Do you leave money on the table when you price your domains?

For years domain name marketplaces have been sharing data that shows a direct correlation between pricing domains and faster liquidity. This means, if you price your domain names, they will sell faster. I don’t think this is up for debate although I personally don’t have the data to corroborate this so have to trust the marketplaces and the data that they share.

As for my own strategy, I’ve gone back and forth for years on whether to price my domains or not and I can’t say that I have a definitive answer or strategy for myself. The challenge that I’ve always had with pricing domains is that feeling that you left money on the table.

Here’s an example.

Earlier this year I sold a domain name on Afternic, Kale.io which sold for $4,223 (note there is a commission there so I made $3,378 net). Now I do think that since I priced the domain name it made it easier for the buyer to pull the trigger and make the purchase. At the same time, I think that the buyer would have likely paid $7,500 or maybe even $10,000 for the domain since they were clearly interested and had a meaningful budget.

kale-io-sale

While I’m happy with the sale since I only paid $280 for it originally, I still feel like I probably left a few thousand dollars on the table. Had I not priced the domain and left it as “Make Offer” the buyer might have placed an offer and we could have gone back and forth likely yielding a higher sale price.

Lately I’ve been thinking of moving all of my domains to “Make Offer” but then I wonder. Well what if the opposite is true with a sale like Kale.io. Maybe, the buyer would see that the domain wasn’t priced and would skip it and buy another name, maybe for $10,000, who knows, but I’d miss the deal entirely since the idea of going back and forth with a domain owner wasn’t something they wanted to do.

I think this is a topic that most Domainers wrestle with and I’m not sure there’s a right answer, I think it really depends on what your goals are. If Domaining is your full time job then I think maximizing liquidity might be the best path to take. If Domaining is an investment strategy, just like investing in the stock market or real estate then maybe sacrificing more immediate liquidity for higher sales prices is worth it.

I’m not a full time Domainer, never have been, never plan to be, so I think I fall in the second camp. At the same time, I think there’s a balance and I’d rather sell a name for 25% less five years earlier than wait five more years just to make 25% more. Does that make sense?

Okay, enough from me, now I want to hear from you. What do you think? Comment and let your voice be heard!

Morgan Linton

Morgan Linton