Determine What You Are Willing To Pay For A Domain Before You Make Your First Bid

Posted by Nick Niesen on November 1st, 2010

When buying a domain name you must determine what you are willing to pay BEFORE you start the negotiations. I think this is an obvious "rule" but I have to remind myself of this every time I attempt to acquire a new domain name.

Just yesterday, I found two domain names that a client of mine would like to use for his business website. Both are available and "parked" at Sedo with a "minimum bid" listed on the pages. One is a .com and the other is a .biz (different names for each).

I submitted a bid for the .com extension at the suggested minimum bid amount and the seller responded with a nice email accepting the offer and we are going to purchase this domain (this is how it is supposed to work, right?). Could the seller have held out for more? Maybe... but he was guaranteed a sale with my offer today and who knows how long it would take to find another buyer for more money, right?

For the .biz domain name I did the same thing. I submitted an offer for the minimum bid amount (keep in mind that based on my knowledge of .biz values the offer we submitted was more than fair). The response came back with a counter-offer that was 15 times higher than the suggested minimum bid amount! I did respond back to the seller with a slightly higher bid (which is the upper limit for what this .biz domain should sell for based on current .biz sales) and stated this was my final offer and that if they wanted to sell today I would pay this amount. I doubt they will even respond back to me. To me this is just bad business... if you want big $$$$$ (note the number of digits they wanted) for a domain name you should price it accordingly upfront and not try to "bait" buyers in hopes they will try to "win" the purchase after you get them started bidding.

The point of this story is... do some research and find out the value of a domain name based on recent/similar sales (reference my post on Domain Sales - Year to date data 2006 plus all-year data for 2005 and 2004 http://www.domainphilosophy.com/domain_philosophy/2006/06/domain_sales_ye.html). Then, decide for yourself the maximum YOU are willing to pay for the domain. If a seller pulls the "bait" technique I would walk away and find a different domain name to purchase.