List Your Domain Name For Sale And Check Offers Firsthand
The best way to find out what people are willing to pay for your domain is to put it up for sale and let the market figure it out. With many services, you dont need to set a price when you put up a listing. Sedo, for example, enables you to list domains for free and entertain offers without any commitment.
Flippa works much the same way, although it does charge a $10 fee for listing domains:
For this approach to work, you need to give your listings some time. You might receive offers that are too low at first, and if you dont wait for more potential buyers to find your domain name in the marketplace, you might come up with the wrong valuation.
Likewise, you might not receive any offers at all. With user marketplaces, you never know until you put up a listing. If youd rather get help from professionals, method number three might be more up your alley.
How To Properly Value A Domain Name
- University of California
- University of Washington
Jennifer Kyrnin is a professional web developer who assists others in learning web design, HTML, CSS, and XML.
If you are considering bidding on a domain name or you want to put your domain name up for sale, you should get an idea of how much it is worth. Keep in mind that the true value of any domain is how much a buyer will pay for it. If you have a domain for sale, you can ask a large amount of money for it, but unless you can find someone who will pay that price, that is not what the domain is worth, its just what youd like to receive.
How Much Is Your Domain Name Worth
You own a domain name youre not using and someone asks if they can buy it from you. How can you figure out what its worth?Its not a simple as appraising a home its very difficult to find comparable sales and attach a price to a domain. Every domain name is unique and its hard to compare one to another.
In fact, if you ask five so-called domain experts how much a domain is worth, youll probably get five different answers.
But you can get a decent idea of your domains value by taking a look at some of the factors that go into valuing a domain name.
Recommended Reading: Cost To Purchase A Domain Name
Ask Yourself: Is It Brandable
Some domains have very little value in terms of search traffic but have an immense amount of brand value. These domains tend to be short, easy to remember, easy to pronounce and highly desirable for startups and online companies.
One example of a brandable domain name with very little generic value is Mint.com a domain thats owned by personal finance tool Mint, which itself is owned by the giant finance and tax software company Intuit.
Based on its generic applicability and search volume, Mint.com is almost worthless. After all, who searches online for information about mints? But the name also has a clear brand value for its secondary meaning as a place where money is created.
Many short and simple domain names have similar value. A name like Facebook.com, for example, has no real meaning except as a brand. Domains like Google, which are obviously well known, are known specifically because of their brand value.
Valuing a domain name based on its brandability is extremely difficult and also very subjective. A domain may have very little brand value at one point in time, but have immense brand value in the future if its desired by a rapidly growing company.
The market for brandable domain names also differs significant from the market for generic domain names, since few people are actively looking for brandable domains on a constant, ongoing basis.
Still, there are several techniques that you can use to determine whether or not your brandable domain name has value:
How Much Is Someone Willing To Pay For It
This sounds obvious, but its a factor thats actually too often overlooked. All the hypothetical signs can look good. A domain can have important keywords, some non-spammy links to it from a past website, and be very brandable.
But if no one is willing to pay for it, then at the end of the day as a sellable asset its worth nothing. At that point, the domain is only worth what you can make out of it.
This is one of the places where the art comes in. Can you find the perfect name that strikes a chord with a buyer who just happens to be looking for a domain name and has a decent budget to make a purchase?
Make sure to check out our domain valuation framework.
Don’t Miss: Transfer Godaddy Domain To Wix
How To Sell A Domain Name At The Highest Price
Are you in domain flipping business and want to learn the art and techniques of selling a domain successfully and profitably?
Then this article is certainly going to help you.
Domains are like internet real estate and as a domain flipper, its crucial to learn the art of selling a domain name at the highest possible price.
There are domains that have been sold for millions of dollars.
Heres an Wikipedia article listing the most expensive domain names ever. Its true that people have paid that much to acquire just a domain name.
So you can imagine how much you could have earned if you were the owner of one of these domains. What could have happened if you registered such a domain on your name before it was sold.
You would have been a millionaire now.
But what made those simple domains sell for millions?
The fact is that the names may look pretty simple in your eyes. But the people who purchased the domains definitely saw something entirely different or they were made to see something different.
This is the art of selling a domain name at the highest price.
You need to learn the art of showing the highest possible value of your domain names in the eyes of buyers.
Thats what will make people buy your domain names.
A domain name is not just a name. But its so much more than this.
Every online business starts with a domain name. Its the first thing people would have to remember when they want to visit your site.
Domain Name Cost: Quick Overview
Every website owner will need to factor domain name cost into their budget. You have the choice of either registering a new domain name, or purchasing one thats already been registered. A new domain will cost around $10-20/year, while the price of a preregistered domain will be more expensive, and vary depending on popularity.
You May Like: What Is The .io Domain
How To Respond To The Initial Inquiry
There are a couple of things you should do when someone reaches out about buying a domain name.
First, try to qualify the buyer. Is it a big company? A budding entrepreneur? All salespeople try to qualify their buyers to make sure theyre serious and capable of buying what theyre selling. This is no different with domain names.
Second, respond to keep the sale moving forward. There are two ways to do this:
Theres a lot of debate about which approach to take. People usually like the other party to make an initial offer. After all, you dont want to quote a price of $5,000 if the buyer is going to make a starting offer of $10,000!
If the buyer contacted you out of the blue and you havent listed the domain for sale, its fair to ask the buyer to make an offer. You can inform them that you havent thought about selling the domain before, and tell them youre open to offers.
If youve marketed the domain for sale, its probably better to quote a price to open negotiations. But what price should you give?
What If Someone Already Has The Domain Name I Want
This is a valid concern, given that over 1.7 billion websites are live on the Internet right now. Chances are a lot of great domain names are taken, and when this happens, the cheapest option by far is to brainstorm a different name. But if youre dead set on a domain thats taken, and dont want to compromise, you still have some options.
