Sweetmantra: Internet Marketing Advice

Expert Tips for Finding a Domain Name for Your Startup

2011-01-03T20:20:31-05:00

One of my favourite things to do is help entrepreneurs find the perfect domain name for their new business startup. Over the last 15 years, I've had the privilege of helping hundreds of companies with this, and I take a certain amount of pride in knowing that I helped play a role - no matter how small - in giving birth to a new business or product.

If you're planning to launch a new business or product, or are in the early stages of a startup, here are five expert tips to help you find the perfect domain name.

1. Give yourself ample time to hunt for a domain name.
The more time you have, the more options you will have, and this will also mean you probably won't have to spend as much. I usually recommend that you allocate at least four weeks to do a thorough search of what domains are available, to gather the prices of domains, and to complete the negotiation, purchase, and transfer of ownership of your chosen domain. In a perfect world, give yourself several months because this will give you the greatest amount of choice and puts you in the best negotiating position.

2. Set a realistic budget.
I hate to be the one to burst your bubble, but you are not going to be able to buy a fantastic, one-word .com domain like pizza.com for only $500. (It sold for $2.6 million.) The likelihood of you getting a quality .com domain name - one that is suitable to build a new business or product around - for less than $500 is pretty slim, especially if you are in a hurry. If you are willing to spend $500-$1,000, there's a lot of pretty good inventory available for immediate purchase. Move into the $1,000-$10,000 range - which is a modest sum when amortized over the life a business - and you should be able to find some very good inventory. And if you can justify spending $10,000 or more, you will open yourself up to a world of fantastic inventory. Sure, you can spend five figures or more (sometimes much more) on a killer, one-word .com domain, but there is a plethora of good quality inventory out there in all price ranges if you know where to look. Speaking of which...

3. Look for "buy it now" inventory in the leading domain name marketplaces.
If you have given yourself a decent amount of time for your hunt (see point #1) and have a realistic budget (point #2), you will be pleasantly surprised by the quality and quantity of domain names that are available for immediate purchase in the more popular domain name marketplaces. Most of these marketplaces will allow you to do very specific advanced searches of their inventory, e.g., .com domains that are 10 characters or less and begin with the word "scuba". The domains that you find in these marketplaces can typically be purchased right then and there for the listed price using your credit card. This removes the vagueness of the domain's availability for sale and its purchase price. Here are the domain name marketplaces I recommend you check first when looking to obtain a premium domain name:

BuyDomains - millions of domain names starting at $100, with lots of fantastic inventory in the $1,000-$5,000 range
Sedo - millions of domain names starting at $10
Go Daddy Auctions - hundreds of thousands of domains starting as low as $5 (plus registration fee); a great source of bargain domain names if you are patient

Since I am the General Manager of YummyNames, I would be remiss if I didn't invite you to search our domain name inventory as well! We have tens of thousands of premium domain names for sale starting at only $477. Be sure to ask for the "Sweetmantra discount."

Some other marketplaces you could also look at, if you wanted to be really thorough, are:

There are lots of other smaller marketplaces where premium domains are listed for sale - heck, you can even buy domain names on eBay - however a search on BuyDomains, Sedo and Go Daddy Auctions will probably capture 80% of the inventory that is available for immediate purchase at a fixed price.

4. Use a domain name broker.
If you want to pursue a domain name that is not listed for sale in one of the marketplaces but is owned by someone else, get help from a domain professional. A good domain name broker will typically have better success in tracking down the owner of a domain name, can usually get you a better deal than you could get on your own, and should offer you valuable advice along the way. BuyDomains, Sedo, SnapNames and - of course - YummyNames (the business I run) all offer domain brokerage services.

5. Protect yourself and the transaction through an escrow service.
When it comes time to purchase the domain name, use a domain escrow service (or reputable marketplace or broker) to safeguard the transaction. Chances are you will be buying the domain name from an individual or company in another city or even country that you've never even met. When you are spending thousands of dollars to obtain a domain name, you want to make sure that you don't get ripped off. I recommend using Escrow.com to facilitate the transaction. Reputable domain name escrow services can also be obtained from BuyDomains, Sedo, and SnapNames.

In summary, if you give yourself a decent amount of time, set a realistic budget, and know where to look, you should be able to find a great domain name for your startup, new product, or marketing campaign.

Good luck, and happy hunting!

Weasels.com - A Typical Premium Domain Name Inquiry

2010-11-06T14:20:24-04:00

Hello again.

I recently saw a funny little video created using Xtranormal, and I was quite intrigued by the video creation platform. Since I learn best by doing, I decided to play around with the platform and see what sort of video I could make.

