A good friend of mine asked be this week about how he could dip his toes into the world of domain investing. I thought it was awesome that he asked before doing what most people do which is, buy a ton of names, find that none of them sell, and then give up claiming that domain investing is impossible and all the good names are taken…
The right way to get started with just about anything is usually to learn from people who are already doing it which will usually save you from making a lot of the initial mistakes most people make when they’re trying something new.
Oh and just to be clear, I didn’t follow this path initially. Rather than asking for advice when I started, I dove in, bought a bunch of .mobi domains, tons of junky .COMs and burned through a lot of money until I realized I had no idea what I was doing. Painful lesson, but I persisted and finally worked up the courage to ask some real experts for advice, and well, safe to say, I wish I did that sooner.
Fast forward to today and there are so many resources out there to learn about domain investing, the challenge is knowing which resources are actually useful and reliable. Since this is top of mind for me, and I know some of my readers might have the same question my friend did I thought I’d share my current advice on how to get started in the domain investing world.
- Don’t overload yourself with resources – seriously, there’s so much out there, if you decide to read forums, blogs, eBooks, podcasts, You Tube videos, you’ll get whiplash, focus on two to three solid resources to start
- To simplify things, make DNAcademy the core of your focus – while there are plenty of free courses and eBooks out there, I give everyone the same advice, start with DNAcademy. In all honesty, nobody has put more time and energy into a course about domain investing than Mike Cyger who runs DNAcademy, it’s the best-of-the-best and your time is best spent in the beginning just focusing on this.
- Skim Domaining.com daily – next up is an easy one that’s just fun to do, and if it’s not fun, well then domain investing might not be something you’ll enjoy too much. The domain investing world is lucky to have a centralized resource with all the domain blogs out there, all in one place – Domaining.com. Skim this at least once a day, if something catches your eye, read it. This will help you learn what’s currently happening in the industry and start to familiarize yourself with the different people.
- Watch DomainSherpa – this is one fun show, it’s packed with info, and it’s a great way to hear from experts on what they’re doing. Rather than searching all over You Tube for different videos about domain investing, just stay focused on DomainSherpa when you start, there are so many nuggets in each episode it should get the creative juices flowing.
- Go to a conference like NamesCon – conferences are the icing on the cake, they allow you to get away from your computer and talk to real people that are doing what you want to do. I’ve found the domain investing community to be incredibly welcoming and meeting people in person and chatting about domains over coffee or a beer is completely different from talking on Twitter or a forum.
That’s it, hope this is helpful, just remember point #1 – don’t overload yourself. It can be easy to get really excited about domain investing and dive in by reading everything you can get your hands on and then registering every cool domain name you can think of. Take a step back, stay focused, and just be a sponge, learn as much as you can before buying domains, and trust me, you’ll be glad you did.
