10 Tips for Investing in Domain Names
1. Attempt to Predict the Future
You may not have the genius of renowned futurist Ray Kurzweil who has been hired by Bill Gates on numerous occasions just to talk, but you can still predict the future of the domain industry. By the time a child born today graduates from college, Kurzweil believes that poverty, disease, and reliance on fossil fuels will be a thing of the past. Ray bases his predictions on the exponential growth in the power of technology, or as he calls it–the Law of Accelerating Returns. We can apply futuristic predictions to valuable domain name investments. Think outside of the box; education & technology, information syndication, social networking, robotics, alternative energy…you get the picture.
2. Stick With the “Dot Com”
This suggestion could be argued, but generally successful investors and domaining old schoolers will tell you that they will put their money on “.com” remaining at the top of the food chain for quite awhile. If you get in the market early for a popular ccTLD (country code top level domain) like .us, .tv, etc.; you may be able to snag a great name. The risk factor for “.com” is significantly less than the other extensions. Maybe we should ask Kurzweil what he thinks.
3. Keep it Short and Sweet
In the world of domains, generally speaking; 2 letter names are a fool’s dream; 3 letter names are king; 4 letter non-sense names are an easy sale; 5 letter names bank a small fortune. You would, however, be hard pressed to find any of those to add to your portfolio. My best suggestion to you is not to stray past two words within a domain name. Memorability, ease of typing and visual aesthetics play a big part in a domain’s value.
4. Keep it Brandable
Make sure the words you choose in your domain flow well together; repeat your name aloud several times to see how it sounds spoken. Ask your friends and family what their first impression of your name choices are. Does your name relate well to the industry or audience the website would be targeting?
5. Keep it Real
We have all seen them, invented names or characters mashed together that form pronounceable syllables–Yahoo, Google, Twitter, Tumblr. While many popular websites today have done well with these odd brand names it would be hard to market a cheaper version of these names to anyone, which brings me to my next point…
6. Have a Buyer in Mind
Before investing your money into a domain name, ask yourself a few questions about your future buyer. Would anyone want to buy this domain name today? What niche industry or population could I market this name to? Is this domain relevant to a small business industry, a single person or a large movement? The more potential buyers the better.
7. Don’t Spend More than Current Value
Do your homework. Research aftermarket domain sales portals such as Sedo, TDNAM, Afternic as well as domain forums for current sales prices of similar names. You can get a good idea of the value of your domain and some insight into how its value may mature in the future. I suppose there can be some exceptions to this tip if you’re Mr. Moneybags and find a name you are just sure is going to be a hit.
8. Don’t Sell Until it’s Ripe
Imagine you’re at the 1923 World Series and Babe Ruth tosses your baseball back to ya with his name jotted down in fresh black ink. A friend of a friend of your second cousin offers you $50 bucks for the ball a week later… you simply don’t sell your green bananas! The amount of people logging on to the internet and developing their own websites increases tremendously each year. If you think you’ve got a keeper, do just that.
9. Develop Relevant Content
Search Engines today are a key element to driving traffic to our names and essentially allow certain websites to be discovered. There are vast amounts of information and domain names that are essentially hidden to the world simply because webmasters do not take the steps to publish and promote quality information. If nothing else, setup a Wordpress blog script on your domain name and regularly publish relevant content to your domains.
10. Nurture Your Name
Incoming unique visitors, Google’s PageRank, backlinks and web reputability can add significant value to any domain. While publishing current events and related content to your domain name, manually submit your site to quality web directories. Social networks such as MyBlogLog, StumbleUpon and Bumpzee can also add reputation and send visitors to your name.
Popularity: 17% [?]
May 8th, 2007 at 2:42 am
Thanks for tips. There are some interesting statistics from domain auctions (including top 250 keywords and more):
May 8th, 2007 at 2:42 am
The URL with stats is:
http://www.dolejsky.com/2007/05/03/domain-auction-analysis/
May 8th, 2007 at 11:03 am
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May 8th, 2007 at 1:28 pm
good info! I think you can add to #9 to publish regularly as well.
