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DomainSherpa Review – Jan 16: Carve.com, MonkeyWrench.com, FineCars.com…

DomainSherpa Review with Michael Cyger, Andrew Rosener, Adam Strong and Shane CultraThis is the show where we get into the minds of successful domain name investors – people we call Sherpas – and talk about the value of specific domain names. By listening to the Sherpas, we expand our thought process so we can become more successful investors ourselves.

In this DomainSherpa Review:

  • We learn what the Sherpas bought or sold recently: Carve.com, MonkeyWrench.com, Model-Planes.com
  • An investor’s portfolio is appraised: FineCars.com, Snoring.org, Body.me…
  • Get your bids in soon for these NameJet auctions: Fort.com, Farms.net, OceanfrontProperty.com…
  • Plus, much more!

We’re joined by three Domain Sherpas: Adam Strong, Andrew Rosener and Shane Cultra.

Review (74:46): Watch | Listen/Download Audio | Domain Lists | Transcript

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Investor Submitted Domain Names

Animal.Fund
Available.Men
BeverlyHills.io
Blown.Glass
Body.me
Bodywork.Online
Chiropractic.Click
Extra.Parts
FineCars.com
FrozenYogurt.Store
Green.Cleaning
LA.Plumbing
Luxury.Cab
MikePence.xyz
New.Wine
Night.Vision
Night.Watch
Quick.Credit
Rehabilitation.Equipment
Safe.Football
Safe.Investments
Snoring.org
Southern.Cooking
Spa.Doctor
Stock.Design

NameJet.com Pre-Auction Listings

christmas.net
farms.net
fort.com
oceanfrontproperty.com
pctr.com
plasticsurgeondirectory.com
privatereg.com
spapackages.com
sueno.com
wholesaleproducts.com

This Show’s Sherpas

Adam Strong
Adam Strong
Adam Strong is co-founder of Evergreen.com, a consulting firm that helps companies create, acquire and manage their digital brand assets, such as domain names and other online markers.

As an internet entrepreneur, Strong has co-founded many online ventures including DomainAgents.com, NameBio.com and Logo.com.

More shows with Adam Strong »

Andrew Rosener
Andrew Rosener
Andrew Rosener is the CEO of the industry-leading domain name broker Media Options.

Andrew is widely considered a thought leader and expert on domain name value & methodology as well as domain name sales & acquisitions. With 20 years experience with domain names, Andrew has leveraged his knowledge and expertise to make MediaOptions the go-to domain name firm for startup & company domain acquisitions as well as high value domain name sales.

More shows with Andrew Rosener »

Shane Cultra
Shane Cultra
Shane Cultra is a domain name investor and owner of the popular domain name blog, DSAD.com.

Cultra is also a fifth generation owner of Country Arbors Nursery based in Urbana, Illinois, and has been a member of the PBS television show Mid American Gardener for more than 10 years, in addition to being a part of various gardening segments on CBS and ABC.

Shane also recently launched two new businesses, BeeHouse.com and Wormcastings.com, leveraging his online expertise with his love of nature and business acumen to create two exciting new ventures that are sure to be successful.

More shows with Shane Cultra »

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Interview Raw (Non-Edited) Transcript

Download/Read the Domain Name Interview Transcript in PDF FormatInterview Transcript in PDF Format (Right-click to Save As…) [View in Google Docs]

Watch the full video at:
https://www.domainsherpa.com/review-20170116/

Michael Cyger: On today’s Review, Adam Strong, Drew Rosener and Shane Cultra talk about some buys and a sale that you’re not going to believe. Stay tuned!

Michael: Hey, Sherpa Network, thanks so much for joining me today. I’m Michael Cyger, publisher of domainsherpa.com, and this is the DomainSherpa Review. This is the show where we get into the minds of successful domain name investors, using real examples so we can learn strategies and tactics to become better investors.

We have three segments to the review. We’ll start off learning what the Sherpas recently bought and sold. Next, we’ll discuss some value an investor-submitted domain name portfolio. And, finally, we’ll preview some domains going to auction soon at namejet.com and whether the Sherpas think they’re good investment opportunities for you.

Joining us today on the DomainSherpa Review are three past Sherpas and industry thought leaders that you’ll also have an opportunity to meet at NamesCon next week. Be sure to go up to them, introduce yourself, shake their hand, and tell them if you enjoy watching them on the review. If you don’t enjoy it, don’t mention that part.

In order from left to right, we have Adam Strong, co-founder of Evergreen, a domain name brokerage focused on domain acquisition, and owner of NameBio.com, the service we all use to find comparable sales. Andrew Rosener, CEO of the domain name brokerage firm MediaOptions.com. And Shane Cultra, publisher of the blog DSAD.com and owner of the Country Arbors Nursery in Illinois. Sherpas, welcome to today’s show.

Shane Cultra: Hi, Mike.

Adam Strong: Hey, Mike, thanks for having us.

Andrew Rosener: Good to be here.

Michael: Good to have you, guys. Today’s show’s sponsored by six awesome domain name industry providers. I’m gonna tell you about more during the show but they include Estibot, Escrow.com, David Weslow legal services, domainIQ, Efty.com, and DNAcademy. But before I tell you about them, we’re gonna start off with a segment called “What’s New, Sherpas?” where the Sherpas share one purchase or sale that they’ve made over the past few weeks. And we get to learn what they paid to or received for the domain, why they thought it was a good deal, and how the negotiation’s progressed. I’m gonna lead you through the questions but the other Sherpas will get to comment during the process as well. This segment where we’re gonna Shane, then Drew, then Adam. Shane, what’s one domain name that you’ve personally bought or sold in the past couple of weeks? Tell us the domain name and not the price yet.

Shane: You and I already talked about it, but I bought MonkeyWrench.com.

Michael: MonkeyWrench.com. And you bought this, right?

Shane: I bought it, yeah.

Michael: Drew, let’s go to you, what do you think Shane paid for MonkeyWrench.com?

Andrew: I like Monkey Wrench a lot, nice little name. I want to say that he paid 10 grand for it.

Michael: Ten grand. Why do you like it so much?

Andrew: Because, first of all, you know, I love monkeys and I think monkey…you know, like…no, no, hear me out. So, in general, like, the term “monkey,” the word “monkey” is playful, it resonates with people. And, you know, monkey wrench is a tool, and so the implications of that mean that it could be a great business name for, you know, a data analytic tool or a networking tool, or, you know, basically any kind of tool. And so, you know, MonkeyWrench.com… “Wrench” is a little tough to spell for the average person, since we’ve discovered that 80% of people are brain-dead. And so I think that MonkeyWrench.com is a…

Michael: Present company excluded.

Andrew: Yeah, everybody except Adam is excluded.

Michael:: That means that I’m the…out in this panel.

Andrew: Actually, I’m the one that [inaudible 00:04:04]. So, no, you know, it’s great. It’s playful, you know, it might be…it’s a little bit long. It’s not Tier 1 but it’s like, you know Tier 2, Tier 3, like, in that…

Michael: It’s almost like a euphemism. Like, you hear the term “monkey wrench.” I don’t know if I actually have a monkey wrench in my house, but yeah. [inaudible 00:04:26].

Andrew: I bet 99% of people that aren’t plumbers don’t even know what a monkey wrench is but it’s the loop that you put around a pipe or a fitting and you’re piking [SP] it, and so it’s kind of almost…I don’t even know what type of compression that is but you ratchet it down and then, you know, you got a tight grip and you can do something with it.

Michael: Almost like one of those chain ones, yeah. Gotcha. All right. Adam, let’s go to you.

Andrew: [inaudible 00:04:51].

Michael: Sorry, man, your video was slowing down. I thought you actually finished, please do.

Andrew: I think that at retail it would sell for, let’s say, probably 50 grand. I would probably [inaudible 00:05:09] and I would be looking for a sale 35 to 50. So, I think, you know, [inaudible 00:05:15] is what I, you know… And if you got for less, you know…

Michael: Are you done, Drew?

Andrew: Thank you.

Michael: We got a little bit of a drag, Drew, so you got to cut me a little bit of slack if I said something over you.

Andrew: I’m gonna mess around here and see if I can figure out why, but…

Michael: Yeah, most of the time it’s pretty clear but just every once in a while we get a little bit of latency on your video and audio. Adam, let’s go over to you. What do you think Shane paid for MonkeyWrench.com?

Adam Strong: Well, I agree with Drew, I like it. You know, from a naming perspective, there is…the word “monkey” is obviously playful. And, you know, the K in “monkey,” they say that the K sound is a sound that resonates with people. You know, comedians use the K to emphasize things, and so Kodak…actually George Eastman Kodak company, they created and coined Kodak based on the double K and, you know, they say that the K is the is the key, I guess. But knowing Shane, I don’t know, I’m gonna a guess that he paid a little lower than what Drew said. I’m gonna say five.

