It’s Saturday, again!!

A Jet Is A Jet
Well the big saga this week was the sale of Jets.com. Last week we had Mint.com, but that wasn’t a domain sale.

This Jets.com sale however is indeed a domain sale. The domain Jets.com was sold for ONLY $375,000. ONLY. We often rate domains by how much they sell for, but not necessarily by how much of a bargain the buyer got. Well this Jets.com sale is the steal of the year!

First of all, for those people who think that AreaRugs.com (sold for $405,000 last week) was worth more than Jets.com, let me educate you. A jet is an aircraft using jet propulsion. Or better yet, have you ever looked up to see a shiny machine in the skies making a lot of noise? Chances are, you have seen a jet. No, not a space/alien ship or UFO. A jet. It is a man-made machine that flies through the skies, taking people from place to place, city to city, country to country. Have you got the picture now?

The bigger jets are normally called jumbo jets (Boeing 747, Airbus A340, A380 etc.) while, the smaller ones are normally called private/business jets (Learjet 45, Bombardier Challenger 300, Gulfstream etc.). The Airbus A380 is the world’s largest passenger jet.

I don’t know who the New York Jets are, and I don’t have time to research them. However, whether they are some cricket, table tennis, rugby or soccer sports team, they are not jets (no disrepect to their fans). They are a sports team. Big difference. So you can’t judge the value of Jets.com by looking at some sports team carrying the word “jets” at the end of their name. Absolute nonsense.

Maybe it’s my ignorance kicking in, but I thought that a rug was just a rug. What the hell is an area rug? Why would someone pay $405,000 for AreaRugs.com? I would flinch if I had to pay $5,000 for that. And yes, I am a domain seller.

Well if the rug business is that big and successful, I better start working my Asian connections for some dropshipping deals.

Maybe I’m biased as well. I am the guy that owns Aeroplanes.com. When this domain went to auction some years ago, I fiercely bid for it. It was like one of those domains that you just had to own. Although I won the auction, the reserve wasn’t met. Fortunately, the marketplace that conducted the auction offered to negotiate on my behalf to help me acquire the domain after the auction.

Surprisingly at the time, only a few other bidders were interested. Now I know why. Americans say “airplanes”. Well America guess what? You have got it wrong. It is really “aeroplanes”. The British and the rest of the world studying English say “aeroplanes”. You can check out Wikipedia to see the history of the word:

“In the United States, Canada and many other regions, the term “airplane” is applied to these aircraft. In Britain and many other regions, the term “aeroplane” is used. The word derives from the Greek αέρας (aéras-) (”air”) and -plane.[1] The form “aeroplane” is the older of the two, dating back to the mid-late 19th century.[2] The spelling “airplane” was first recorded in 1907″.

Now, I wouldn’t sell Aeroplanes.com for less that $5,000,000. Yes, laugh all you want. You can’t appreciate the true value of a domain name unless you understand its true branding potential. The word “aeroplane” is used daily in the news on TV, in print and online. Aeroplanes are seen in almost every movie and television show. There is no other object, word or thing that symbolises or represents “travel” better than an aeroplane.

Now, the domain name “Jets.com” is shorter and passes the domain radio test easily, but Aeroplanes.com is the better domain name. Period. Nonetheless, I was personally hoping for Jets.com to stay on the market a bit longer, and I wouldn’t have a problem paying a million dollars for it.

Anyway, I am not going to elaborate on this Jets.com sale, as Alan of NewFoundNames.com wrote a superb article on the Jets.com sale. I left a comment and subscribed to the comments thread. The debate got so hot I had to unsubscribe as my iPhone just kept beeping every few minutes with the “new comments” email notifications.

I like Alan’s blogging style as he says it like it is. Too many domain bloggers spend too much time trying to be politically correct, just because they don’t wasn’t to piss off advertisers. Well, it seems like only a few can really afford to call a spade a spade.

One final thing on this Jets.com sale… I want to give credit where it is rightfully due. I read somewhere where a popular domain industry figure gave credit to another blogger for “uncovering” the Jets.com deal.