You can use resources like snapnames.com to see domains that have recently become available . Otherwise, youll have to pay much more for an aftermarket domain, usually by dealing with online auctions in which youd bid on an already-registered domain to be transferred to you.
Aftermarket domain prices are so expensive because the value that a short, relevant domain name can bring to a brand is, well, invaluable . For example, if you were looking for car insurance and werent sure where to start, you might head to CarInsurance.com a domain which sold for $49.7 million in 2010.
Of course, not all aftermarket domains will go for millions, but as a rule, any useful one will still be pretty expensive. Since most of us wont be dropping our lifes savings on a domain name, were going to have to come up with our own. So you might be wondering
Read Also: How Much Does It Cost To Buy A Domain
Domain Name Cost: Final Thoughts
The simple answer to how much is a domain name is: it depends on your needs. Registering a new domain should never break the bank, though prices will increase after the first year. But if you need an aftermarket domain, be prepared to pay a lot more. In any case, privacy protection, domain transferring, and auto-renewal shouldnt add much, if anything, to the cost of your domain name.
Generally, the cost of a brand new domain name will be between $10-20 a year, which will fluctuate depending on introductory and renewal prices.
Choosing a registrar also depends on what youre looking for whether thats simply a registrar, a hosting provider included, or a registration with a website builder, there are options for every commitment level.
How Much Is My Domain Name Worth
This is the most important question a domainer should ask before investing. Whether or not you make money from your investment depends on the type of names you register or buy.
Domain name investing can be likened to investing in real estate, virtual real estate . As the buyer, it is crucial that you know what you are doing and do your own research prior to purchasing a URL. Whether you are buying website addresses to develop a site, monetize, park, or sell for profit, their worth can determine your success.
Let me begin by making an honest statement here: Do not waste your money on paid appraisals that are not worth the value of the paper on which they are printed. You can value a URL free yourself via the links I’ve listed below.
Also Check: How Much Do Domains Cost Per Year
Compare Your Domain To Recent Sales
When people sell a car, they usually check out recent sales data to see how much they can get for it. The same thing can be done with domains. Many websites offer information about recent domain sales. These include sites like DNJournal or ShortNames.
While you cant search these sites and get an exact match for your domain, you can take a look at transactions from the past few weeks. Take a look at the domain itself and how much it went for. You can use the data to compare and contrast the quality of your own domain and come up with a reasonable starting price.
Checking The Popularity Of Keywords
If youre unsure about any words in your domain name, you can turn to Google for more information. Google Trends allows you to see how the popularity of keywords rises and falls over time. You can even see how many monthly searches are made. When youre determining your domains value, use this tool to accurately gauge where those keywords currently stand.
While your domain may consist of a recognizable keyword, that doesnt necessarily mean its relevant to what end-users are after. Check to see how popular the word is to determine how it affects the domains overall value.
Recommended Reading: How To Find Out Who Owns Domains
How To Sell Your Domain Name In 5 Simple Steps
In this guide, well take you through each step to successfully sell domain from start to finish. From valuation and pricing to marketing and transferring the domain name to the buyer, we break it down for you step by step.
Heres a glimpse at each step and what well cover below:
Step 1 Determine the domains value.
Step 2 Set a price for the domain.
Step 3 Put the domain name up for sale.
Step 5 Transfer the domain.
Of course, the process isnt as simplified as this, so lets dive into the nuts and bolts of each step.
Read More From Toughnickel
5. sedo.com
Sedo.com is the worlds biggest domain brokerage. Sedo provides an instant appraisal service once you become a member and log in.
There are many other sites onlinesome require payment and others are free. From my experience, the five best ones are listed above, but another site, URLAppraisal.net, provides an instant appraisal service that you may want to try out.
Recommended Reading: Transfer Wix To Shopify
Think Art Not Science When Calculating Domain Value
If youre looking for a predetermined formula to calculate exactly what your domain is worth then, unfortunately, youre out of luck. Domain appraisal services can churn out a number based on a complex set of criteria, but theres much more to domain names than algorithms and search rankings. A domain exists in the wider context of the online and offline worlds, and all of their complexities and nuances will play a part in how much interest there will be in your domain.
To figure out domain value, you ultimately need to understand who your potential buyers are. What industry are they in? Is a website important for their business? How relevant is your domain? A domain is only as valuable as someone is willing to pay for it, so knowing what related domains are priced at, how sought after your domain is, and how much to reasonably expect a buyer to pay will help you arrive at the right number.
How Is Domain Value Determined
When looking at your estimated domain value, you may wonder how that score is calculated. Here are factors that determine your domain worth:
1. Domain length
When looking at your estimated domain value, one of the influential factors is your domain name length. Generally, shorter domain names have a higher value.
Shorter domain names are easier to remember, so people are more likely to remember them and visit them. Additionally, shorter domain names tend to be less specific. Therefore, they can be resold to multiple types of companies.
Take Hot Topic, for example. Their domain name, hottopic.com, is short and straightforward. If they wanted to sell their domain, any number of businesses could purchase the domain, from bloggers to podcasters to retailers.
On the other hand, a domain name like hottopicclothingandshoes.com wouldnt sell as well. Not only would it be too specific to sell, but it also would be too long.
If you have a shorter domain name, you can expect the estimated value of your domain to be higher.
2. Branding of domain
Another factor that influences the value of your domain is your domain branding. This value factor is a bit subjective but essential in determining your websites worth.
Branding is a critical component of your business because it tells people who you are and what you offer. One of the most evident branding pieces on your website is your design. Your design choices can convey if your brand is laid back, sophisticated, high-energy, and more.
Also Check: Average Domain Name Cost