poll Shotgun Vs Sniper approach?

[Kyle Tully]

Every few days watching the domain drops I'll see a flurry of keyword domains dropping.

e.g. One day there might be dozens of "meta" names dropping, a few days later it might be "spatial". Whatever the hot topic was a year or two ago.

Typically there may be one or two OK names in the bunch, but they tend to get progressively worse as you go through the list. The sign of someone going on a "shotgun" hand-reg spree. And my first thought is always what a waste of money... my approach has been more that of a sniper, picking off only the best names (IMO) that I plan to keep for 10+ years and testing the waters before going deeper.

This has worked very well for me, e.g. I had a thesis about a specific type of .gg name, reg'd 3 and sold 2 for $5k each within a year. Reinvested those profits into more of the same type of name. Did the same in the gambling niche, turning 2-figures into 5 within 18 months. I only have a handful of AI names for the same reason.

But what you don't see with all those names dropping is what the investor sold from that bunch of names. They might have registered 100 and sold 5. Perhaps the shotgun approach works better?

I'd love to hear what style of investing you tend to take when going into new niches or spotting new trends and how it has worked for you.

Do you take a shotgun approach, grabbing everything that fits a loose criteria and planning to drop names? Or are you taking more of a sniper approach and only getting what you consider to be the best names you plan to hold?

 

[InterNation]

In 99% of cases I don't know who the end buyer is so this is not something I think about. I have some names where I own both the singular and plural, or the root keyword + a 'er' or 'ly' version. Ideally I'd love to sell them both to the same buyer at the same time, but as most sales come in via networks the chances are these will go to different people and I'm fine with that.

Agreed, there is just about zero chance to get involved in a network sale.

Two questions:
1) Where do you sell most of your domains? (If they mostly sold through networks, on which site did you list them?)
2) Do you ever do research in terms of who might be a good fit and then reach out and offer the domain to that end user?

Selling directly to the end user allows for higher price and profit per sale, but I guess the networks bring in much more turnover, and ultimately more profits, right?

 

[InterNation]

Nice find! Need a little luck, timing, and foresight to see these kind of things in real time and grab potential opportunities… then the conviction to hold for 20 years!

I think most often the seller is someone who spotted an opportunity during expiry rather than the person who originally registered the domain.

I have even forgotten to renew a domain at a registrar I use rarely, and ended up losing it to an opportunist.

 

[Kyle Tully]

Agreed, there is just about zero chance to get involved in a network sale.

Two questions:
1) Where do you sell most of your domains? (If they mostly sold through networks, on which site did you list them?)
2) Do you ever do research in terms of who might be a good fit and then reach out and offer the domain to that end user?

Selling directly to the end user allows for higher price and profit per sale, but I guess the networks bring in much more turnover, and ultimately more profits, right?

I list on Afternic, Dan, and Sedo. Alternate between Afternic and Dan landers based on my mood. Most sales come through Afternic network.

I don't do any outbound. Inbound will always get you higher prices because they came to you so you hold the power. You just need to be patient.