May 8th, 2007 at 2:49 pm
I think this was a great post. I’m currently working on my .mobi names ie, http://www.areacodefinder.mobi but I am also taking my profit from these names and dedicating them to purchasing a generic .com.
May 9th, 2007 at 8:56 am
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May 11th, 2007 at 12:33 am
Domains on hot news topics get snapped up INSTANTLY- I can never get there fast enough.
May 11th, 2007 at 1:31 pm
[…] be mad rush of registrations. I don’t recommend that you get caught up in the hype. As I have mentioned before, the risk factor for “.com” is significantly less and it’s popularity has stood […]
May 14th, 2007 at 3:27 pm
[…] few days ago in my article, “10 Tips for Investing in Domain Names,” the first tip was entitled “Attempt to Predict the Future.” It may not be as […]
May 17th, 2007 at 9:52 pm
[…] Essentially your brand IS your domain name. However, it would be wise to remember that your brand also encompasses your logo, slogan and web design. The following “commandments” are essentially tips on how to pick a good domain name.See also, “10 Tips for Investing in Domain Names.” […]
June 28th, 2007 at 5:51 am
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June 28th, 2007 at 6:17 pm
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July 3rd, 2007 at 8:27 am
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July 5th, 2007 at 8:24 pm
Mark:
Great tips..and great post.
With #9 in mind, do you suggest that investors should skip domain parking altogether? Are you recommending development over parking as a general rule? It’s an interesting thought.
July 9th, 2007 at 7:23 am
[…] 10 Tips for investing in Domain names An article by Mark Fulton […]
August 10th, 2007 at 4:12 am
Very good article , I think #8 is defitely something some people forget when they get offered the money.
August 10th, 2007 at 1:31 pm
Nice Article and posts yes ellisd you are correct
August 19th, 2007 at 3:49 pm
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August 20th, 2007 at 8:23 am
The first tip caught my eye. It’s all true though. And, it’s a risky investment too, I must add…since you’ve to “predit the future”.
October 4th, 2007 at 11:02 pm
Very good article
October 11th, 2007 at 6:42 pm
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October 23rd, 2007 at 10:15 pm
I invested in a few domains with namecheap. I made a bit of money then selling them on digital point forums. I guess it is a worthy idea, compared to other forms of high risk investment.
November 6th, 2007 at 4:26 pm
I have had no luck in purchasing domain names - but this article might be of assistance to me in the future.
November 17th, 2007 at 7:50 pm
[…] 10 Tips for Investing in Domain Names […]
November 22nd, 2007 at 10:01 am
Nice info, very helpful - but tell me onething. its a news that domain names extension will soon available in various indian languages, will it effect the .com extension ?
November 23rd, 2007 at 6:25 pm
I’ve heard that new extensions are going to be available. Do you think its worth buying a popular kw with a new extension?
November 27th, 2007 at 8:14 pm
Many domain names are usually valued on how much the owner earns a month times one year. However, the price can shoot up as Mark said according to memorability, ease of typing, and aesthetics.
November 28th, 2007 at 12:19 am
[…] valuable and I don’t really want it.” This is an attempt to get your registration fee (the investment) back. Destined to […]
November 29th, 2007 at 9:28 pm
[…] 10 Tips for Investing in Domain Names: Get some basic advice on how you should go about investing in domain names in this posting from DotSauce. […]
March 9th, 2008 at 4:05 pm
I Mark, hello everyone …
Mark, i have 2 questions and if you please response to me:
1 - some people say that we dont need to build a site, just invest in domains (if we can effort it).
What is your opinion?
2 - I have some money to invest, and after a few months bloging in blogger and others blog platforms, i want to build a WP blog with a dot com domain.
My doubth is, will i buy a long tail keyword domain and build a reader followers comunity or should i invest
in expensive and old domains with a few letters?
Sorry my english, i`m portuguese …
March 28th, 2008 at 6:23 pm
Very nice
btw very good tips i will use them. Some of them i did not know.
May 27th, 2008 at 7:33 pm
[…] 10 Tips for investing in Domain names An article by Mark Fulton […]
May 30th, 2008 at 12:32 pm
i personaly feel 5L brandables will sky rocket its price in couple of years time, and worth the investment as you can find them at reg fees these days