Post: #1

Does anyone here have any experience doing this.

I am thinking about trying to buy an existing .com domain name. Haven't approached the owner yet, but here are the details:

-The current domain is very much a hobby site that clearly makes no money at all for the owner, and isn't updated regularly, or really at all. Not something like an active blog for example.
-It seems to be owned by an individual rather than company.
-I wan't the domain since I am considering registering a business with this name, but I am not dead certain I will use the name, or that the business will be registered very soon. The domain will act as a placeholder for some future time.
-Based on the above I'm not really prepared to offer much money for it. Obviously I'll have to offer something, but it's not worth it to me to offer a large amount.

My basic question for people in the industry, or those who have done something like this is:
What is the best way to approach this?
Get the email address of the owner and just email him with a proposal? Work through an agent (but then this will cost $$$).
Approach indirectly?

Any info from the members here would be most appreciated.

Post: #2

1. First get the email of the owner. If it's not shown on the site then you can lookup the Whois info.

2. Send him an email to ask if he is interested in selling the domain.

3. Ask him what price he would sell if for. Don't make the first offer unless he insists.

4. Agree on a price.

5. Discuss payment methods. If the price is over 100 USD then I recommend using Escrow.com.


The whole process is not too complicated. Good luck.

Post: #3

(02-20-2014 10:29 AM)zoom Wrote:  1. First get the email of the owner. If it's not shown on the site then you can lookup the Whois info.

2. Send him an email to ask if he is interested in selling the domain.

3. Ask him what price he would sell if for. Don't make the first offer unless he insists.

4. Agree on a price.

5. Discuss payment methods. If the price is over 100 USD then I recommend using Escrow.com.


The whole process is not too complicated. Good luck.

Thanks Zoom

I guess I'm concerned that in approaching him he might get the idea that the domain is worth more money than it is. I suppose it's unavoidable since I can't buy it without approaching him (duh). Just wondered whether a certain KIND of approach would better communicate what the domain is actually worth.

Will check out escrow.com. Definitely necessary since I would be pretty annoyed (understatement) if I paid and the domain wasn't transferred.

Post: #4

Just say you want to write a fitness/travel/personal blog under that same name. Don't tell him it's for a business. Offer him $100. And also offer to pay for his next year's hosting services for causing him inconvenience. This will essentially eliminate any worth he feels the current domain has. You've got to be more confident.

Post: #5

I had a domain for my business. My idiot business partner didnt update his credit card when I told him to and we lost our domain. I go to try to buy it back and it's on auction for $5,000. I approach the guy and automatically the guy thinks he has something even though he doesn't even know it's my domain which he picked up. I would be very casual and nonchalant when approaching this guy, definately come across with the take it or leave it attatude. I wouldn't negotiate at all or he knows you want it, I would make a small offer and walk away. Unless it's some unbelievable domain I would be he will come back to you. If it were that valuable to affliate marketers and things like that someone probably would have already approached him or he would be doing something with the domain himself.

Post: #6

I recommend Sedo.com for contacting domain holders. They do escrow.

You can also check on Afternic.com.

Check estibot.com for value of domains & archive.org's waybackmachine, because domains have a history.

If you need help, DM me. I work w/ domain selling quite a bit.

Post: #7

Great advice all around.

It's also worth noting that when buying any existing domain--especially if you're spending $$$ on it, you should check the backlink profile to make sure there aren't any glaring signs of link spamming.

There are tons of tools for evaluating how risky a link profile is. Link Research Tools is quite solid and you can run it without uploading links from Google WMT. I believe there's a $50 1-off plan for their Link Detox report. Make sure you classify all the keywords and rerun the report to ensure it's accurate.

Alternatively, you can manually evaluate the link profile yourself. webmeup.com/tools/backlinks.html is free and does a great job of picking up the toilet bowl of links that Majestic and Open Site Explorer don't find. Haven't tested it against ahrefs.

Mostly, you want to avoid buying a domain that has a substantial number of links from deindexed websites or websites that look/are spammed out to the gills and may get deindexed later. This is probably the #1 thing you want to avoid when buying an existing domain.

Post: #8

Thanks to everyone for their input.

Checked out estibot.com's site and it values the site at more than $5,000. Since it hasn't been updated for more than 5 years, and has no serious links, commercial or otherwise, I can detect I am near certain the current owner isn't making any money at all from the site. No advertising on the site at present. Seems strange that it could be valued more than $5,000 then. Estibot say there are around 2,000 exact match monthly searches. This seems quite low to me. A site with so few search results could be worth more than $5,000?