Michael: 5K.

Adam: But I agree with Drew on values. I think…I mean it’s a sound name and it’s got that playful quality and, you know, it could be used for…it’s kind of an empty vessel name. So, good buy.

Michael: And so you agree that selling between 35 and 50 and asking maybe a little bit more. What would you ask for it retail?

Adam: I wouldn’t be surprised to see it. At this point, I’d probably…50 seems a little high but, you know, if you’re willing to hold out, I could see this probably more in the 20 to 30 range.

Michael: Great. And I’ve heard the same thing about the Ks in certain words and I think that’s why I like Krispy Kreme Doughnuts so much.

Adam: There you go.

Michael: Shane, let’s go over to you. What did you pay for MonkeyWrench.com?

Shane: I paid 5,000.

Michael: $5,000. Adam nailed it. Drew, Shane got one of those Drew deals. It seems like whenever you come up with these phenomenal names that you acquire, you get them all for 5K.

Shane: So, there’s a great story behind it. So, my goal this coming…starting early this summer was to go and find names that had not been used, had been blogs, even websites or in use, just buy the whole thing. If the domain is more valuable than the website, just buy the whole thing. So, that’s how I came across Blowtorch. Remember we talked about Blowtorch last show, where it was a seated movie house, and I bought that. And then, of course, I’ve gone through all the names, I go through the tools and I go things that’d be good brands. But I can’t do all the emails myself, so I told my wife and daughter to start emailing. My daughter hasn’t been very strong about it but my wife, I’m like, “I’ll give you a cut of this if you do it.” And she starts them out, and if they answer in the negotiations, she hands them over. And so…

Michael: Your wife won’t do that just for the fringe benefits of being married to you?

Shane: Not at all. As a matter of fact, I had to pay her to not do…just to be my wife, let alone… But it’s been helpful because that’s how I bought thebigisland.com, you know. It had been a site for 20 years. So, this one had been a blog forever and I don’t think that there’s ever been another user, it’s never been for sale. That’s a perfect name.

Michael: So, let me ask you, who found this deal for you, your daughter or your wife?

Shane: My wife.

Michael: And so she just sent an email saying, “Would you be interested in selling your website?”

Shane: Absolutely, yeah, something along those lines.

Michael: And got a response back saying yes?

Shane: No. They always come back no and then we have to start with a stronger number. And that’s something that I’ve realized, you know, and we’ve been talking about this book, you have to give them an offer that would change their thoughts about, “Hey, you know what, maybe that’s enough money to make a difference. And not everybody has the same amount. Sometimes the difference is $500. But $5,000, to a lot of people, is a lot of money. They’re thinking, “My goodness, I can take a vacation all because of a name I’ve got sitting and I haven’t blogged on for three years.”

Michael: So, let me ask you then. It wasn’t just, “Is this website for sale?” It sounds like your wife reached out to them and said, “Would you sell your website for some amount of dollars?” What was the initial offer?

Shane: The initial offer was $2,000.

Michael: $2,000, and they came back and said no?

Shane: Yeah, they came back, “No, that’s not enough,” and came back with…I think it was $20,000.

Michael: [inaudible 00:09:48].

Shane: $5,000 and held. $5,000, there was no movement and probably 15 to 20 emails… Really nice guy, I’m not sure what nationality he was, was not American. I believe he is British. But my wife handled most of it and just kept it calm and I told her $5,000, what we’re willing to pay. And, you know, it’s something I think she may want to build out, she’s looking for something to build out now MonkeyWrench may be not in her realm. But, you know, you have friends and family that watch what we do and you say, “If you find some passion you write about, find a good name and do it.” And I think she likes corresponding with people via email and, you know, again, you need help. And Drew knows, you can’t do everything yourself. It’s nice to have some people alongside you can bounce stuff off. And I’ll say, “Do you think that’s a good name?” and she’ll say, “I think it’s terrible,” and then, you know, vice versa. And so it’s been real… My daughter doesn’t… She [inaudible 00:10:43].

Michael: [inaudible 00:10:43].

Shane: Not, she’s not. If I paid her, I think she might get inspired but she hasn’t received a dime because she hasn’t done shit yet.

Michael: Pay by the hour man, come on. You’ve gotta head off to college, gotta save some money. All right, great buy, Shane. Congratulations on that. Drew, let’s go over to you. What’s one domain name you’ve bought, sold, or brokered in the past couple of weeks? Tell us the domain name, not the price yet.

Andrew: Okay. All right, I’m gonna go with carve.com.

Michael: C-A-R-V-E dot com?

Andrew: Correct.

Michael: Okay, did you buy it or sell it?

Andrew: Bought it.

Michael: Bought it. Adam, let’s go to you first. Drew bought carve.com, as in carving wood or carving the turkey, carve.dom. What do you think he paid for it?

Adam: Good name, I like the K sound again, the hard K, even though it’s a C.

Michael: Yeah.

Adam: I am going to say 15.

Michael: Fifteen, and why do you like it, let me ask you?

Adam: I like the short dictionary words. It’s a verb that I’m not 100% convinced on it. I’m not seeing…not thinking about the possibilities of use for this one, but…

Michael: The applications to businesses. But you like the fact that it’s a dictionary word, it’s five letters, and it’s a verb?

Adam: Yeah, it’s a verb. You know, and I’d say just an inherent value, it’s kind of an empty vessel.

Andrew: Aren’t you a skateboarder and a snowboarder?

Adam: Okay, I know, but it doesn’t…

Michael: All right, two more applications or one more application.

Andrew: Old people carve, young people shred.

Michael: Yeah, that’s right, Drew. And stop chiming in. See, this is exactly why I want newer investors to listen to this. Because sometimes you look at a domain name and you don’t see all of the possibilities. Even like experts…you guys have been in the industry for, you know, over a decade, maybe two decades. Like, it sometimes takes a little bit of time to think about it. And Drew, you just talked about two other [inaudible 00:12:52].

Adam: As an empty vessel, it’s something that you have to build a brand around. You know, you have to kind of think through the possibilities. I’m thinking…obviously my mind went straight into like a business perspective. The first thing I said was “carving out a niche.” But, you know, as soon as Drew said skateboarding and snowboarding, I’m like, “Duh,” you know…

Michael: Yeah, I totally misled you there too by saying “turkey.”

Adam: Yeah, so I will still stick to my guns on the price that he paid but, you know, as far as value…

Michael: [inaudible 00:13:21] retail on that.

Adam: We talked earlier about another name off there and, you know, like, I think that one-word domains are still commanding a high value. So, you know, I could see end user pricing into the six figures on this but it just kind of depends on how hard Drew wants to twist somebody’s arm, I guess. But, you know, Drew buys on the cheap or buys…makes good buys, you know, he makes his money on the buy, and so…I don’t know. What did I say, 10, 15?

Michael: Fifteen.

Adam: Fifteen, yeah, so…

Michael: All right. Shane, let’s go over to you. What do you think Drew paid for carve.dom?

Shane: I know Drew’s gotten out the wallet lately, so I know a little insider…because I’ve been on the show with him a lot. And we had a little pre-talk about Drew, when he likes a name, he pays for it. But then he always surprises us with these great buys. I thought turkey immediately too, I have to admit, I’m not gonna lie. As soon as I heard “carve,” that’s the first thing…

Michael: [inaudible 00:14:18] the holidays, I don’t know, yeah.

Shane: But then I think of productivity too, you know, carve your niche, you know, carve this… So I can see… You know what, you’re not gonna mess it up. It’s a nice short little one, so it’s a fantastic name. I’m probably right, though [SP], I think a $20,000 for that.

Michael: So you think he bought it for 20K?

Shane: Yeah. I think he could probably sell it very quickly for 75, but it’s a six-figure name to the right person. You know, it’s not that, wow, we shake our head and, you know, wanna be Drew on that purchase but it’s still a fantastic name. But there’s been [inaudible 00:14:53] names where you thought…you and I go, “Damn, that’s a fantastic name.” He never brings bad names to these little “guess what price it is.” He always brings the big guns, doesn’t he?

Michael: He doesn’t disappoint. Drew, so we got…Adam thought you bought it for 15K, Shane thought you bought it for 20K. What did you pay for carve.com?

Andrew: $2,750.

Michael: Shut the front door, dude, you’re killing me. Like, you actually had to cut your $5,000 acquisition costs in half.

Andrew: I’m joking, I’m joking. I paid $27,500. But I wanted to make you feel really bad about yourselves for a second.

Michael: Oh, yeah. Thanks, buddy. I appreciate that. All right, $27,500. And who did you buy it from?

