A good question to ask yourself, when contemplating your website’s “brand name” and whether to choose a “to branded website domain name” versus “the domain name that is the generic name of the product or service you plan to offer” is “What is our budget for building and maintaining the ‘meaning of the branded domain’ TO MAKE IT MEAN what the keyword domain ‘already means’”?

How much do you have to spend or plan to spend to help make the connection, in consumer’s minds, that your branded or catchy domain name – say FizzleBip.tld – is the name of a website where people can get mortgage quotes?

FizzleBip.tld or MortgageQuotes.tld?

When contemplation “our brand” remember that “brand” stands for much more than a name or symbol. The brand-name or brand-symbol are merely references to or associated with the user’s experience OF your product or service. In other words, brand exists in the experience. The brand-name or brand-symbol are merely associates, not executives, so to speak. Experience -> execution, making of the brand experience. Words or symbols -> associations.

People labor about “branded domains” when I think they really should be laboring and focusing on “user experience”. Get the experience of the the product or service or website as an experience right and, if you do, you can use an onion or tomato or potato sack as your “brand image”. Likewise, if you have the money and talent to get image hosting as a service working and you could call your service Flickr and it will work, at least until the money runs out for free image hosting.

When it comes to choosing a brandable domain versus a generic descriptive domain for a website you need to ask “How much money, time and effort will it take to associate the branded domain with the service/goods?” That will be a function of the industry’s competitiveness, amongst other factors. It can be a very large sum/cost. Also, the cost of branding efforts may be perpetual if you are a small to mid-size player.

When you have the industry’s generic name as a website name the costs of “making the association” likely drop significantly. That cost or savings needs to measured against the cost of acquiring the generic, descriptive domain.

Read the title again.

Any questions?

Still don’t get it?

Then you really should find another line of work.

Inserting this < <<<<<<< Example.com >>>>>>>>> or !!!!!!!Example.com!!!!!!!!!!!! in a domain name forum subject line is just a waste of bytes and screen space.

Likewise, inserting superlatives into a subject line such as “REALLY GREAT!” or “SUPER OPPORTUNITY” will never transform a sow’s ear of a domain into a silk purse domain.

Instead, such forum practcies make you – the domainer/poster who employs such tactics – come across as naive, desperate, pathetic, or worse – someone who thinks that adding a few spicy words to a post will blind others to the obvious: That your domain(s) suck.

Even worse, by using such tactics you are implicitly addressing yourself to your audience as if you believe them – those who participate or read – to be gullible morons.

Are there gullible morons in this world? Surely. Someone has to buy what spam is meant to sell. But, really, do you want to share in aura of the spammer’s ill repute? Really?

You want to know what works, besides actually doing your homework before speculatively registering a domain hoping for a resale? Try this: Just post your best domain name(s) in the subject line of any forum thread that you start and, IF your domain name(s) have merit AND you have priced them correctly “for the market” – the domain name aftermarket mostly being comprised of penurious, opportunistic, domain piranha, looking to pay no more than 1-5% of an expected enduser value.

That’s life.

Domain name forums are where shoddy domains go to die, despite all sorry efforts to breathe life into them.

I’ve been teaching others about “How to Buy a Domain Name from a Private Owner” for years, by answering related questions posed at WebmasterWorld.com, where I moderate the Domain Name Forum.

Despite my best efforts it appears the world hasn’t yet learned how to do it, so allow me to outline my view on the best approach.

First, understand that most folks who have held domains numbering greater than “a few”, for more than a few years, likely have received hundreds if not thousands of inquiries about their domains over the years. At least that’s the case if they were any good at picking them.

When contacting someone about buying an older quality aftermarket domain it behooves your to assume that the domain registrant is likely a) as smart, if not smarter than you, about domain related issues; b) has some business savvy, including how to negotiate deals; and, c) has received countless poorly crafted inquiries about their domain holdings.

Assuing the above your approach, when contacting the registrant of a quality domain about possibly buying that domain, needs to reflect a) respect for their intelligence; b) actual business negotiation savvy on your part; and, c) a clear indication that you respect and value their time.

How do you do this? “The answer” to how to effectively negotiate for the purchase of an aftermarket domain is simple.

