Negotiating purchase of already registered domain name...

Truss

Has anyone been through purchasing a domain name off another person who already has it?

I am a business startup, not actually gone live yet - have registered the .com, .ie, .net, .co.uk, .biz, .info, .eu but I don't have the .org - someone else has that. The person who has it is not using it, it just redirects to their hosting provider and they have had it since February 2008 with hosting up in February 2010.

I am trying to think of the best way to approach them, must be through email as they are in the states.

- best to leave it to see if it is not renewed? We will be going live in January 2010

- best to just contact them and tell them I want their domain? Make an offering price?

- leave it and don't bother? Already have the 7 other domains registered...will also be trademarking the name also.

- don't like suggesting this one but - would it be seen as bad to ask to buy the domain under not false information but not disclosing certain things, e.g. the business I am setting up will actually provide a large quantity of free data, what if I stated that in my contact but did not state that i would be selling other data? Bad practice? To me it is but just curious as to other peoples opinions.

Agent Smith

is the .org vital to the launch? perhaps you should offer say 200 for it. he might be glad for it


if you want to pm me the address, i'll take a look at his one.

Truss

See, one thing I am unsure about is what would make it vital to have the .org?

The business is niche in it's products but at the same time the products are intended for international distribution.

To our knowledge having our name trademarked will reduce the possibility of the owner of the .org site doing what we do, but of course peace of mind is always nice to have if we had the .org.

You think €200 or $200...? Considering our potentional profit this is a small price to pay so perhaps no harm.

I have the data on their site and contact details and name/address/phone of owner - thanks for the offer though Agent Smith.

In my opinion the .org is not important, You are setting up a business, the .org domain is meant for organisations. It is as well to have it if you can pick it up for a ton, but I wouldn't worry if the owner doesn't want to sell - that domain won't bring in business.

There are cybersquatted .orgs linked to fairly big corporations (try bing.org) and the corporations haven't bothered pursuing rights to the domain.

mneylon

Trying to contact the owner of the domain directly may not be the best way to acquire the domain. There are several companies that specialise in acquisitions.

As for bing.org - check the registration date. It's been registered since 1997 - long before Microsoft even thought about their current use of bing.com

Truss

blacknight wrote: »

Trying to contact the owner of the domain directly may not be the best way to acquire the domain. There are several companies that specialise in acquisitions.

Could you expand on that a little more? Some well known examples? I have read a few articles about this and one mentioned that it would be worth paying up to $20,000 for a domain if you take certain factors into account (won't go into them here) though it did not specifiy if it was a .com or a .org I would presume it was the .com, but have no actual basis for this opinion.

blacknight wrote: »

As for bing.org - check the registration date. It's been registered since 1997 - long before Microsoft even thought about their current use of bing.com

That said would Microsoft not have chosen a name they could own all ccTLD's if they are that important? Or have purchased it already, the person owning the bing.org would get a considerably higher price now considering the Microsoft's Bing has gone live than before it would have been known what the exact useage it would have been purchased for...

mneylon

Truss wrote: »

Could you expand on that a little more? Some well known examples? I have read a few articles about this and one mentioned that it would be worth paying up to $20,000 for a domain if you take certain factors into account (won't go into them here) though it did not specifiy if it was a .com or a .org I would presume it was the .com, but have no actual basis for this opinion.

Examples of what exactly?
I'm merely saying that if you contact the vendor directly you could end up paying a lot more than someone who does this on a daily basis

Truss wrote: »

That said would Microsoft not have chosen a name they could own all ccTLD's if they are that important? Or have purchased it already, the person owning the bing.org would get a considerably higher price now considering the Microsoft's Bing has gone live than before it would have been known what the exact useage it would have been purchased for...

Considering how much money MS are throwing at the entire project overlooking the .org strikes me as really dumb, but it's not the first or the last time that a large company has made silly decisions about domains

In other words - just because it's Microsoft doesn't mean that they're doing it properly

Dades

I suspect if you contact the person directly they will just see "$$$" in their eyes.

People get greedy and will cling to a domain rather than be separated with it for less than it's worth - despite the fact that it's worth nothing.

Truss

blacknight wrote: »

Examples of what exactly?
I'm merely saying that if you contact the vendor directly you could end up paying a lot more than someone who does this on a daily basis

Some examples of companies who do this and costs of hiring someone - perhaps just my naivety but paying someone to send an email? I realise there would be money transfering but ontop of that maybe there is more to it than meets my eye...surely that's a bit unnecessary though, paying for the domain plus paying someone to do the negotiation...

Dades wrote: »

I suspect if you contact the person directly they will just see "$$$" in their eyes.

People get greedy and will cling to a domain rather than be separated with it for less than it's worth - despite the fact that it's worth nothing.

Yeah I hear you - trouble is how else can it be done? If I contact them directly or I pay someone to do it for me either way it's still a person asking another person for a domain name...

If you were suggesting waiting to see if they don't renew it, then I can see your point, it might be the better option and if they do renew have a previous amount we would be willing to pay and attempt a purchase.

mneylon

Truss wrote: »

Some examples of companies who do this and costs of hiring someone - perhaps just my naivety but paying someone to send an email? I realise there would be money transfering but ontop of that maybe there is more to it than meets my eye...surely that's a bit unnecessary though, paying for the domain plus paying someone to do the negotiation...

Sedo is an obvious one.

They know how much a domain is really worth based on past sales and a serious sellers will know that they're just acting on behalf of a client ie. the price won't get hiked up just because someone is asking about it.

Truss

blacknight wrote: »

Sedo is an obvious one.

Cheers, thanks for the obvious one.