Andrew: From the owner, original owner. He had a multimedia agency. Actually, it was kind of cool deal and it was funny because, I mean, the guy you knew [inaudible 00:15:59] a lot more. He had been offered $100,000 in the past, like three years ago. And essentially, again, this was perfect timing. The difference here is that it was literally the first time that we ever contacted him. So, this was just shit luck, you know, perfect timing. Whereas, like, when I talk about perfect timing, usually it’s because, you know, if you just continuously follow up with people, you’re gonna be there at the right time, whereas this was just dumb luck. But basically the guy was like, “Yeah, I mean literally I just shut it down, I’m in the middle of my [inaudible 00:16:39] off my email. I need you to leave the email up for me for another 60 to 90 days.” You know, I said, “Ho problem,” and he was like, you know, “You’re the first guy that contacted me since I made the decision to sell it so, you know, it’s yours.”

Michael: Wow. Hey, Drew, when you reached out to him the first time, did you put a price in the email or was it just an open-ended, “Is the domain name or website for sale?”

Andrew: I offered him 10 grand. He wanted 50, I think it was 50 or 60 or something. And, you know, ultimately we arrived at…

Michael: Did you work your way up or did you, like, come up to $27,500 and then hold steady there?

Andrew: So, I agreed at $25,000 with him and then I had $2,500, like, a little finder’s fee I had to give to somebody that gave the ref…they didn’t negotiate, they just referred me, they said, “You know, I think this domain could be available.” I think basically what they did is I think they just saw the name servers updater. I don’t even know actually but they said, “You know, hey, I think you should try to buy this name, I think it’s available,” so I reached out to the guy.

Michael: Nice. Hey, who paid the escrow? Did you go through escrow, Drew?

Andrew: Yeah, I paid escrow, I paid escrow. I’m a firm believer that buyer pays escrow.

Michael: I agree, I just wanted to double check. Shane, did you pay escrow as well on your deal?

Shane: Yeah.

Andrew: If I’m soliciting you, then it’s my job, I should pay escrow. And if you’re soliciting me, then you should pay escrow. But I wanted to bring up, so I think, you know, Carve, for me, I’m a little bit humbled because I don’t think these guys loved it as much as I did. I really…I was like, “Holy shit, carve.com, I love this name.” And the reason I love it is just because, first of all, it’s a verb, you know, really, really difficult to buy verbs. Like, mainstream single-word verbs is just incredibly hard to find. Second of all, you know, many, many applications which I talk about all the time, you know, I like names where you’re not limited to like a single outlet. Not that I wouldn’t love to own cars.com, but you know, cars.com, you’re not gonna sell cheeseburgers, right?

And Carve, you know, it’s like, okay, it could be like custom blades, custom knives, big big big business and growing right now. Skiing, snowboarding, skateboarding, all hot, all popular. You know, action sports in general, big and growing. “Carve out your niche,” so you know, in terms of productivity, in terms of multimedia, in terms of, you know, apps, consulting. I like Carve. I just think it has a lot of different applications. I mean he ran…I think it was like, you know, 18 years he was running a multimedia agency on it and, like, big. I mean, they were doing work for Disney, they were doing work for customers, but you know, if you go on Archive, you can see like some of the old projects they’d done and it was for banks and major, major, major companies.

So, yeah, I like names where people have created successful businesses on them in the past. You know. It’s battle-tested. It’s like this guy has a brand that sustained itself. Obviously there’s a lot more than went into it, but I mean, you know, if his company was called dogshit.com, it wouldn’t have done probably quite as well. So, you know, it just ticks off another box.

Michael: Definitely. What are you gonna ask for it, Drew?

Andrew: A lot more than what these guys are talking about. So, I’ll be asking like $350 and, you know, hoping to get to 250 plus.

Adam: We said six figures.

Michael: Yeah, they said six figures, they weren’t talking about 100,000.

Adam: I wasn’t talking about the name.

Shane: I just said you could sell tomorrow for 75.

Michael: I heard, I heard. You know, I could see getting into the six figures, that’s why…

Adam: I didn’t where it stopped.

Michael: I think we all agree it’s a great name and sometimes it takes a little warming up. Just like yesterday, I was pinging you about a domain, Drew. And you’re like, “Now I’m warming up to this.” It just takes some time. It’s a great domain, Drew.

Andrew: That’s right.

Michael: Congratulations on the buy.

Adam: You can sell it to [inaudible 00:21:12].

Michael: Let’s go over to you, Adam. What’s one domain name you’ve bought or sold or brokered in the past couple of weeks? Tell us the domain name and not the price.

Adam: This is a Sherpa exclusive.

Michael: Nice, it’s not even a NameBio.

Adam: It isn’t a NameBio.

Michael: You guys suck up everything in the NameBio, so it will be as soon as it’s there [SP].

Adam: Yeah. This is a premium name. It’s one of a kind, you won’t find a name like this anywhere, thankfully.

Man: [inaudible 00:21:41].

Andrew: Strong.com, would you sell strong.com?

Adam: No, no. Well, I’ll give it to you, it’s model-planes.com.

Michael: So you’re talking about like the model planes, like an RC plane, model planes that you can fly, yeah, model-planes.com.

Adam: Like an airplane, yeah, hodel-planes.com.

Michael: Did you buy that phenomenal ultra-premium domain name or did you sell it?

Adam: I bought it a long time ago but I sold this time around.

Michael: You just sold it, all right. So, Shane, let’s go over to you. The question to you is what do you think Adam sold model-planes.com for?

Shane: It’s a bigger market than people realized and that’s what my wife does for a living, works for one of the largest hobby companies in the nation.

Adam: Don’t tell me this.

Shane: Yeah. Now, it’s a…yeah, Hobbyco and Horizon Hobby [inaudible 00:22:44].

Michael: Come on, it’s got a hyphen and it doesn’t end in the DE. What do you think he sold it for?

Shane: I think, well, now that you just put that little out there, I’m gonna think he didn’t sell it for as much. I’m gonna say $4,200.

Michael: Forty-two hundred. Drew, let’s go to you. What do you think Adam sold model-planes.com for?

Andrew: Yeah. I mean, I was gonna say five grand. We’ve got a few good, really good hyphen domains but they don’t move, man. The biggest one we ever had, I think, was patio-furniture.com, which sold to a German company because they’re the only ones that actually do like hyphens. And I think we got 16,000 or 18,000 for that. I’m gonna say five grand.

Michael: Okay. Adam, let’s go back to you. What did you sell model-planes.com for?

Adam: Well, unfortunately I did not sell it for that much. This name has been in my portfolio for, oh God, 10 years maybe, probably as long as I’ve been domaining. I bought…I own quite a few hyphen names. I own, like, kentucky-derby, golden-gate, you know, just really decent, you know, combos. I have sold a hyphen name for a considerable amount of money, close to six figures, a double hyphen name actually. I can’t talk about it but…yeah.

Andrew: What do you mean?

Adam: Yeah, I can’t talk about it.

Michael: That’s must have been the heydays and it was like sex or gambling or something like…

Andrew: Is it double hyphen like an equal sign?

Adam: No, no, not an equal sign and not dash dash, and not an IDN. It’s on an NDA and I can’t talk about it. It was a numeric as well. So anyway I sold this because it’s just been sitting in my portfolio and not doing anything. And the guy hit me up a few years ago about it and I don’t know, I think I priced at a grand because it doesn’t make any money, it just sits in my portfolio. You know, I’ve probably spent what I made on this domain. So, just to have it in my portfolio makes no sense. I also own model-cars and model-trucks, which I will sell to either one of you guys for $5,000 right now. Before I tell you the price that I sold this one for. Takers?

Andrew: No, 300 bucks.

Adam: I sold it for $463.

Michael: Nice. How did you come up with an oddball number like 463?

Adam: 463, I think the guy…we handled it through DomainAgents, so another company that I’m invested in, and the transaction went through there. DomainAgents charges a fee on the buyer side. So, I think that probably it was about 500 bucks, you know, based on the fees. So, he probably offered it…he was probably seeing his fees totaled on and just decided that I’m not gonna spend more than 500. He was very adamant, like, “Four hundred and sixty-three is my final offer, okay?” And, you know, he’s pestered me again, like you guys were saying earlier, you know, you just keep on somebody, eventually they’ll sell. Well, hey, it’s not making me any money and…

Andrew: It’s a new car [SP].

Adam: Okay. I don’t know anything about the buyer other than he’s in the UK and is persistent. And if he wants model-cars, he can come back to me get it for $5000.

Shane: Well, Mike’s gonna have him on next week, talking about his big buy.

[crosstalk]

Michael: He stole it from you, you wanted 1000, you got it for a less than 50%. That’s awesome. Well, congratulations moving one of those domain names that we all have in our portfolio that never gonna do anything, right? Let me ask you this, why haven’t you let that drop by now?

Adam: Just, you know, it’s one of those names that I think somebody like this guy…what’s that?

Michael: No, I was yawning. I said sorry.

