Some call them domain names. Other people call them web addresses. Both terms are referring to same thing: the address you type after https. For example: you may be reading this on a domain named www.associatedcontent.com. This article deals with someof the ins and outs of making money online by buying and/or selling domain names. If you would like to know how to make money online with only a five dollar investement, read on.
Domain names sales made new recently when vodka.com was purchased for three million dollars. Earning that kind of money for a domain name is not the norm, but one can earn money buying and selling domain names if they adhere to some basic principals.
> General domain names sell best. Cars. com would fetch a pretty penny because any and all car companies might want that web address.
A domain name like “carolinacars.com” would have less of an appeal. You might still get bids from some car dealers located in the Carolinas. but I am sureyu see that it’s appeal would be limitted to that area or to someone named Carolina. . March.com recently sold for over $40,000 dollars: single, general words always get a larger price. Consider your “audience” and aim for terms and words that have the broadest appeal.
> Steer clear of patented and copywritten names. Even if “toyota.com” were available, that name is owned by the Toyota Company. Most sites would bar you from offering that name for sale and if not do you really want to litigate with Toyota? The same can be said for names of famous people. The governing board of such matters (they are called ICANN) have time and again ruled in favor of celebrities who have asked to have thier names returned, after they have been registered as domains. Do not waste time investigating or trying to buy domain names that you suspect you do not have a right to own. You’re probably right.
> Do try to find three letter combinations like jky, zoh or kng. There are many businesses and /or indiviudals who use a series of letters when abbreviating thier
themselvesor thier business. Three letter combinations have been know to generally get higher bids than four or five letter combinations.
> Hyphenated words may or may not be valuable. Recently busi-ness.com sold for a very large sum, even though hypehenated words are usually thought to be less valuable. Businesses generally fear that the person typing will forget the hyphen and wind up at a competetitor’s site. However, in this case all forms of the word “business” had been taken long ago. So in this case the purchaser felt the opportunity to be called “business” in any form was worth tens of thousands of dollars. Studying sites like sedo can inspire you to try variations of this idea. They are very successful at times.
> Do not overprice your domain names. I think it is always better to take the “make me an offer” option. You do not have to accept the first offer you get and
one bid can lead to another. If you set a high price for your domain name you may get no bids at all.
>Do not sell your domain name for too little either. If you buy a dot tv domain for twenty dollars and sedo charges you fifty dollars to handle the sale obvioulsy you will not want to sell that doman name for one hundred dollars. Some people do buy domain names to hold on to them and plan to sell them in the future.
In fact, many are doing this with dot tv’s, in particular, but most people want to sell thier doman names now. Just remember to consider all your costs when you decide what the minimum bid you will accept is going to be. At sedo you do not have to accept any bid that you feel is not adequate.
> Shop around before buying domain names. If you are buying domains just to sell them you do not want to pay a “hosting fee’. You simply want to buy ownership of the doman name. What you are actually paying for is the registration of the site to your name. Prices vary, some charge as little as five dollars for dot com addresses. Dot tv domains usally cost about twenty dollars. Just make sure you are Only buying what you need. That is buy domain ownership. Unless you plan to build the site and do business on it , you do not need hosting, for which you will incur a monthly charge.
>Study what’s selling. Take a look at websites like “sedo” to see what is and isn’t being bid on. Sedo is a site where you can list your domain name for sale at no charge. You can also purchase a particular web address there. If somene already owns the domain name you have your heart set on this is where you can make an offer on it. Be advised that if you list an web address or domain name for sale at sedo and you accept someone’s bid, sedo charges a fee of $50 to broker the transaction. Study what names are getting the bids and how much they are selling for. Many aim to make money by selling a dot com they bought for five dollars for a thousand, while the goal of others is to wait till they can find domain names that might bring in huge amounts. After studying the sites you can decide “what type of seller you’d like to aim to be” and should have a general idea of what type of domain name would be popular enough to draw bidders.
> Start slow. I would not recommend paying to buy numerous domain names in the beginning. It can be excititng to see what is available and think you are “sure it will sell”. The last thing one wants though is to own two hundred domain names, none of which are being bid on. You will probably also want to spend some time considering which domain name ending you want to invest in. Dot com and dot biz are the most popular but there are now numerous endings.
Dot info can be a valauable ending if the dot com and dot biz are already taken. Dot mobi refers to domans that can be accessed via mobile phones, and is new and gaining in popularity. Dot tv is also new and some people use them on television, specifiically. A company that sells products on Tv might want that ending. There are also domain name endings that refer to specific places like dot jp, for japan and .uk.com for companies located in the United Kingdom.
These domain names Can be valuable, even if they are not a dot com, but it pays to spend time looking at sites like sedo and others to see what types of domain names and which domain name endings are getting bid on. For sites other than sedo, simply use a search engine and search “sell + domain name.
There are many options, though I do prefer sedo because it is free to list there.
> Realize that you are not the only player. When someone abandons a web address or domain name, by not paying thier yearly renewal fee, there is a period of time where it is listed as “about to be available”. There are various sites that seasoned buyers and sellers belong to where they pay fees to be advised on what is about to be available. This does not mean that through trial and error you can not hit upon an available domain address that will noone owns. It does mean that unless to become a bidder you will have to spend some time trying numerous domains before you come across one that is available and that you think has good potential. Try not to get frustrated, others are thinking up combinations at the same time you are. If you are diligent, you can still find valuable domain addresses that you can register as your own and sell.
If you follow these simple principals you Can make money buying and selling domain names. With a bit of research and perserverance you could be one of those people who turned five dollars into hundreds, thousands or even tens of thousands of dollars. Domain buying and seling is not only fun, it can be profitable and how many other ways can you think of to make money online…. with an investment of only five dollars? Good Luck trading!