No, It was Jamie Zoch of DotWeekly.com who first broke the news about the Jets.com sale. Jamie broke the news TWO days before the other guy did. I believe it is only right to give Jamie the credit.

Now I am not bringing anyone into any controversy. But this is something that happens all the time in the domain space. Someone breaks the news, and then another guy regurgitates it. Guess who gets the credit? The one who regurgitates it days later.

Now as a reader, you wouldn’t understand why I am mentioning all of this. But as a blogger, I know what it feels like when you are not given the credit or someone just barefacedly steals your story, content or topic.

Anyways… moving on.

Domain Auctions
We announced our daily domain auctions earlier this week. We won’t be meeting the October 1st deadline, as our promotional material is not yet ready. Also, we have another key upgrade to make. However, please continue to submit your domains, as they will have to be approved before they can be submitted to our auctions.

Have a great weekend!

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Yes, every domainer seem to have finally realise that the domainer-to-domainer aftermarket is just not sustainable. Everyone is now preaching the gospel of marketing to end-users.

I remember in my very early blogging days I wrote in one post that selling domains to fellow domainers is nothing more than a grand and luxurious way of wasting precious time.

People get away with it, but as with all pyramid schemes that are successful for a while, they all collapse in the end. No, I’m not disrespecting the domain aftermarket by calling it a pyramid scheme, but when you look at what is going on very closely, it works almost in a similar fashion.

People register any rubbish domain, hype it up with a few senseless stats, sell it on forums, and then the buyer goes around doing the same exact thing. This circular movement goes on and on for as long as the domain industry can attract the less-knowledgeable newbies.

Domain parking was or is still a brilliant way to monetize domains. That’s a fact. However, as I have said before, it created for many, a lazy lifestyle that caused the masses to forget the real purposes of domain names.

Domain names are the gateway to the Internet. They are like the address to your home. It makes it easy to find your home. In the case of domains, they make it easy to find a website that is assigned to an IP address/server.

Domains are like plots of land. Imagine what would happen if real estate brokers only focused on flipping plots of land rather than selling to developers? The city would be one giant empty space without any buildings  - houses, offices, warehouses etc.

When you stop looking at domains as plots of land and start envisaging the buildings that could be constructed on those said plots of land, you will start getting the true meaning of domains.

Now, domainers are so alienated from the end-user market that whenever they refer to end-users they seem to believe that end-users are ignorant and stupid.

Yes, some end-users may not understand fully the workings of the domain aftermarket, but they are far more clued up about branding and the need for the right domain name, than you could ever imagine.

All of my end-user domain sales are from people or businesses that approach me regarding domains that I own. As a matter of fact I have never approached anyone, whether an end-user or another domainer in a bid to try and sell a domain name. I believe that domains are supposed to sell themselves. If they can’t, then they are not worth having.

When end-users approach me, they don’t come to waste my time. They come to do business. Give them a fair deal and the business is done. They know about domains, they know that they want the domain name that you own, and they want to pay a reasonable price. Don’t waste their time, and they won’t waste yours.

The synergy between end-users and domains are always missed because people simply do not understand how branding works. I am not going to explain it here.

If you want to market domains to end-users it is imperative that you think about costs versus benefits. We all want to make huge profits, but if you are stupid, end-users aren’t. End-users won’t invest in your crappy domain name, as they will immediately see the reasons why your domain name would be useless to their business and/or marketing plan.

If people want to really sell domains these days, then it would be more fruitful for the whole domain industry if we simply educate the world about the existence and legitimacy of the domain aftermarket. The world knows about domain registration, but not necessarily about the domain aftermarket.

When the world realises that although the premium domains are already registered, it is still possible to buy and assume full ownership of them via an aftermarket, the end-users will come knocking at your door in droves.

I’m totally against people preaching about approaching/cold-calling end-users. Why? Because those that find it necessary to approach end-users are usually those that have crappy domains.

When the domain masses start bombarding end-users with crappy domains at ridiculous prices, the end result can only be disastrous for the domain industry.

We do need end-users, but we can’t afford to bring the domain industry into disrepute with our methods of trying to attract them.