Adam: Oh, okay. No, I just, you know, part of it is, you know, the management of a portfolio…I’m up to about 12,000, maybe 15,000 domains and I was moving my names the other day between registrars. And, you know, I’m sitting there, going through each domain, trying to figure out, to keep, sell, or move. And, you know, when you’re at that level of names, the time to invest in going through, you know, to save 100 bucks, it’s gonna cost me thousands of dollars of my time to go through.

So, it’s kind of just moved along with the other names. You know, it did get some traffic in PPC, you know, back in the day. It probably earned its keep. Nowadays, with PPC being what it is, it doesn’t earn its keep, so it is a good time to sell it. I think a lot of domainers I’ve been talking to lately that are kind of…been around since the good PPC days, talk about this and talk about how, you know, they’re marking their names’ down price to sell. That’s kind of weird that we both scratched it [SP] at the same time.

Shane: That was weird, right?

Adam: But anyway, yeah, it’s just been along for the ride, and you know, it did make money and probably paid for itself initially. I don’t even remember how I picked this one up. I got those three all at the same time, so I probably just bought them in a batch deal.

Michael: Well, congrats on the sale, Adam.

Adam: Yay.

Andrews: You know who’s buying drinks?

Adam: Yeah, exactly. [inaudible 00:28:19]. Amen.

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Michael: All right, we’re gonna move on to the next segment of the show. In the domain portfolio review, we take a user-submitted domain name portfolio and provide honest and constructive feedback to the owners. They can either cut their losses, continue to hold the domain names long-term, or figure out a sales strategy going forward.

Today’s portfolio was submitted by BJ Adrezin as part of BJ submission. He made a generous donation to the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center to help us all find a cure for cancer. BJ’s list of 25 domain name starts with animal.fund and it ends with stock.design, a good number of new GTLDs in BJ’s portfolio. If you’re watching the show, this is the point where you should bring the window back to the forefront and press Pause. Review the domain names that are listed below, price the domain names, pick your top three, your bottom three, then come back and listen to what the Sherpas have to say about this portfolio. That’s the way we improve our skills.

We need to, like, detach and process things on our own for a few minutes before we listen to other people’s evaluations of the domain names. This segment, we’re going to go Drew, then Adam, then Shane. Drew, let’s start with you. When you look at BJ’s portfolio, what is your general impression of the domains that he’s purchased?

Andrew: I think he’s doing a pretty good job, you know? I mean, none of these names are gonna set the world on fire but, you know, it’s a lot better than some of the portfolios we’ve seen recently.

Michael: What do you like most on the list?

Andrew: I don’t know. I mean, there’s nothing on here that I’m like, “Wow, this is just a great name.” But there’s, like, a lot of names that, you know, I would put in my own portfolio at the right price at a low cost. You know, like Finecars, a good brand for anybody selling exotic cars and classic cars, which is big business and a hot segment. You know what, I think snoring.org is probably my favorite name on this list because it’s a massive affiliate opportunity, huge, you know, SEO opportunity. Like, there’s a big market for snoring products, there’s a massive, massive market for snoring products. There’s a lot of different ways to monetize that name.

Dot orgs are very trusted and most of that market is super spammy, scammy, you know, multi-level marketing wankers. And so, you know, if you’ve come into this space with snoring.org, probably it’s gonna be a paid search campaign but still, if you’re snoring.org, I don’t know, you’re like the snoring institution. That’s the new thing. Now, it’s like, you know, you want to be the thought leader in a particular subject, you’re the Sleep Institute. Now you’re gonna be the snoring institute and you’re snoring.org. And you’re gonna [inaudible 00:31:40] website into snoring and the research, blah blah blah. And then you’re gonna sell the same spammy snoring device that shows up on my Facebook account every day. But I like that name. I would buy that name.

Michael: So, Drew, let me ask you. If you owned snoring.org today, what would you price it at retail?

Andrew: You know, look, I’m the last guy to usually say this, okay? But I would actually probably make a play to develop snoring.org, as opposed to just sell it, just because I think that there’s a lot of low-hanging fruit in that segment and you can monetize it pretty easily, pretty effectively. You can easily develop the content that, you know, the science is out there, all the data’s out there.

Michael: Let’s say that, you know, he just wants to invest in domain names, not develop. What would you price it at?

Andrew: I don’t know.

Michael: Order of magnitude.

Andrew: Probably an unrealistic price that nobody would actually ever pay. But you know, if you want to actually sell it, probably 10 grand, the most anybody is gonna pay for that, maybe 15.

Michael: So, maybe ask 15, 20. What do you think about finecars.com, what would you price that one at if you own it?

Andrew: Fifteen to 25.

Michael: Okay.

Andrew: And you know, I might take 10, if somebody offered me 10, you know, but I’d probably price it in the 15 to 25 range.

Michael: So, in general, I’m hearing from you that, you know, these aren’t terrible domain names, he’s heading in the right direction. And he’s got some domain names that are at least five figures retail price he’s gonna ask for it and he just needs to wait on those.

Andrew: Yeah. There’s very few names that I would just drop.

Michael: What would you drop?

Andrew: Even the new TLDs on here, like, you’ve got a couple that, you know, even me, the naysayer, would buy, like night.vision. Again, assuming that there is a normal renewals. If it’s more than a $25 renewal then, you know. But if it’s a normal renewal, night.vison, great name.

Michael: You know, I was thinking about that. Ollie Vandy [SP] used to own night.vison and he sold it on Flippa. I wonder if BJ picked it up, I can’t remember. But yeah, that’s a great…

Andrew: [inaudible 00:34:10] place to go where they had the old prices of domains.

Michael: I know, NameBio. I wish they had an archive of the old prices.

Andrew: There’s a business model. I think, you know, like safe.football, I’d probably let that one go. chiropractic.click, definitely I would let that one go.

Michael: Okay, cool. All right, thanks, Drew. Let me go over to you, Adam. What are a couple of domain names on the list that you think have the best commercial value, that have the best resale value?

Adam: Sure. Well, you know, overall he’s got, you know, this is like 95% new TLDs. So, you know, I would be…if you’re looking for quick sales, I don’t think they’re gonna come off of this portfolio. Unless you’re doing heavy outbound, I think there’s a lot of potential. I think all the new TLD stuff sounds good, for the most part. I’d say about 90% of it sounds good and makes sense. I personally wouldn’t be purchasing these again. Like you said, if there’s high costs for renewal, I’d think about, you know, how long I want to hold on to these.

You know, I like Finecars, that’s kind of the obvious one. Again, that’s not a new TLD, so you gravitate towards those. snoring.org I like as well as Drew. I think Drew pretty much covered it. You know, names like SafeFootball, like with all the concussion stuff going on, I could see how that can have some possibility. Again, it’s a stretch, you know. I don’t know if safefootball.com is taken. You know, if you want SafeFootball, you play soccer.

Michael: Where do you see FlyingCars? That’s not on my list.

Andrew: FineCars.

Adam: FineCars.

Michael: Oh, FineCars? Sorry.

Michael: Flying cars would be awesome.

Adam: I don’t [SP] want that one. Ironic. I would say, you know, there’s names like…in terms of…some of these new TLDs I didn’t even know exist, like dot glass, like I had no idea. What else was there? Dot equipment, dot football, I kind of knew was coming. You know, he’s got a lot of different variety of new TLDs. And some of the ones he’s got are great. LA.plumbing, I could see that, you know, going to plumbing company. You have to do some outbound on that as well. So, overall I’d say, you know, if he’s gonna hold long-term, he’s got some potential here. It all really depends on the renewal prices.

Michael: Yeah. It’s a long-term hold. So spadoctor.com would be a great brandable domain name, assuming, you know, somebody would want it. I’m not sure how much spa companies, which are typically smaller companies, are gonna pay. It’s almost like the gardening companies that come around and mow, you know, 50 lawns a day or something, or a week. What do you think about spa.doctor? Clearly, you need to hold a long time till these small companies learn about the new gTLDs. But do you think that that one would be a good long-term hold as a brandable?

Adam: Yeah, tough one. I mean, I don’t know what your upside is on that. Again, you know, there’s other potential. You know, I was listening to a past Sherpa where you guys were talking about a love.doc or something like that. And Monty was saying, well there’s doctor, there’s doc, there’s MD. There’s all these other possibilities as well and you have to look at that. And new TLDs, I’ll give you an example. BlownGlass, I kind of looked at that, I was like, “Okay.” Well, to me the word “blown glass,” I haven’t ever heard it phrased that way, but “hand-blown glass” I have. And there’s categories with hand-blown glass. And you know, Drew knows all about that. Right, Drew?

Andrew: Absolutely, man.

Adam: Yeah. So, the blown.glass, I went and checked, and you know, blownglass.com is for sale, and it’s on Sedo, it’s been listed on Sedo for sale since 2013. You know, when there’s a possibility of somebody buying blownglass.com, will they buy your blown.glass? You know, I don’t know. Me personally, I would buy blownglass.com.

Michael: Lost Adam. Oh, here he comes.

