Now’s a Good Time to Watch Snapnames & Namejet

Elliot Silver — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 16:30:45 +0000

I don’t really keep tabs on drop auctions, unless I am bidding on them. I also don’t generally place a bid on a domain in auction to watch it, even if there are many other bidders involved. However, Mike’s post, which has little to do with drop auctions, should make us more aware of what’s dropping.

With PPC down, companies are less cavalier about spending significant money on dropping domain names because they simply won’t be able to maximize the value with a parked page. For domain investors that develop or that buy and then target end users to re-sell, this is a big opportunity. Names that were selling for 4 figures are now selling for 3 figures, and there is less competition – especially for longer tail keywords. Some can even be picked up for registration fee after the auction ends.

In addition to the PPC slide, domain tasting has been virtually killed. This is causing more domain names to drop than ever before, allowing domain investors with a sharp eye to get deals. IMO, there are many great domain names that would be perfect for niche businesses, but they don’t get much type-in traffic. These types of names can be perfect for a quick flip to a targeted end user buyer.

I talked about a good deal I got on CabCompanies.com a while back, and every day, there are dozens of great domain names like this that would have sold for much, much more several months ago – or would never have even dropped. If you haven’t been paying attention to Snapnames or Namejet auctions, now is a very good time to do so.

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Use Caution When Buying Typo Drops

Elliot Silver — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 16:20:51 +0000

I’ve been looking at dropping auctions more regularly on NameJet and SnapNames, and I frequently come across generic typo domain names that are enticing. They seem generic enough that they would avoid any type of trademark violation, and they could potentially get traffic based on some analytics I’ve done. These are typically misspelled words where one letter is replaced with a letter that’s next to the correct letter on the keyboard.

Today I found a typo domain name that I was considering, and I went to the website to see if I could find some analytic information – like Compete.com traffic. When I got there, I saw that it was a porn site, and it got me concerned. I know that a domain owner may not be liable for what a previous owner did, but that wouldn’t necessarily stop a company from filing suit under the assumption that you had something to do with its prior usage.

Now if you are sued for misuse on a high value domain name, that’s another story and a cost of doing business in most cases. However, if you are sued because of a cheap typo name you bought hoping to make enough PPC revenues to cover the drop price, you have to ask yourself if it’s really worth the effort.

Furthermore, you should ask if the domain name is really worth acquiring if it’s currently a porn site, as it wouldn’t make sense for the domain owner to monetize it this way if it received traffic (it’s unrelated to porn).

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Now’s a Good Time to Watch Snapnames & Namejet

Use Caution When Buying Typo Drops