First Domains (1 Viewing)

Im looking to increase my portfolio and I was wondering if anyone has some ideas or things I should look for when buying Domain names.

My son has been dabbling for a few years and you can see the domains he contributed to at:

dn.ca/market/maplemark

There is so much and you have an in-house expert at hand, but I'd say one thing is to visit the Domaining.com site daily or at least regularly to see the domain headlines of the various domain blogs. To see what is trending and what is selling. Also check DNJournal.com for the weekly domain sales report to see what sells, and what extensions are popular.

Don't extend yourself financially, especially as we may now be going into a recession or slowdown. That said, from being in domains 22 years I can say that domain sales kept happening through every previous slowdown. Probably because the internet and tech was still in growth phase, and a business needs a domain for a website. So the tech trend kind of made up for the slowdown in the general economy. And that effect might still be in play for more years ahead.

Look at the renewal price for domains you buy. Some extensions have $40+ renewals so it's harder to maintain over time if you aren't selling and have a lot of those. The .io extension is pricey for example. .com and .ca are good in comparison for renewal rates. As you grow your portfolio keep in mind you are increasing your annual costs if you plan to renew them all.

Back in 2000 I 'should have' focused more on quality than quantity. Back then you could have bought names in the aftermarket for 100's or low xxxx that are now easily xx,xxx or even xxx,xxx. Also, if you have a smaller portfolio of high quality names, that is less annual renewal fees than a large portfolio of mediocre to decent domains.

It is always a balance about what to keep and what to drop, balancing costs vs sales, for everyone. And domain quality is so subjective, you never know what will sell or not sell. For example, I still haven't gotten over how popular .xyz has become and all the high sales it's had, since I remember when it first came out and didn't get much respect for years. Anyone could have built up a good portfolio of one word .xyz back then that would be very valuable in today's market.

Keep in mind my comments are from someone with a 20+year portfolio who right now just adds the odd domain here and there from TBR or a hand reg, <1000 domains total, mostly .ca and .com, with minor .net, .org, .co, .io, .xyz, and newer gtlds. Doing low xx,xxx to low xxx,xxx in annual sales.

domains said:

There is so much and you have an in-house expert at hand.

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I certainly agree.

However, I am in a similar stage where our son thinks totally different than I do and so are the other children. So we have various different tastes in the pool we manage. What I think as "Prime" may not be "Top" in their list and what I "Trust" would bring revenue "Fast" is not "Always" the case. So as @domains mentioned, it's important to know the cost to keep the domains active and concentrate on a few notable extensions only.

I too have been in this field for 25 years now and it's the above that has helped me stay in the game this long. I remember registering with MelbourneIT at $180 USD for each .Com. Couldn't afford to keep renewing them and wasn't aware of too many other Registrars then. Then moved to Register.com and then with Look Communication locally and was there on the first day, when CIRA was launched. But too bad, I have spent all my reserves on the .Coms and was not ready for the Nov 8th launch of the .CA space.

But persisted and started adding on TBRs each day - there was a TBR everyday then, which was later changed to every Wednesday now. Little by little, managed to build a reasonable size portfolio.

So all the very best and the most important thing is to get started, which you have done already. So you are many strides ahead of most others. Congratulations!!

Eby said:

But persisted and started adding on TBRs each day

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I think TBR is a great place tom learn, they are technically all domains that have been purchased before.

The cool calm domainers will snap up the domains everyone forgot about in their haste to bid 5k on the prime choice. Meanwhile some treasures slip by for basically registration fee.

I don't have much time to send in TBR but if everything goes according to plan my son will sniff out some bargains in the months to come.