Obtaining a Domain Name

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Permalink Reply by Bill Sanders on September 15, 2008 at 10:41am

In my opinion, that's insane. Unless of course you have a very unique doman name that someone is sitting on just waiting to sell it. Check out http://www.networksolutions.com/ to get a good idea of where the prices should start.

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Permalink Reply by Rae Kridel on September 15, 2008 at 10:46am

When you buy a domain name, you don't really buy it, you rent it for as long as you want or as long as you remember to renew it. They cost very little. Some web hosts will give allow you to register it for free if you host with them but don't do it, since they really have the domain name and you can only use it if you host with them. If you decide to change hosts, you lose the domain. Still, you should only be paying $10-15 a year for a domain name.

Now if you want a domain name that someone has already "bought" and they want to "sell" it to you, then yeah, maybe they'll part with it for $1200 because they thought of it first. There are some people who make their entire living off of thinking of domain names, parking them, and waiting for someone to decide they want it and will pay a huge amount for it. In that case, you either cough up their fee or think of another domain name that someone hasn't already parked. I'd go with the latter option.

Also, once you have it, DON'T FORGET TO RENEW IT! A friend of mine used to be the Executive Director of the Bloomington Early Music Festival and he forgot to renew his in time. Someone snatched it when www.blemf.org rolled over and was available, and held it hostage till he paid to get it back, putting up a porn site to embarrass him to pay as quickly as possible. The hostage-taker was in Europe so he couldn't really do anything legal to try and wrangle it back, so his lawyer advised him to pay the $500 the guy wanted to get it back. He had it back in a couple of days. I'm sure others on here can tell more stories of domain hijacking like this.

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Permalink Reply by Will Hardison on September 15, 2008 at 10:47am

I'd try to come up with a different domain name and save that $1,200! A new domain name runs anywhere from $5-$20 depending on where you register it.

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Permalink Reply by Rae Kridel on September 15, 2008 at 10:53am

You can try the name with hyphens or underscores between the words or choose .net instead of .com; those might be available. Or just go with something entirely different. When I started my company, I wanted to name it Media Noche which is a pun, sort of. It would be a media company, but media noche is Spanish for midnight. But of course, every variation of domain name I tried was already taken so I just came up with a different company name that was unique enough that no one had taken the domain yet.

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Permalink Reply by Cara Cumberland on September 15, 2008 at 10:51am

Thanks for all of your help. I thought this seemed a little insane. It's actually buydomains.com that owns it, so I am guessing this is their business- to buy and sell.

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Permalink Reply by Rae Kridel on September 15, 2008 at 10:57am

That sounds like exactly what they're doing. They register new domain names or wait for one to roll over because the poor owner didn't renew in time, and they sit back and reap the profit.

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Permalink Reply by Joe Meadors on September 15, 2008 at 10:52am

Unless someone already owns the name, $1200 is truly insane. Tiger Technologies, GoDaddy and many others will establish your domain name for less than $10. Now if you're talking web page space, email accounts, etc. you may pay a touch more... like $15.

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Permalink Reply by Tim Heidenreich on September 15, 2008 at 1:08pm

Cara - That is probably way too much, but it depends on what you are doing. We register new domains for clients for $15 a year (new and unique name), but if you are trying to buy one that someone already registered and controls there is no limit to what they can charge to transfer it to you.

Our company, ProVim, provides this service and we can also give you some advice on it if you'd like. Let me know if you want some help.

Tim
http://provim.net

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Permalink Reply by Mario Guerendo on September 15, 2008 at 1:44pm

Hi Cara,

It depends on the domain. Does it below to someone? if yes, the owner can price it however he/she wants. If it is available, it should not be more than $20. Hope this answers your question.

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Permalink Reply by Cissi Sherlock on September 15, 2008 at 3:36pm

INSANE!!!!!

A truly cheap way out would be to create a site on freewebs.com and then register it on .tk.

You spend NO cash!

You are getting a lot of good advice here. I would listen to the experts. These people are GOOD!

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Permalink Reply by David Mark on September 15, 2008 at 5:08pm

It's insanity for sure.It should only cost you $10 (per year, or less). Get another name if you can and you can. I have some advice when shopping for a domain name. When you search via Network Solutions or Go Daddy or whomever, buy it the same day you're searching. I learned this the har way once when I felt I had to think things over. I went back the next day and it was gone! It's unfortunate, but it happens.

Good luck.

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Permalink Reply by Mike Seidle on September 16, 2008 at 8:39am

Cara -

Note: I buy/sell domains all the time (here's an example that is for sale right now).

First, you can get a new domain for $10-$20 from any registrar. If you need a good search tool, DO NOT USE registrar tools like Network Solutions. They will reserve the domains for up to two weeks when you search to force you to buy from them (this is called front running). Use domaintools.com.

Second, the price of a domain owned by someone else is set by the following criteria:

* Marketing value. Something like mortgage.com is worth more than mortgagez.com. This really is a coolness factor, more than anything.
* SEO value. Domains that are keywords have extra value to buyers who care about SEO.
* Length. Short domains are worth more than long ones. Why? Marketing Value.
* Does not contain other people's brands. Big rookie mistake in domains is to get domains like Coke-deals.com. The trademark owner can take the domain from you for $600 via ICANN. So domains with other people's trademarks are usually worth less than $600
* Idiot/Unsophisticated buyer factor - domain buyers who don't know what they are doing overpay.
* Existing traffic - some domains have lots of traffic already due to their name being ranked in google or due to an old website that still has lots of traffic and residual links.

Some rules of thumb for buyers:

* A successfully parked domain makes more in ad clicks than it costs to renew the domain, so the seller isn't losing anything to keep the domain.
* Start offers reasonably low. If someone is asking $25,000, don't bid $200. The smaller the listed price, the closer to the price you'll have to be with your bid to buy it. I might accept a $1000 bid on something listed at $3000, but you will have bid at least $25 for a domain listed at $30.
* NEVER EVER EVER use paypal to pay for anything but a small domain transaction. It's easy to get scammed because paypal will not protect sellers and buyers of non-tangible products.
* Services like escrow.com are a good idea for larger domain transfers. Protects both parties.
* Be very careful with unsolicited email messages about buy this hot domain.

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