Andrew: He’s back. That was a strong comeback there.

Michael: That was. Hopefully, you’re gonna join right back in. All right, welcome back to Adam. Shane, let’s go to you.

Shane: I looked up NightVision, 1379, okay.

Michael: Welcome back, Adam.

Adam: Right. All of a sudden, everyone was gone.

Shane: Let him finish up, man.

Adam: What was I?

Michael: Blownglass.com is available. You wouldn’t…you know?

Adam: Yeah, I don’t know. Just generally speaking, I think there’s possibilities. When you buy a new TLD, you got to look at what other better opportunities there are for somebody that’s gonna be your buyer, and I think there’s other opportunities here. I would dump mikepence.xyz [SP], and like Drew said, I don’t like chiropractic.click either. SpaDoctor kind of falls close to that buying for me. And new.wine kind of, unless you’re gonna build something there. Extra.part seems kind of weird to me.

Overall, not bad, you know, I think Drew said it well in saying that he’s going the right direction. I’ve seen some portfolios that you guys reviewed in the past and that was like, “Oh, gosh, I feel sorry for the guys that have to talk about the names.” I don’t really think this is one of those, like, you know, he’s making good choices. But again, long-term holds are more likely on these.

Michael: Yeah. So, good. [inaudible 00:39:50] which ones he should drop because then he could take that money and put it into, you know, renewals or other dot coms or other gTLDs.

Adam: Right. You know, we get a lot of domains, you know, through domain agents’ offers on new TLDs and then we close some. You know, sometimes you sell. I’m not in this market, so I kind of have to rely on some of the data points from either NameBio that I see coming through our marketplace. And these sell, but again, it’s a lot less…

Shane: They sell. Somebody just hit me up with a domain, it’s not public yet, I told them to report it to NameBio and DN Journal. But he sold it for $6,500, a new gTLD that he just hand-registered. So, you know, they’re selling, they’re not selling maybe as fast. There’s not as much publicity.

Andrew: Was it generic, thought, or was it like…

Michael: It was a shortened word. I wasn’t the full word, it was actually like a shortened version of it, not an acronym but just a shortened version. You know, I’m still trying to get the details from him and it was like a…I can’t remember the TLD, maybe dot pub or something like that. Anyways, we’re running short of time, so let me move on to Shane. Thank you, Adam. Shane, what do you think about BJ’s list. Besides what Adam and Drew have said, what do you like on list?

Shane: I’ll just make it short and say that I think if you’re gonna do it, this is probably how you need to do it. I mean, they’re words, for the most part, that makes sense, and so I thought the same thing. You know, new Gs [SP] have their place. I still think the new Gs are more for people building out new businesses for an alternative domain. The resale market, it’s just not that big. But there’s some names I like and they weren’t the new Gs but the snoring.org…

Michael: Now we got a little bit of a latency issue with Shane’s video feed here or maybe it’s mine. Uh-oh, it looks like it’s mine.

Michael: Hey, nobody mentioned quick.credit. Do you guys like that one as a brand?

Andrew: It’s okay. I think, you know, the financial teams…I’ve sold a lot of credit names like that. And it’s a sound credit name, if it’s dot com [SP]. But, you know, if you’re a new TLD, quickcredit.com is for sale right now. Buy this domain. Let’s see. There’s actually a Buy It Now…oh no, it’s not a Buy It Now. But it’s listed on Sedo with a $6,000 asking price, whatever that means.

Michael: That’s like a minimum offer before a deal [SP].

Adam: Yeah. So, they probably want $300,000 [SP].

Michael: Yeah. You know, all these names have…I mean, they’re better than a lot of them that we’ve come across but it’s gonna to be a sit and wait. And if you’re sitting and waiting for all these, I think it’ll be a while. Every time we talk bad about these, someone emails us and lets us know they’ve sold them. But we also know there’s millions of them being registered, so if three guys email us, that’s still not a lot of people. So, I think it’s fine but if I’m investing, this isn’t where I’m going. And the other thing that drives me crazy is none of us can tell…I could ask all of, you none of you know how much renewals are on any of these things. It could be $200, it could be $50, and that greatly affects… If you don’t know the holding cost of your asset, how can you possibly make a good determination?

Michael: Put a value on it.

Adam: Yeah, put a value on it. But I do like snoring.org a lot, I really like that. And I don’t dislike body.me, I mean, there’s nothing more personal than your body.

Michael: I like body.me. I like dot me, I’ve always actually…dot me, I think, has always been my favorite, like, dot tv [inaudible 00:44:17], but you know, dot me has always been…I love that. As long as it makes sense.

Man: Dot me is still undervalued.

Michael: Yeah. Awesome, guys. The one final thing… Oh, who’d we lose, Shane? Oh, there he is.

Shane: What is going on?

Michael: I don’t know. That’s weird. We lost Shane, but he’s come back. The one thing I’ll mention to BJ is go watch Mark Levine’s interview from just a couple of weeks ago where he talks about his dot io portfolio and how he’s been able to get a phenomenal sell-through rate. One of his lessons learned is that GOs in dot io weren’t ones that we’re selling. He wasn’t getting any offers because the people that are looking for the dot io startups aren’t interested in buying GOs. And real estate agents aren’t interested in, you know, buying a domain name that they have no idea how it works. But great feedback from the Sherpas. Before we jump into the domains going to auction soon, I want to tell you about three of our other sponsors.

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Michael: We’re gonna move on to the marketplace list. This segment is sponsored by NameJet. We’ll be reviewing 10 mostly no-reserve or reserve-met domain names heading to auction soon. And half of the domains are in the right of the dot NameJet auction taking place at NamesCon next week. If you like one of the names below, click through soon because, once they go to auction, you lose your opportunity to put in a minimum bid and be a part of the auction or even just watch the results.

The links below go directly to NameJet. They’re not commissionable links. NameJet just want to see how much traffic we’re sending them. The list starts with christmas.net and it ends with wholesaleproducts.com. For transparency, I always ask the Sherpas if any of the domains listed below are owned by them or brokered by them. I don’t believe that’s the case.

Andrew: No.

Adam: No.

Michael: Okay. Sherpas are saying no. Again, if you’re watching the show, this is the point to pause the video or audio, review the domain names that are listed below, price the domain, pick your top three, your bottom three. Then come back and listen to what the Sherpas have to say so you can improve the way you value domain names. This segment, we’re gonna go Adam, then Shane, then Drew. Adam, let’s start with you. From an investment perspective, for newer investors that don’t have a ton of money, let’s say, they don’t have $100,000 put in domain names, maybe they have a couple of thousand dollars or a few thousand dollars, what do you like on the NameJet list and why?

Adam: I like fort.com for sure. I like Swenyo [SP].

Michael: Swenyo.

Adam: And I like…

Andrew: Swenyo.

Adam: Yeah, sorry.

Michael: You guys always do that to me too. Like, I’ll just read it and they’re like…

Andrew: It’s an eñe, not and N.

Adam: And I like farms.net. There’s a few that…I mean they’re all pretty solid. There’s not one on here in particular that I’d say is not good.

Michael: Fort.com, when I gave you the information to review, you know, a few days ago fort.com was at $5,100 and it had a reserve. It is the only domain on this list that has a reserve. And the reserve, between $10,000 and $25,000, so you don’t know if it’s $10,001 and you don’t know if it’s $24,000.

Adam: I could tell you where it’s at. I think it’s in the higher end of that. fort.com was marketed a while back, in fact, I made an offer [SP] in that range.

Man: You were brokering?

Michael: Oh, you were?

Adam: Somebody else brokered it for you. But I made an offer in the ballpark that the reserves are right now and they turned it down.

Michael: So do you think it’s a good deal at $25,000?

Adam: I’ll be bidding.

Michael: Oh, you will? Why do you like fort.com so much?

Adam: You know, it’s short, four letter, sounds like, you know, a solid company that you’d want to work with. It’s got some positive qualities.

Andrew: Comes after third [SP].

Adam: What’s that?

Andrew: Comes after third.

Adam: Yeah. It sounds like a noise that somebody makes. But, you know, cyber security type things, anything that requires some sort of level of insuring or security, it seems like it would be a good brand for that. And it is just short. That’s probably my top pick on that list. I’ll probably participate and I’ll probably elevate the level of involvement if we run this and people are watching it. But I expect this is one that’s gonna be at NamesCon.

Michael: Yeah. And it’s such a short…it’s probably gonna go to NamesCon and be in the live auction.

Adam: Yeah. It’ll get some action. So, I probably won’t end up with this name. It’ll probably go, I’m gonna guess, in that upper five-figure range just based on a live auction generating a little bit more buzz.

Michael: So, the other names you mentioned, Adam, was farms.net. Dot nets have been soft recently. We’ve talked about that. Why do you like farms.net?