• First, research domain name values. IF you don’t have a decent grasp of values then don’t bother emailing.
• Places to perform domain value research: DNJournal.com’s weekly reports of “confirmed sale values”. Sites like NameBio. Domain forums such as DomainState or DNForum. (There’s much more to talk about concerning value, but you can also always ask a pro for guidance.)
• With a firm appreciation of at least a range of likely aftermarket values (actually a working range of values for your target domain) make your offer to purchase the domain by including an actual cash offer in your initial contact. For negotiation purposes you can proceed with a lower number that you are prepared to pay or a plain and factual statement that “It’s your best offer”.
• Now, here’s the secret of success: Put your initial offer for the purchase of the domain IN THE SUBJECT LINE of your email.

It’s really that simple. “It” being the answer to the question: “How do I effectively make an inquiry about whether a domain registrant would be interested in selling me their domain name?”

By putting an intelligent monetary offer in the subject line you greatly increase the odds that your email will actually be opened and read. If you can’t get past the issue of having your email read you have already lost any chance of making a deal. This advice, of course, assumes you also did the part about researching values and made an offer within that range of value.

Due to the volume of email received by successful domain registrants many domain owners won’t even open emails without a clear sign of intelligence in the subject line, especially email coming from Yahoo, HotMail, GMail, etc. All signs of “nonsense to come”.

Just putting “Example.com” in the subject line OR “Is Example.com for sale?” in the subject line shows no intelligence and no capacity to make a deal. None whatsoever. And most will tell you that years of experience has taught them that such offers might as well have a subject line that reads “FAIL, Don’t Bother Opening”. And many won’t open the email or if they do they won’t take any further action since most inquiries, constructed in the FAIL manner, do in fact fail to go anywhere.

So, you want to get someone’s attention? Show something that will get someone’s attention.

To borrow a line from Jerry Maguire, in the realm of aftermarket domain purchases and sales: “Show me the (respectful, intelligent) money!”

Put your opening offer to purchase right up there in the subject line: “Offer $50,000.00 to Purchase Example.com”

Of course, those who know anything, know the last example given also has “Fail” written all over it, because no one can ever own Example.com.

If you haven’t read any of my posts at WebmasterWorld.com, where I moderate the Domain Name Forum, I suggest you start by reading what I’ve written about determining an aftermarket value of domain names based upon the value of the sales, customer or client leads the domain generates.

Basically I’ve called this model (I think I’ve coined the phrase, as applied) the “converted lead valuation model of domain price appraisal”. Shorthand version: converted lead value. (Feel free to disabuse of me the idea that I coined the phrase. The raw concept – that domain names deliver traffic/visitors that have inherent value – has been around since the first person registered a so-called “type-in domain”.)

The basic concept is this: People who type-in domain names are often people very focused on finding “what the domain describes”. Yes there are others who type in domain names, such as those who are “just curious” or those checking to see if a domain is either registered or associated with a live website.

Then there are those who are “in the market” for what the domain describes, by which I mean “generically describes”, i.e., a generic descriptive domain. (NOT a typo of a widely known and/or exclusive trademark.)

Those who are “in the market” tend to be those ready to buy, to consume, to enter into a dialogue about doing business. Ergo, such visitors/typists can be considered to be “read to convert (buy) . . leads”.

So, how does this analysis apply to valuing aftermarket domains or making decisions about how much to pay? The basic math of the model works this way or “has these variables”:

• What is the volume of traffic the domain delivers? More traffic means higher value.
• What is the income generation and profit potential of entering into “a deal” (sale, contract, etc.) with any one of those visitors? High lead values, to enduser consumer of those leads, should mean higher values.

Example: If a domain delivers 50 visitors a year and, of those visitors, 15 are actively looking to tranact business around the subject of their “type-in query/search”, and if such focused visitors are likely to convert – in part, due to your skills/offer – at a 50% rate, and if such converted leads produce a revenue stream of $500 or $5000, then: 15 x 50% = 7.5 x $5000 = $37,500 in revenue value (not saying profit) just from the direct navigation or type-in traffic of the domain.

Forgettting any other benefits derived from simple, meaningful, generic descriptive domains – such as any SEO benefit, memorability benefit, inbound link anchor text benefit, aural/radio benefit, etc.

