Some domain investors own a lot of domain names and get a lot of inquiries, some are desirable, some are lowball and some are just a snarky comment about why they don’t deserve to own the domain name.
There are services out there such as Domain Agents which provide a secured offer service where if you want to make an offer on a domain name, it is going to cost you $29.95.
From the site:
Open a negotiation for $29.95. Your offer will be presented, guaranteed*
Buying or selling a domain name doesn’t have to be complicated.
There is a reason why every year, thousands of clients trust us to assist with their negotiations.
There was a thread started on Namepros where a member was incredulous that Telepathy Inc, headed by legendary domain investor Nat Cohen was asking for $19.99 in order for him to make an offer. Namepros member Keith stated,
“I’m sorry but not a chance I’ll ever pay $19 in order to negotiate on a domain. This is a clear money grab. You get bombarded with emails? Set up an automated system to field offers and go from there. This is the kind of sh*t that gives the domain industry a black eye! ”
There was some back and forth where some agreed it was outrageous, and others understand that someone like Nat gets flooded with inquiries and that a system that separated the serious from the curious made sense. The site Telepathy uses is called SecuredOffers.com.
From the FAQ on SecuredOffers.com:
Why can’t I contact the domain owner directly? By using SecuredOffers.com you are reaching the domain owner directly. The domain owners who work with SecuredOffers.com have designated SecuredOffers.com as the exclusive means of submitting general inquiries and offers for their domain names.
Why do I have to pay to submit an offer?
SecuredOffers.com provides a valuable service by fixing a broken system for communicating between domain buyers and domain owners. Domain owners often ignore inquiries. For their part, domain buyers often feel that they are sending inquiries into a black hole as they rarely receive a response and don’t know who to contact that has decision making authority.
Holders of large domain portfolio receive a steady flow of inquiries. Many of the inquiries are anonymous or from aliases. Some are generated by automated scripts.
A portion are from people who don’t understand the value of quality domain names and think it is reasonable to offer $20 for a domain that may have been acquired for thousands of dollars.
A few are from those who will resort to legal threats if they don’t like the price offered. After years of responding to inquiries that lead nowhere, domain owners typically are burnt out and stop responding.
They are looking for a better solution. SecuredOffers.com provides that solution.
SecuredOffers.com pre-qualifiers the inquiries sent to domain owners. We ensure that the offers come from real people, that the inquirer is serious enough to spend a few dollars to submit a qualified inquiry, and that the inquirer does not question the legitimacy of the domain owner’s domain name registration.
Of course some people on principal alone who are actually serious will not pay to open a dialogue.
Give your thoughts, would you pay to make an offer on a domain name?
Well at least they would make more than parking this way lol.
When I see the page I would pass. The party involved probably has no interest in selling the name unless the offer is extremely high.
What they should do is not accept offers under 10k. Easy fix DNS does it. That is why people use them.
I have to go I just got another email saying that a China buyer has a 20 million dollar budget to spend on domains so I guess I better send my names over to them. I mean when you get 5 of them in a week it really is kinda stupid after a while.
Yes, I would pay if I REALLY Need the domain. But it is not good to collect money when the sale might occur eventually.
Nat is a great guy, he bought a name from me, first class all the way and is very ethical as well. I can see why Nat does this because if he didn’t he would spend his whole day responding to waste of time lowball offers. Another solution would be to have an offer form which rejects any offer under a certain amount, but then you still have time wasters putting in 222222222, or other random numbers just to put the fake lead in.
A minimum offer system does not work, they just put the number in the box, solves nothing.
Listen when you deal with high value assets, you have security at the door, you have cameras, you have extra staff, all this costs money.
We are not talking reg fee names, these guys don’t even talk under $100K, so if someone is serious this is the course of action, and if they do not wish to pay, well looks like the owners are willing to avoid the business, and are not worried about losing it.
At the end of the day, they are their own gatekeeper, and they are doing what is best for them, which is their right.
I honestly am looking to implement something like this, every morning, I wake up with a few dozen offers from India in the $1-$100 range for 4-6 figure domains.
We all want great domains, some economies of scale do not work, and these people just do not get that such names cannot just be had for a simple fee. Doesn’t mean they won’t waste their time trying, but you have every right to save your own time.
Kudos to this company for setting a new standard.
If I have 6 figure names I would do this for sure. Also, not a bad Idea to stop the asshats that want your price , so they can spam potential buyers to see if they can sell your domain before they buy it.