Adam: You know, I’ll probably let Shane talk a little bit more about that one. I’m sure that he probably likes it as well. But from a real estate perspective, you know, we both are Illinois boys and we know that farmland and farms get sold around here for high dollar. And, you know, I don’t know if that market’s soft right now, I just haven’t been paying much attention to that.

But, you know, just in general I think you build a pretty decent website on farms.net. There’s plenty of land brokers around my area, and I’m sure around Shane’s area as well, that would benefit from that kind of website. Even though it is a dot net, it’s pretty-sounding, in my opinion. I don’t remember what the reserve was it on, my email crashed.

Michael: No reserve on farms.net.

Adam: Okay, we’ve just lost Drew here but…there he comes again. You know, I just think it’s probably…if it’s a no-reserve, I could see…I’d spend a couple grand on this. And I’m probably guessing that it’ll go past that easily. You know, I asked [SP] about appraisal that you sent us is at 22,000. That seems a little high to me because of the softness of dot net…

Michael: Well, not to retail. So, I would hope that, you know, it is in the right of the dot auction, so whether it goes to live auction or not, I would hope that it would sell someplace, you know, below the retail, right?

Adam: Yeah.

Michael: All right. Thanks, Adam. Shane, let’s go over to you. Since we just discussed farms.net, do you like farms.net?

Andrew: Is that Christmas music?

Michael: Who is that? Drew?

[crosstalk]

Man: That was my phone.

Shane: We know who it is. I’ll talk because Adam was handed over. farms.net’s in our wheelhouse here in central Illinois. You drive down the road and there’s always some kind of sign somewhere of a brokerage or an auction coming up. And farms.net is a perfect name to stick on that sign. That’s a pretty easy build-out, too, for us just because there is so much content to put on it. And farms are soft but they still sell like crazy. I mean, it’s amazing what…$12,000 to $17,000 an acre land just flips back and forth constantly.

Michael: So, right now it’s at $1,833 at a no-reserve for the right of the dot auction. Are you gonna be in on that one?

Shane: Yeah, I’ll definitely be in on that. The problem with farms names, they still do very well, I’ve watched them for years. Because it’s what we do and they always do very well just because there’s so much money involved in that. No, I don’t know about the building out, making money, I don’t know how that site is, but I know there’s plenty of content.

So, of the dot net, it’s a strong, strong segment. Obviously, Christmas would be a pretty big holiday as well. It’ll be interesting to see what that goes for, I mean for somebody that could be a pretty good deal. I mean it’s Christmas, what can you say? So, I really liked that and I think OceanFrontProperty is another one to bid long, but I can see that on… You know, I like to envision things that are gonna be in use and that’s another one that I see being used. Even though it’s a little long, put the right capitals in the right area, I think people can remember that as well.

Swenyo, I love the shortness, I love what it means in Spanish, but I realize that not everybody knows what that means or what value it is. But it’s a huge growing population. The Hispanic market is very underutilized as far as domains being used in the United States. I don’t think that you’re gonna buy, I don’t think the resell market’s there. But I think that segment is growing so quickly, somebody that truly understands that there’s a lot of money to be made in the Hispanic market in the United States because it’s growing so well. And they’re spending money, spending lots of money.

So, Swenyo is a fantastic brand. And I think it could be a steal in the long term. The other one…I hate plasticsurgeondirectory, I hate directcampaigns [SP]. That’s just my personal thing. Nobody ever builds them out, I haven’t seen a directory built in like 20 years of any value. I’m sure that it’s just me, but no way, you couldn’t give that one to me.

Michael: Good. I put that one on there. I was hoping somebody would like hate it and say why they hated it. And yeah, these directory names just aren’t in vogue anymore.

Shane: It’s not 1997 anymore.

Andrew: Yeah, Google killed the directory model.

Michael: Yeah.

Shane: Especially when you put it in the title, like, you know, you’re gonna put “directory” so they know. I’m sure there’ll be dot directory sometime to make it even worse, if that’s possible at all.

Adam: Plasticsurgeons.com is a directory.

Shane: No, exactly, exactly. That’s the model for doctor names right now. That’s essentially what they…

Andrew: No, [inaudible 00:54:36] is the model for doctor names. And now those businesses are all busted.

Shane: Yeah, there’s not money in it. But I will want to add that you said, “What’s a newer name that a new investor could buy?” and Adam said fort is a gift [SP] at $20,000.

Michael: I threw that one in because I liked it. But yeah, that one’s not. What about, so, christmas.net? I don’t know. Resell on [inaudible 00:55:03].

Adam: Wait, wait. What was joke there? I missed the joke. I’m me.

Michael: The joke was no newer investors are gonna throw down 30K, 40K or fort.com in a best-case scenario.

Adam: Okay, farms.net is not gonna go for cheap, christmas.net’s not gonna go for cheap.

Shane: No, there’s not much on here that’s gonna be for the new… If you’re at the live auction…

Michael: [inaudible 00:55:22] these dot nets are gonna go for, farms.net and christmas.net?

Adam: They’ll go in the five figures, easy.

Michael: Five figure…over $10,000 for farms.net?

Adam: You don’t think so?

Andrew: I disagree. I think farms.net sells for like three to five grand. I think christmas.net sells for less.

Shane: If it’s under $5,000, Adam and I are building it out.

Michael: You and Adam are gonna build it out.

Shane: Hey, Adam, [inaudible 00:55:45].

Adam: We’re gonna drive the prices up right now just by talking about it.

Andrew: I’ve been picking up killer dot net domains not for pennies. I mean people heard about…

Adam: I heard about all your three-letter dot nets from the last show. That’s the last one that I watched. Weren’t you guys saying that they were $5,000 names or something like that?

Shane: That was just to make Drew feel better. He was kind of sad [inaudible 00:56:05].

Adam: I didn’t know that Oliver was gonna…they were gonna be everywhere after that show.

Andrew: So, we’re gonna tell new investors to buy dot nets. That’s our advice…

Michael: Well, that’s what it’s sounding like but you guys are saying throw down like five figures and Drew was like, “No [inaudible 00:56:23] back.”

Adam: I’m not saying the new investors should be throwing down five figures on a dot net.

Michael: Yeah, no.

Adam: If they’ve got five figures, they should, you know…

Andrew: I do not think that either of those names will go into five figures.

Michael: But four figures. So, the takeaway is, if you can pick up phenomenal names like Christmas or farms.net from an end user that maybe had it developed and has held on it for 10 years and you offer them $500 or $1,000, then take that and go put it in the right of the dot auction because they’re probably gonna sell for a few thousand bucks, and that’s an easy way to make some money. But you’ve got hustle and find these domains for that cheap. All right, so anything else, Shane?

Shane: No, I’m just gonna…and I will say that dot nets, I’ve said it on this show a million times, that dot nets are great value if you want to build out a name rather than buying a new G. At this point, I think dot nets are established enough and usable enough that you can pick up a solid dot net and build it out and have a great name. Now, reselling, we talked about that enough. That’s not great market right now. You’re not gonna pick up a dot net and sell it.

Michael: Okay. Drew, thank you, Shane. I’m sorry, I was just looking at…asked about wholesales…or appraised values and I had a heart attack because christmas.net is $89,000. And Shane, do you think there’s any way that if you own Christmas.net that you’re gonna get $89,000, $90,000 retail for that domain?

Shane: Not unless I’m doing $50,000 a month in sales.

Michael: And then it’s a business, not a domain name.

Shane: It’s a business, yeah.

Andrew: We own center.com [SP]. We’ve spoken to every single person in that market, every single one. They’re the cheapest people on earth. There’s nobody spending any money, they’re super cash flow conscious because, you know, their party comes around once a year. The guy that buys this name in auction is gonna be sitting on it for the next decade until he puts it up at auction and sells it for, you know, whatever it sells for. Don’t get me wrong, I mean it’s got, you know, a million exact match searches, it’s a monster domain name in terms of keyword. But, you know, just having, like, actual experience selling domains into that market, tough.

Shane: And I will say the same about farms.net, nobody should buy it. And if they do buy it, bad things will happen.

Michael: You’re gonna hold it forever and you’re gonna be sorry.

Shane: You’re gonna hold it forever and it’ll be the worst purchase you ever made, so don’t buy it.

Michael: I’m gonna contact you every year, Shane.

[crosstalk]

Adam: Have you guys [inaudible 00:58:59] site called NameBio? I’m looking at right now and I’m just looking at dot nets because Drew’s…I’m not in that market. And I’m looking at prices from this past year in the five figures for names that are on par with this.

Andrew: Yeah. That’s great. Even if there’s like a hundred sales in the five figures for dot net domains, like, does that make a market?

Adam: At an auction like this… All right. Put some money down on this?

Andrew: Yeah, I’m ready, let’s throw down, let’s make this interesting.

Shane: Well, now I have to bid it up.

Adam: Yeah, then I’ll just bid it up so I can win.