Not surprisingly I found myself doing a short video about domain names. The result of my first stab at this is below. You can also link directly to the video here.

When you own a large portfolio of premium domain names for sale, like we do at YummyNames, you get a lot of purchase inquiries. This is a typical one. While it is not based on an actual inquiry (tempting though that may have been), this video captures the spirit of many of the inquiries we get from people who are shocked we won't sell a premium domain name to them for $50.

Thankfully, we also get lots of inquiries from people who do appreciate the value of premium domain names, and we sell hundreds of thousands of dollars of domains to people like that every month.

And yes, YummyNames does own weasels.com.

Enjoy!

To the Top with Bermuda's Smartest Entrepreneur

2010-07-19T08:00:00-04:00

I love entrepreneurs, and I meet them in the most unlikely places. In this case, on a beach.

Earlier this year my wife and I vacationed in Bermuda. I had not been there since a child, and I was excited to return to the beautiful island and give my wife the grand tour.

I did not realize I would also meet the smartest entrepreneur in Bermuda.

For our day at the beach, I decided to take my wife to Horseshoe Bay, a spectacular public beach area featuring the famous Bermudian pink sand, all sorts of rocky coves, and great snorkeling. The weather that day was perfect for the beach: hot and sunny.

We took the local bus to Horseshoe Bay, and were dropped off at the main entrance, which is at the top of a steep hill that winds its way down for hundreds of yards. As we walked down the hill towards the changing room area, we started to pass people who were leaving the beach and making their way back up the hill on foot. It's a long walk uphill in the heat, and these folks looked pretty bedraggled, with sweat pouring off them. We realized that we'd probably have the same hot and sticky walk back up the hill when it came time for us to leave, and we were not looking forward to that.

But that would not be our fate, thanks to a brilliant entrepreneur named Dean Ming. For the last 11 years, Dean has been the owner and operator of the ultimate niche business, which he calls "To the Top." (Smart name, too.) His business does one thing, and one thing only, and it does it very well: gives tourists a quick ride to the top of the hill in a small passenger van.

Dean realized that after spending a day at the beach, then showering and changing into their street clothes, a lot of tourists didn't want to then spend 15 minutes walking up that long and steep hill in the heat. So for $2, he gives them a ride "To the Top," and during the two-minute drive shares a few tidbits of historical information about Bermuda. I estimate that on a good day Dean is pulling in about $200 an hour operating his service. Not bad for one man and his van.

Dean's sign says it's the best two dollars you will spend that day, and I think most of his customers would agree. This is a great example of an entrepreneur identifying a very specific need and then fulfilling that need. Smart. Simple. Successful. We can all learn from entrepreneurs like Dean.

Six Amazing Experiences I am Grateful For

2010-05-26T08:00:00-04:00

For my first post after my unofficial 'sabbatical' from blogging, I thought I'd share some photos and observations from some of the more memorable positive experiences I have had over the last eight months. I am truly lucky that I get the opportunity to travel for work and pleasure.

Had dinner by the beach in beautiful and eclectic Key West, Florida with some fellow domainers (domain investors) who had gathered from around the world. The people I was dining with at this table manage portfolios of several million domains. I was there attending a business event hosted by Sedo, but it was the networking and informal social interactions that proved to be the most valuable.

Took my wife for a surprise helicopter ride over New York City at sunset. (Interestingly, it was one of the domainers at the Key West dinner that gave me the idea for this.) I never even realized you could charter a helicopter and do this, and I highly recommend it.

Scuba dived a Soviet warship off the coast of Cuba. I had visited this wreck 10 years earlier but had run into some complications and had to cut short my dive. This time around I was better prepared and brought along my camera.

Drove through Death Valley with one of my team members (who took this photo) and visited Zabriskie Point, which I have wanted to visit ever since seeing the Antonioni film of the same name. Despite its name, Death Valley is teeming with life, and my colleague and I had a great time exploring this amazing landscape en route to another domain conference.

Learned the fine art of "The Throw" on a balcony overlooking Bourbon Street during Mardi Gras. You learn a lot about marketing and negotiating doing this. Seriously. This was another domain conference, yet despite its more informal nature provided a great opportunity to really bond with new and existing business partners.

Explored The Crystal Caves in Bermuda, which I first visited as a child. They were first discovered by two teenage boys who were looking for their lost cricket ball. Thanks to the curiosity of kids, we can now all experience this natural wonder of the world.

It was amazing experiences like these, which I am very grateful to have had, that counterbalanced the negative energy of the deaths in my inner circle during the same time period. Here's to more of the former and less of the latter in the coming years.