4 Ways to Liquidate Domain Names

[IDNer]

4 Ways to Liquidate Domain Names
Andrew July 15th, 2008

Here are three ways to get cash for domain names fast — and a fourth potential way.

Perhaps you are looking to trim your portfolio. Or maybe you need to raise some cash. Unfortunately, domain names aren’t very liquid assets. But here are three ways to sell your domain names quickly, as well as a potential fourth way to do so in the future.

1. SnapNames - SnapNames isn’t just an expired domain marketplace. You can also list domain names for sale. I tried this out by listing about 30 domains with reserve prices between $59 and $1000. 4 of them sold, including three for $99 that I had hand registered a couple years ago. The other one, a .biz, started at $99 and went to $114. I tried to sell the latter domain on forums several times with no luck, so the added exposure on SnapNames helped. SnapNames takes a 20% cut. Names must be at Moniker or a SnapNames registrar and must have 6 months of registration period left.

2. Forums - there’s a lot of noise on forums, but you can still liquidate domains if you are willing to cut your prices.

3. Sell to NameMedia - I saw a blog post from NameMedia recently that said it was “aggressively” buying domains. I told them to look at my Afternic portfolio. Without getting into specifics, the company offered me an average of $21 for the subset of domains it felt worthy. I had paid more for some of the individual domains in the lot than the company offered for the entire package! I’m not one of those people who thinks my domains are worth millions, and I understand the company’s model has low inventory turnover, but paying about 1 cent on the dollar of their sales prices doesn’t seem very “aggressive”. I wouldn’t waste my time with this option, but I would recommend listing your domains on Afternic with expanded promotion.

4. Domain Name Wire - A number of people have asked me about promoting domains on Domain Name Wire. I don’t want to get into the business of listing domains for sale, but I’m going to try a new system. In the top menu bar you’ll see a link to “Domain Sales“. Every week I’ll list a few domains for sale at “buy now” prices. These domains will also be promoted in the RSS feed. If this works I may consider listing other peoples’ domains in the future. You can see this week’s domains here. Bonus: I’m giving away two expiring domains free this week on the sales page.

http://domainnamewire.com/2008/07/15...e-domain-names