Shane: Yeah, not that [inaudible 00:59:44] spending $9,000 [inaudible 00:59:44].

Andrew: He’s throwing up the paddle [SP], $10,000.

Michael: Yeah, I love NameBio. Recovery.net, $200,000, private sale, January of last year.

Adam: portugal.net [SP]. Oh, no, that’s not one, hold on. jubilee.net.

Michael: The great thing about NameBio is that you sort it by date, you’re looking at the most recent dot nets that have sold, and then you look at the venue. So, if it’s on DropCatcher, it’s on NameJet, or it’s on GoDaddy, it’s likely selling to another investor. And that doesn’t mean that that investor is gonna get their money out of it.

Adam: Right. If you pull up the date range on the top and you pull up past year, you could see all the dot nets from last year.

Michael: Oh, yeah, and then sort those last year, past year by descending price and then you can look at the best-case scenario.

Adam: You got it.

Michael: Yeah.

Andrew: There’s been a few good ones but that’s…you know, they’re few and far between.

Shane: So is it over under 5,000, is that we’re using as a number for the bid? We need a…

Andrew: Hey, you guys are talking five figures, 10,000 is the over under.

Adam: I don’t think 10,000 but definitely 9,000 [SP].

Andrew: You’re talking five figures, you’re trying to…

Adam: That’s [inaudible 01:00:58].

Man: I said low five figures.

Andrew: Trying to pull it over on our viewers here?

Shane: Below 20. Just a [inaudible 01:01:08] over 10.

Michael: All right. Drew, let’s go to you. What do you love, what do you hate on the list?

Andrew: So, the only one I hate is plasticsurgeondirectory, worthless domain name. I pretty much like everything else actually. Yeah, I mean, you know, obviously they have varying degrees of value but I like everything else. You know, I really…I like Swenyo, even though the N should be eñe, you know, with a little thing, the tilda. But yeah, man, I mean, so certain Spanish names that are like ubiquitous sell really well because they make great brands.

But a word like this most people don’t know, I mean, it’s “dream” or…it means “sleep” too. And it’s a phenomenal name. I mean, if you owned sleep.com or you own dream.com, I mean these are big boy names, you know, seven, eight-figure names. So, you know, it is a phenomenal domain but there’s just no market, there is no market. And then, you know, it’s not perfect because Spanish-speaking countries, they actually have the eñe on the keyboard, so it’s not perfect.

Fort is obviously the best domain. And I agree, for cybersecurity, one of the top five or top three hottest segments of the tech economy, you know, just great name. So, yeah, I regret…I could have bought that for 40 grand, I [inaudible 01:02:57] and I imagine it’ll go quite a bit higher than that.

Michael: Hey, Drew what about privatereg.com? You know, I think a lot of domain investors look at domains with “domain” in the name or something related to hosting, or registration. They look at PrivateReg and think who is privacy [SP]. Is anybody gonna come knocking for that domain name in the future?

Andrew: Probably not, but you know, I was surprised to see that PrivateReg actually has like 8,000 people a month searching for private reg as keywords. And so I have no freaking clue what they’re looking for. But I mean, it is something, and so I’m sure if I did a little more due diligence, there’s got to be something out there where there’s a commercial application for that name. It’s a clever little brand. I mean, you know, I don’t think it’s worth a lot of money but I would buy it. If I saw it dropping, I’d pay maybe 100 bucks for it, 200 bucks.

Michael: But it’s currently at $600 as of a few days ago.

Andrew: So yeah, I mean I wouldn’t pay that much but it is what it is. It’s a good name for somebody.

Michael: All right. We’re at the end of today’s show. I’d like to give the Sherpas an opportunity to share anything that they want about names they’re brokering or selling deals they’re offering, opportunities they’re looking for, where they might be in a week. I keep saying a week, I know you guys it’s two weeks out but it’s gonna air on Monday. Or anybody they want to give a shout-out to, let’s start with Shane and work our way towards the other side. Shane.

Shane: We have officially moved over to DSAD and I want to thank Travis for doing all the legwork moving the site. It’s amazing what people can do. There’s no way I could do all the things he’s doing. So, thanks to Travis. He’s a partner over at DSAD. So, you can type in domain chain [SP], but it’s not about me anymore, it’s about the team. So, believe it or not, I’m not hogging [SP] the spotlight as much. And then, yeah, NamesCon, I’ll be there at NamesCon. Don’t fight me, just shake my hand and say hello.

Michael: Hey, who else from the DSAD team is gonna be there? Travis was there last year, I [inaudible 01:05:17] meeting him.

Shane: All of us. Aaron’s gonna be there, Josh is gonna be there, the whole team. We got our first annual meeting ever, four guys.

Michael: Awesome.

Shane: Yeah, I think we made enough to buy around the drinks, so it’s gonna be a hell of a company party.

Michael: Three guys and a coder.

Shane: And be honest, I’ve never met Travis in person. Isn’t it amazing how the Internet works so you can have a business partner, talk to him every single day, and yet never have shaken their hand in person?

Michael: Didn’t he come last year?

Shane: No, he didn’t make it last year.

Michael: That’s weird. I’ve had conversation with him. I must have like be piecing together his picture from DSAD.com and the conversation I’ve had and I assumed that he went to NamesCon last year.

Shane: I met Eicher Josh [SP] last year for the first time, and again, I was already working with him. And it’s funny, in your head, you picture what they look like and how they move and then you see him in person, like, I don’t even know this guy, never seen before in my life. So, that’s how, you know, there’s been some big businesses built on guys that didn’t meet until several years after they were successful even. So, it’ll be fun. It’s the best week of the year, undoubtedly.

Michael: Definitely. Thanks, Shane. Drew, anything you want to promote, give a shout-out to?

Andrew: Not really, I mean, we’ve got we’ve got some phenomenal domains up for brokerage, we’ve got ct.com [SP], jail.com, we got galaxy.com. I think galaxy.com is just hands down the best domain name left on the internet, period. I mean, like, you want to be the next Amazon, you know, it’s like there’s not a lot of names that can be as ubiquitous and grandiose as galaxy.com. It’s, you know, universe, galaxy, planet, Planet X.

Michael: Yeah, galaxy.com is a phenomenal domain. And I just thought today that your newsletter had like a buyer’s request. So, if people want to like find out the domains that you’re brokering and buy requests, they need to get onto the MediaOptions.com newsletter.

Andrew: Yeah, absolutely. Sign up, MediaOptions.com, top right-hand corner, you can sign up for the newsletter, goes out twice a week. We’ve got the best names in the business, you know, coming straight into your inbox.

Michael: What was the buyer request for?

Andrew: The buyer request, you know, it’s not a domain investor, it’s a big end user. They’re in the Medicare space and are looking for domain names or particularly interested in any websites with traffic, revenues optional, you know, related to senior living, senior care, Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security. I mean, really anything that targets seniors, that demographic, and they’re looking for that traffic.

Michael: Cool.

Andrew: For domains or websites space, please contact us, we have a serious buyer. But, you know, it’s got to be good, it’s got to be not…my grandmother once was in seniorcare.com.

Shane: Help.oldpeople.

Andrew: Yeah. You know, I’m gonna shout out. I’m gonna be at NamesCon and my broker Chris Zucker is coming. He will be there, it’s his first sort of…he’s been in the domain business now for almost two years, very successfully brokering domain names for many auctions. And this is gonna be his first coming-out party to the domain industry itself. So, you know, if you see Chris, you know, shake his hand, say hello, introduce yourself, make him feel part of the community. He’s got a lot to offer, he’s a hell of a broker, he hustles more than almost anybody I’ve ever met in my entire life. And yeah, looking forward to seeing everybody for sure.

Michael: Yeah. I’ve had a few conversations with Chris. He is definitely somebody you want to meet. He’s got his finger on the pulse of what’s going on the industry. So, I look forward to meeting Chris. It’ll be the first time for me.

Shane: Are you bringing Turtle with you? I forget his name, I always call him Turtle because he’s your best friend, he looks like turtle.

Andrew: No, no.

Shane: Okay.

Michael: All right. Thanks, Drew. Adam, let’s go over to you. Anything you want to mention or promote?

Adam: I will be at NamesCon as well. I’m speaking on Sunday afternoon, I think, about naming.

Andrew: You know something about naming?

Adam: No, not much. I’m with Victor Pitts, and we’re gonna be talking about naming. So I’ll be there Sunday through Wednesday. I’m taking a short trip there, not staying for the whole thing. But no, I’ll give you shout-out to… We just finished up NameBio, just finished up a contest to win tickets to NamesCon. But if you haven’t downloaded the app, we’re pushing the app right now, and you know, we got a lot of people participating in that contest, and it was kind of fun.