So, what is a domain worth in the aftermarket if it generates $37,500 A YEAR in added revenue? Revenue that is insulated from the ups and downs of search engine rankings? That depends, in part, on profit margins. However, once you have a handle on a domains revenue potential you should have a better idea of why some domains command far greater prices in the aftermarket.

That “built in revenue stream” of generic descriptive domains is often why a domain will command a value in the tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars.

Think: Loan.com, Mortgage.com, CreditCards.com and move around from there.

As an attorney I know first hand the converted lead value of generic, descriptinve direct navigation domains.

So, next time you ask yourself “Do I really want to buy RealEstate.com? The seller is asking sooo much!” don’t forget to ask yourself the follow up question: In the evolving and increasingly complex and competitive landscape of online marketing what’s my advantage?

I’d say “owning the generic name of the service” – general (Plumber.com) or geo-targeted (City+Plumber.com) will remain an advantage you can take to the bank, year after year.

Mike Berkens, the lead auther of the website The Domains, asks the question “Is The Sale Of Poker.Org For $1M A Game Changer?”

His answer? “We Say Yes”.

I hold a few .Org domains so the sale and the commentary naturally drew my attention.

Arguing that any single aftermarket domain name sale lifts all gTLD associated (.Org gTLD) values is a hard sell. I don’t think that’s Mike’s perspective. Anyone who is excited about the sale influencing their.Org domain portfolio’s value is likely deluded. Temporary delusions are part of the domain aftermarket business, good for registries and registrars. Bad for the domainer. (All of us included at some point in our careers.)

Generally, in the aftermarket, you might see 5% as a historical – and across the board – “relationship equation” between the value of .Com and related .Org domains. I’m not a proponent of pegging domain values to reported aftermarket sales, a matter I’ll address another time, but it’s a data point of some use to some folks – especially when they are on the buy side of better domains.

What drives .Org values higher than 5% of a related .Com value? Some of the more important predictors of value include:

• Do a significant number of people “expect a website” at the location, that is, “Is the .Org domain well suited to the gTLD”? (Tourism.org versus DownParkas.org)
• Is the .Org’s subject “highly commercial”? (Investing.org versus Handkerchiefs.org)
• If the domain name’s “topic is commercial” what value does the market place on that commerce? (Poker.org vs. Gardening.org)

The sale of Poker.org for $1,000,000.00 isn’t an across the board game changer for the aftermarket value of .Org domains. It may be a leading indicator that the development community is prepared to accept that certain domains work so well for developed websites under the gTLD that .Org aftermarket values may be a bit higher than once “accepted”.

I surrender. To necessity. To practicality. To reality.

I’m choosing to develop certain domains because there is more money “in them”, i.e. the monetization potential of the domain names is inherent in the domain itself. I’m talking finance, insurance, law, etc. . . not the arts. I’m also not talking long term development potential. I’m talking rapid development.

There is so much more to this world that I would prefer to invest myself into, to become a part of, to advance. The domains I’ve sought, pursed, acquired reflect that: arts, music, culture, travel, good works, more . .

Then, there are my “money domains”. Mammon. Lucre.

I feel like I sell my soul a bit, like I lose something – to choose to focus on money making projects], but there are mandates to life.

Does anyone else feel the pain of having domains that reflect or represent something about yourself that, for whatever reasons, you just have not yet “done anything with them”?

I’m struggling here, with issues of balance and necessirty and the love lost in letting go for some greater good. In this case the greater and right and necessary one of “paying the bills”.

Do your domains remind you of your unfulfilled dreams or hopes or promises to yourself?

I’m not looking for an uplift, nor to bring anyone else down, but it seems to me that the undeveloped domains we hold are about as concrete a metaphor or representation/manifestation of our unfulfilled dreams as any I have met.

Thoughts for a Sunday morning.

Are your undeveloped domains . . unfulfilled visions, dreams, goals, hopes?

DomainState.com , a domain name forum where I have been a member for years (CrankyOldMan – if the nic fits, register it and wear it humbly) – is being put up for sale by the current 3 administrators.

DomainState has always been a free reg forum, unlike DNForum, and is run without advertising. The membership includes many of the most respected voices in the domainer community.

It would be a shame to see its character change. Stay tuned.

UPDATE: It is reported that DomainState.com has been purchased by Above.com.