one long sales pitch.
Not providing any real contact information in the signature line for a domain that has none of your info in the Whois while emailing from a free email account [email protected].
Michael Marcovici says
Agree, we also get tons of these every day, after realizing how bad targeting was in this area we developed 5 tools for leadgeneration at Domainindex. Domaininvestors with more than 10 high value domains are excluded, everyone with more than 100 Domains is excluded, parked pages are excluded, proxy emails as well, we also came up with 5 different ways of generating leads and from the first month of operation I can say most users say they doubled the amount of leads and even more important receive much less complaints. As more domainers move in this direction it will be become more important to develop better ways to market domains.
Site Name Marketing says
Frankly, if it weren’t for your much appreciated blog posts and the occasional big headline sale, you’d never know that anyone but domainers bought domain names for anything above registry prices.
Michele Neylon says
We get a LOT of inane domain sales emails because the idiots sending them can’t parse whois properly.