Here’s what you need on your domain sales landers, according to someone who’s been helping domainers created them since 2006.
My guest this week is kind of the OG of domain name sales landers. Tom Klosowski created a script back in 2006 that let domain investors create their own marketplaces and ‘for sale’ landing pages. This is before hosted services were all the rage, so he later turned this into a hosted service called Domain Market Pro. On today’s show, Tom explains the origins of his service, important things to have on your domains lander, and answers the question: does creating your own domain marketplace actually work?
Also: Where to eat and what to do in Austin during NamesCon.
Sponsor: Name.market
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 23:33 — 18.9MB) | Embed
Subscribe via Apple Podcasts to listen to the Domain Name Wire podcast on your iPhone or iPad, view on Google Play Music, or click play above or download to begin listening. (Listen to previous podcasts here.)
Don’t believe in the marketplace idea, people land on your page by trying a certain name, why would they be interested in browsing through completely different names? And its too visually heavy imo.
I’m skeptical of the marketplace, but I see how it can work if you have a niche topic. If someone is looking for a mortgage name, they might be interested in more suggestions.
I want the buyers to land at a location that maximizes sales.
We’ve had many partner commissions for our domains on SEDO. Is that a “lost sale”? Seems like they purchased domains with a lessor price, and we made some money referring them. I’m happy with that arrangement.
It strikes me that the “niche” should be synthesized at the larger marketplaces to pull together as many domains as possible. This would make it the obvious place to go and actually simplify searches for the buyer. I also dont have to prove that they can safely send me money, Afternic and SEDO’s background can easily be found.
At that point the domains do complete on quality and available budget. I don’t see how placing a lessor quality domain in a walled garden is going to increase sales or income given the potential buyer vetted their interest by typing the domain in.
What we need to be able to do is make more customizations of our landing pages at SEDO, Afternic, etc. And have them automagically select appropriate categories for them, at least as a first pass. Then better support category searches.
Yes this might not help if I have poor quality domains, but is a walled garden going to stop people from looking at other options?
I think that you have the wrong concept of privately owned marketplaces or sales sites, if I am reading you correctly. If I am misreading you, please forgive me. You don’t want to rule out mainstream marketplaces like Sedo or Afternic from your sales strategy. But if you have the skill to vet domains and build a quality portfolio, then you have a strong position to create a viable sales site.
Let me give you an example where not having your own shop is a disadvantage. I recently received a serious first offer for a good domain I own which came through Sedo. It was below my acceptable price. However, if I knew where the offer came from and I could openly negotiate with the prospective buyer then potentially we could arrive at an agreement. This could even involve partial payments over a few months. But on Sedo I could not know this information or have the option of negotiation beyond a few canned responses.
My counter offer expired on Sedo and that was the end. This is only one example. There are many others of why having your own shop has advantages. If the offer came through my own site, I would be able to email the person or even call them on the phone. Imagine the advantage of that. Even if we didn’t come to an agreement, I would still be able to contact the person down the line and negotiate.
Domains do compete on quality. There are multiple domains of similar quality that are worth between XXX and XXXX. That’s where marketing and salesmanship come into play. If you send your traffic to marketplaces that offer competing domains, then you reduce the chances of someone choosing your domain. It doesn’t matter how much customization you make to landing pages at those sites. Because those sites are not interested in selling YOUR domains, but selling anyone’s domains.