And I think we’re probably gonna try to do some more of that. We were looking forward to trying to do one in conjunction with the actual live event at NamesCon. So you know, we got a thousand captive audience, people participating and competing on that. But I’m not sure that’s gonna fly it but that might come out. But NamesCon, you know, is a perfect opportunity for that but we just did in the front end of it instead. But anyway, so NameBio–I got so many things– domainagents.com, and actually my main company right now is Evergreen, so that’s my pitch.

Michael: Evergreen.com, that’s a great domain name in itself.

Shane: It’d be way better off, way more profitable in cannabis than in domain names.

Michael: Yeah, it would be.

Adam: Or selling evergreen [inaudible 01:11:13].

Michael: [inaudible 01:11:12] selling it, Adam, if you got an offer that was high enough?

Adam: Say that again.

Michael: Would you rebrand your naming consulting company from Evergreen if you got an offer high enough from, say, somebody in the cannabis industry?

Adam: Yeah. It would have to be pretty high. No pun intended.

Man: How high?

Michael: At NamesCon, Sunday, I think 11:30, I’m gonna be leading a discussion table around newer investors getting into the industry. And then come find me in the networking lane. It’s not the big sponsorship room, it’s just the networking lane where there are small tables. I’m gonna have a table for DNAcademy. If you want to learn more about that, I’m gonna be right next to the FT table, if you want to learn about portfolio management using FT to manage your domain names landers, things like that.

If you received benefit from today’s show, please post a comment below and thank today’s Sherpas. Oh, the other thing I want to mention, way at the top of DomainSherpa, there’s a little banner that says, “If you go to NamesCon and you want to attend the DomainSherpa Review live with Drew Rosener, Shane Cultra, and Frank Schilling and have them review your domain name live, submit that domain name there.” You have to go to NamesCon, you have to be in attendance, and then we’ll review domain names. So, submit it up above.

Again, thank today’s Sherpas. They take time out of their schedule to come and share back with the community. I want to be the first to thank them and thank BJ Adrezin for submitting his portfolio and making a generous donation to the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center. Thanks to NameJet for submitting their portfolio and sponsoring that portion of the DomainSherpa Review. And thanks again to our DomainSherpa panel, Adam strong, Andrew Rosener, and Shane Cultra, for sharing their experience and insights. Come see them at NamesCon, we’ll see you all next time.

Watch the full video at:
https://www.domainsherpa.com/review-20170116/

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30 Responses to “DomainSherpa Review – Jan 16: Carve.com, MonkeyWrench.com, FineCars.com…”

  1. Ategy says:

    Re-listening to this one again … I think my favourite moment in all of the Sherpa podcasts is at 24:15 …

    Shane: “Is it double hyphen like an equal sign?”

    lmao .. I seriously love listening to you guy! :)

  2. Another great video thank you sherpas!

    I think Carve.com is a great domain name I can see it brand just about anything.

    1. Thanks for watching, Julio. Another Review is coming Monday!

  3. Ategy says:

    Great show once again guys .. thanks!

    I think the biggest takeaway from this episode is what Andrew said about .net .. which I think actually applies even more to some other TLDs like .io .. which is that while admittedly there are some good notable $xx,xxx sales, at the end of the day the number of such sales are minuscule compared to the number of domains being held by domainers. As such total holding investment will never payoff overall. So with almost anything non-.com you have to be sure to have great short in-context domains.

    One of the reasons one of my preferred non-.com’s is .co is because it has a very broad context (keyterms don’t really have a niche to fit as almost anything can fit “.Co-mpany”, so most work as long as they are short or catchy) .. but I still make sure to get short domains with great single key-terms .. otherwise an end-user would likely go for the .com. Back on topic .. I think that while .net is becoming really soft .. it will eventually re-emerge as more of a niche TLD based on pretty much anything tech (which is still a relatively wide market).

    That being said .. if you have ultra premium key-words/key-terms like soon-to-be Shane’s Farms.net .. you’re still sitting good, as the historical factor of .net (meaning it’s known and somewhat memorable) still counts for something, even if it’s not as much as before.

    Michael .. in the description above it shows Snoring.com instead of snoring.org. Also .. for future shows it might be a good idea to ask the people submitting their domains for renewals costs .. as I think not knowing whether a domain has premium cost to hold or not really makes evaluation (already a difficult thing to do sometimes) almost impossible.

    Thanks again guys! :)

    1. Hi Ategy,

      Thanks for taking a few minutes to share your thoughts. I always find thoughtful summaries like yours to be immensely useful to me, as an investor.

      I fully agree with your statement about .io and other TLDs. However, I think you can become a “sniper investor”, one that has a unique understanding of a TLD and can spot the valuable domain names, only purchase ones that are under market value (wholesale) and make a profit. That’s what I’ve tried to do with my .io investments. In the past 2 years, I’ve sold 6 .io domains for 200% profit in the low five figures. Others I know have done well too. And I think if you understand any TLD well, you can get similar returns.

      But I don’t think we’re disagreeing on any points. I’m in agreement that a Farms.net would be a good investment in the long run, and that .io may fall out of favor with startups who are paying four and five figures for these “cool/hip” domains.

      Thanks also for sharing the typo I made. I fixed it last week, but haven’t had time to comment until today.

      Have a great weekend,
      Michael

  4. Paul says:

    Thanks for the show and always appreciate the insights of the sherpa panel and thanks Michael for asking those new investor questions!

    1. My pleasure. Thanks for watching!

  5. Carl says:

    Great show! Thanks Adam for sharing your insights about the Kodak name! Here’s more info:

    “The letter “K” had been a favorite of Eastman’s, he is quoted as saying, “it seems a strong, incisive sort of letter.” He and his mother devised the name Kodak with an anagram set. He said that there were three principal concepts he used in creating the name: it should be short, one cannot mispronounce it, and it could not resemble anything or be associated with anything but Kodak.” In 1907, Kodak became the first company to integrate its name and look into a symbol, and starting in the 1930’s, Kodak adopted yellow and red as its “trade dress” colors.

    1. Hi Carl,

      Thanks for sharing that information about Kodak. Made-up brandable names like Kodak are only going to increase in price.

      Thanks for watching!

      Best,
      Michael

  6. Michael Calabretta says:

    Thanks Mike, Adam, Shane, Andrew for sharing your time! Everytime I listen to you guys I learn something! Much appreciated!

    1. Thanks Michael for watching (or listening) I learn something new every time just sitting in on the discussion

    2. Thanks, Michael. Your viewership is appreciated!

  7. Eric Jenkins says:

    Great show!! Thanks Sherpas…..

  8. Saro says:

    Another awesome show!

    I think FORT.com is probably a mid 6 figure name at least.. personal, home & cyber security being on the top of everyone’s list. Plus means “strong” in French as an added bonus.

    Thanks Guys for another great show.

    1. Definitely a great name. I’d love to own it.

      Thanks for watching and taking a moment to post a comment, Saro!

  9. Anunt says:

    Thank you Sherpas for another great show as always!!!

    I love Namebio.com … it’s a great place to learn about domain values.

    Why is the Alexa ranking dropping for namebio … i thought it would be a lot more popular.

    1. Thanks, Anunt.

      I think Alexa is good for relative values and trends. I’m not sure why the Alexa is dropping for NameBio as NameBio is only getting better and increasing in use, from what I can see. Could be bad data in their index. Who knows.

      Have a great weekend!

  10. Greg B. says:

    Well done. Excellent information, gentlemen.

  11. Tom says:

    Such a great show full of useful learnings for us!

    1. Thanks for watching and taking a moment to post a comment of gratitude. :)

  12. Rajeeva says:

    thanks for sparing your precious time.

    It was really enlightening.

    Regards

    1. Thanks for watching and posting a comment, Rajeeva. It’s much appreciated.

  13. franz says:

    carve.com is worth 35k – 45k imo. when was the last time anyone bought knives?

    1. Greg B. says:

      With all due respect, Franz, but it appears that you posted your comment without actually watching the show. Because if you did you’d realize that it has many other uses besides knives. That’s what I look forward to hearing on each show — how other investors think more broadly and find opportunities when I never even realized one was there! :)

      I plan to be a Sherpa one day, but I need to sell a lot of names between now and then. And thinking more broadly is definitely something I’m going to need to do.

      1. franz says:

        i watched the entire thing , its just imo.

        1. Everyone’s entitled to their own opinion. :) I’m often surprised at how low or high some domains sell for.

          I do know that Luke Webster (past sherpa: https://www.domainsherpa.com/tag/luke-webster/) has expanded his Grooming Network to include knives and they’re selling well. I’ll have to get more information the next update we do.

          Thanks for watching and being a part of the Sherpa network. I appreciate it.

    2. Franz,

      You couldn’t be any more wrong. I sold the domain name to a custom knife company Deejo.com and they are crushing it . Like all growing companies, as they grew so did their sales territory. So they upgraded their name to the dot com. They were willing to pay a good amount and that name is nowhere near as good as carve.

      1. When I said I sold “the” name I meant I sold them deejo

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