I have received an increasing amount of inquiries from new domainers, mostly by means of DMs in Twitter. I love the fact that there is fresh blood entering the industry and looking to learn and profit form domain names. Even more, I am humbled that these new domainers are looking to me for advice on this early stage of their journey.
Many of the DMs are good, solid questions asking me to expand on previous tweets or on email approaches to selling domain names to end users. Others are people struggling to make a sale and don’t understand why it’s not happening. They will either include a list of their names in the initial contact or follow up with another message asking me to review the names the are trying to sell.
It’s been about 5 years since I posted an article entitled 3 Reasons Why Your Domains aren’t Selling and my philosophy on this has not changed. As jagged of a pill it is to swallow, the number one reason your domains aren’t selling isn’t because of the economy. It’s not that there is a dip in domain sales across the board. It’s not that the universe has singled you out as the one person to grant a miserable set of life circumstances, although it may feel like it at times. It’s simply because your names suck.
That’s it. The pure truth.
Now there can be several reasons why they suck and that is beyond the scope of this post and a great topic for debate. Could make for a great follow up topic.
I’m not suggesting that I have the greatest portfolio in the world by any means. In fact, I have had more sucky domain names in my portfolio over the years than I have had decent names. But as time has gone on and mistakes have been made, I have done my best to learn from them. I have let most of those horrible names expire or sold for less than I originally anticipated. It’s because of the mistakes that I have learned the most.
If you have the guts to keep making mistakes, your wisdom and intelligence leap forward with huge momentum.
– Holly Near
Don’t be embarrassed by the names you have chosen. Just be sure to learn which are good and have serious potential end user value and those that do not. Learn to let go. Remember, most end users don’t likely have a strong appreciation for domain names, so to get their attention, it’s got to be highly attractive to the industry they are in.
This advice goes for hand registered domains, domains picked up at auction, or premium aftermarket domains. Just because you are spending more money on what you think are higher end domains doesn’t mean they are great domains. You need to get a deep understanding of domaining and of the industry you are targeting to be successful.
Follow domain sales of others so you can get a feel for what the market is attracted to. This isn’t a perfect formula for domaining success (I’ve see some names I wouldn’t spend $1 sell for 4 figures), but it’s a good tool for learning.
I’m happy to continue reviewing portfolios as time allows, but don’t be discouraged when I reply with “These names suck.” Take it as a learning opportunity and dig deep to figure out why they suck and how you can find better names.
Wondering what the other 2 reasons are?
