One question I commonly see asked across some of my favorite domain-related forums is how people can sell more of their domains to end users. Everyone wants to find that one person who says they’ll pay whatever the seller wants for a specific domain name in their portfolio. The truth is, for most domains in your portfolio that type of scenario is never going to happen. In fact, for most domainers that scenario is never going to happen for any of the domains in their portfolio. Instead, to be successful and sell your domains to end users on a regular basis you’re probably gonna need to be much more proactive. Remember, business owners are busy people and they’re not out looking for new domains to acquire on a regular basis. Finding and selling your domains to end users will always return a higher profit when compared to resellers, and the process of finding and selling to these types of buyers really isn’t that difficult. Continue reading to learn more about how you can find more potential end users, and successfully close more sales when pitching your domains to them.
Difference Between an End User and Reseller
Before I offer up some tips on how you should be selling your domains to end users, it’s important to clearly state the differences between an end user and a reseller. It’s important that you know and understand the differences between these two because they both have different motives for the domain you’re selling. An end user is someone who wants the domain for a specific purpose. That purpose could be development, brand protection, or even the hopes of redirecting a domain for the type-in traffic it receives. Regardless of what the purpose is, end users are the ideal buyers for domains because they’re the ones who will pay more. A reseller is someone doing the same thing you are. Buying a domain because they see potential in it for selling it to an end user somewhere down the line. Resellers are never going to pay the price an end user will because they need to return a profit just like you do. With that in mind, if you’re out selling a domain to people on a forum then they’re likely resellers. Don’t plan to go list your domains on a forum and ask end user prices for them because you’ll never get them. Now that you know and understand the difference between these two types of buyers, let’s get into end users more specifically.
How to Sell Your Domains to End Users
There are two main methods when it comes to selling domain names to end users. Either they reach out to you, or you reach out to them. Domain investors with huge portfolios will often have people coming to them on a fairly regular basis. But then again, we’re talking about portfolios with thousands of names in them. For the average investor sitting on a couple hundred domains they’re gonna need to be pretty pro-active if they want sales on a regular basis. Don’t sit back and wait for people to come to you – Start going out and finding them! Unless your domain portfolio is full of premium domains (like one word dictionary .COMs) or contains at least a few thousand names, most of your end user success is likely going to come from you being the one who contacts them. So, let’s get into some tips that will help you find end users, contact them, and hopefully close the sale!
How to Find End Users
Before contacting a potential buyer you obviously need to find them. To start you can simply use Google and Yahoo to do some searches. These two search engines use completely different algorithms and it isn’t uncommon to go back several pages when building a list of people to contact, so I recommend using both. Begin by doing some searches relevant to your domain. For example, if I were selling MiamiPlumber.com then I’d be doing some lookups for “Miami plumber” and “Miami plumbing.” I’d even expand to suburbs around Miami and target those as well. When doing search engine lookups try to find results that go directly to the homepage and not inner-pages. You’ll often see directories listed in the results and we’re not interested in those. Instead, we want to make sure we’re targeting actual companies that offer these services in the area. Once you’ve done some searching you should have a list of names built. At this point you can move on, or try to expand and gather even more potential contacts. Find similar domains that are parked or undeveloped and see what ads are displayed on them. You might be able to find more companies that are relevant by doing that method as well.
How to Contact End Users
Next it’s time to begin contacting those companies. One common mistake people make when contacting companies is that they use contact forms and other details listed on the website. You should never be making contact through a contact form or to an email like customerservice@ or info@ addresses. Most of the time going this route is not going to get your email in front of the decision maker for the company. It’s going to hit some lower level employee who will likely think its spam and delete it without ever saying a word. That means you want to try and get your email to a decision maker in the company. Doing a whois lookup on the domain is one good way to get that information. You can also try looking the company up on LinkedIn or sending them a message on Twitter/Facebook asking for an email address to reach the marketing division. It’s also good when you can find a contact with a specific name. You can then make your email a little bit more personalized. Speaking of email, remember to keep your initial email short and to the point. Your initial email should state something along how you found them, and that you have something for sale their company could use. Don’t plan on doing too much selling in your initial email – That comes later once you’ve got a bite.
How to Sell to End Users
The most common bite I’ve received when pitching to end users is simple – How much? Once you get a reply from an interested party there is still more work to be done! Before responding with a price go out and look the company up. Do a Google search on them and see what information you can find. Are there news articles about them receiving some big private investment? Does a site like Manta have them listed and show their yearly revenue? Is the company owned by one guy with a small/basic website or a large company with a network of websites? All of that information should help you determine whether you’re going to be giving them a number on the lower or higher end of the spectrum. Once you’ve determined a price respond and once again, don’t oversell. Thank them for taking the time to write you back, give them the domain in question, and provide a few sentences as to why they should buy it and how they can use it. If you go this route you should find that you’re able to successfully sell more domains to end users out there.
