A few months ago I was browsing some of the domains coming up for auction at NameJet and I had the idea to see what sorts of common people’s names – I mean the names are common, not the people – might be dropping. I looked at several names and ran Google searches on them, studied the results, and considered their search popularity.

I ended up back ordering a handful of names, and won several at the minimum bid of $69 each. These included AprilWilliams.com, LauraVega.com, and MattGreene.com. I thought I might contact some of the people with those names and try to sell them the domains. As it turned out I got busy with other things, but only a few months later I received an offer for AprilWilliams.com through Sedo, and sold it for $500.

If you’ve been trying to acquire generic domains at auction and getting outbid, you might try some real “names”. If they’re common enough there’s sure to be a market and a steady trickle of traffic, and at the moment there’s not a lot of competition for these domains.

Popularity: 90% [?]

“Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.”

- Thomas Edison

Having a hard time with this domain name business? Or for that matter, with any other challenge you’re facing in life? Have you been working at it for a long time and starting to feel like you’re not going to get there?

Don’t give up, evolve. Learn from your mistakes.

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Popularity: 27% [?]

In my previous post I mentioned Sedo’s ongoing premium dot Mobi auction and suggested two of my own domain names, installer.mobi and updater.mobi, that were included in the auction. I’m not quite satisfied with the results of the auction, but I can live with it.

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Popularity: 18% [?]

A recent study published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology analyzed the tactics people use when negotiating, and how well buyers and sellers feel that they negotiated once the deal is done. The study contains some interesting lessons for domain name professionals and anyone else who deals with products with negotiable prices. It turns out that most people don’t bargain very well, and don’t get the best possible price, whether they are buying or selling.

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Popularity: 25% [?]

I’ve never tried selling a domain name on eBay because I’ve heard from other domain professionals that you can’t get a good price there. Furthermore, listing fees can eat up your profits if the domain sells for a low price, or if you have to list it more than once. Most domainers advise sticking to traditional industry auction/aftermarket sales sites, like Sedo.com, Afternic.com and GreatDomains.com.

Recently, however, I’ve been following a few forum threads in which experienced domainers insist that they have made some very large and profitable domain sales on eBay.

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Popularity: 10% [?]