WHAT TO DO WHEN NEGOTIATING DIRECTLY WITH A POTENTIAL BUYER:
-Suppose a potential buyer sent an email offering you to pay a bit less than the domain name price you proposed in the beginning.
There are three alternatives:
1) You immediately accept his offer. This tactic gives a bigger probability that the buyer will purchase your domain before he has a chance to change his idea. However, if you reply too fast, he may think you are desperate to sell it and then come up, later on, with yet an other offer proposing a lower price -or worse- if he thinks you are too desperate to sell, he might even think that your domain name is not worth and give up buying.
2) Delay a few hours or even one day before replying his email. This might make him think you are quite confident and not in a hurry to sell it. However, this interval of time is too big which allows him to rethink if he is really going to buy and then he might end up giving up.
3) Reply soon after -but- propose an intermediary conciliatory price whose value is somehow between your initial proposal and his offer. This tactic may cause him to think that your domain is really valuable so that you decided to not accept a lower price which then may then encourage him to accept your counter-offer. However, it could happen that this intermediary price is above his budget or what he thinks it is worth and give up, or pretend “he has no conditions to pay more than his offer and pretend to give up just to test your determination”. In which case either you make a concession accepting his offer -or- stick with your word and do not make any concession until he eventually “accept defeat” and decide to pay what you proposed -even- if such decision ends up delaying the final deal for several months.
Well, this is my analysis about this type of negotiation. What are your opinion, experience in these situations and possible objections about these tactics and their estimated relative probability of success ? What are your own tactics ?