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Simply enter your keyword and click search in the Domain Search Box.
Instant domain transfer with most domains!

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At the request of end-users we keep most sales data private. After all, buyers are entitled to conduct business with some sort of privacy and dignity. Some buyers just want a category-killer premium domain name for their business. They don’t want to be brandished shamelessly in forums and on blogs.

I personally don’t believe in openly bragging about domain sales figures, as I believe that this sort of thing could easily upset the domain buyer. I regularly see on domain forums and other places where domainers brag about buying a domain name for lets say $250 and then flipping it for $10,000 a few weeks, months or years after.

Domain buyers don’t want to feel that they have been cheated or have gotten a bad deal. If was to purchase a domain name today, and then a few hours or days later I see the seller bragging about their huge margin, I would feel pissed!

Some may say, “So what? The deal is already done”. However, have you thought about repeat sales? What about those who have not yet made a purchase, and would be turned off by that sort of lack of professionalism?

Whereas it is very good for the domain industry to regularly report domain sales, there is always a professional way to do so. DN Journal does it superbly. These sales reports help to show that the domain aftermarket is alive, and also give an intuitive guide to pricing domain names.

These sales reports do help to prove that domains are worth much more beyond their initial registration fees. There are people who still seem to think that all domainers all squatters. The sales reports help to prove these people wrong. Nonetheless, there are still a few unscrupulous people in the industry. But, save that for another day.

If we brag about domain sales we may end up offending the buyer. However, if we report the sales in a dignified manner, we may help the buyer to add value to their newly owned premium domain name, and earn some respect in their niche and/or industry.

Rick Schwartz for example has done a good job in adding more value to Candy.com since its sale. Candy.com was recently sold for $3 million. The buyer won’t feel cheated. The buyer will inevitably earn credibility and respect in their industry.

I will quickly raise my hand here. I use to have this mentality that domains should not be sold. A domain name is quite unique, and if you happen to own a particular domain name, as there is none like it the value can only increase.

This is true, but only for some domain names. As we have seen in recent months, not all premium domain names will retain their value. As a matter of fact, rather than increasing in value, they will lose their value.

A lot of domains were overpriced in the first place. I have written before that there have been countless questionable domain sales figures in the past. Some domains and their reported sales figures just do not add up. However, save that for another day.

So the question is, are you selling domains? If an offer comes by, do you reject it, thinking that a multi-million dollar offer will come sooner rather than later?

Lets face it, when you get an offer on certain domain names, you should seriously consider yourself lucky. And am not just talking about crappy domains here.

There are some premium domain names that are indeed category killer, niche-dominating domain names. But the key thing to look at is, in that niche, how many potential end-users would you have that truly “get” domains?

If the players in that niche are unlikely to ”get” domains, then the chances of a domain sale in that niche are extremely remote. So yes, the domain name is a category-killer premium domain name, but the target market for an aftermarket domain sale is either very tiny or non-existent.

If you can’t successfully monetize a domain name, or don’t have the resources or time to develop the domain name into an ebusiness, then any offer that is profitable is a damn good offer.

Don’t get sentimental to domains that will never sell. You are falling in love with a liability, and that cannot be a good thing!

Need an affordable premium domain for your eBusiness?
Choose from over 500,000 quality aftermarket domains at eBusinessDomains.com!
Simply enter your keyword and click search in the Domain Search Box.
Instant domain transfer with most domains!

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We will soon be offering an eBusiness-In-A-Box service here at eBusinessDomains. We will give you a free minisite with certain domain purchases. We will roll out this service in the very near future, firstly to our newsletter subscribers.

We may also add free hosting from Widest.com.

If you are a minisite developer and you want to partner with us, please contact us at support[at]ebusinessdomains.com. You must be prepared to offer this service to us at a discounted price.

The minisite will be free for our clients. We will pay for your minisite or simply give you a gift voucher from a pre-approved developer.

We will not be responsible for the content or design of your minisite. It will be the client’s responsibility to detail their request to the developer.

This package will be suitable for entrepreneurs wishing to launch online business on keyword-rich commercial domain names.

Subscribe to our newsletter to be the first to learn about this exciting offer!