It never fails that I receive a domain inquiry in regards to buying a domain name I own, or questioning whether the domain name is for sale and how much.

Most of the time, such domain inquiries are nothing more than tire kickers that have no intent to buy.

Such tire kickers inquire only to either curse me to the hills and back, try to threaten me with legal action with no leg to stand on, or they try to explain to me why I’m asking too much for the desired domain.

No matter their negative response, such inquirers end up right back where they started: not owning the domain!

Most of the unsuccessful buyers settle for a hand-registered domain that is nothing more than a cheap knockoff of the domain they really desire.

However, there are those few occasions where someone will lowball me for a domain and respond to my counter with a substantially higher amount than their initial offering.

I tend to sell 90% of those types of domain inquiries.

All in all, like everything else in life, you can’t judge a book by its cover when initially fielding domain inquiries.

Will the real domain buyer signing the check please stand up?

For every domain inquiry that I receive, I have to perform my due diligence on a buyer.

I do this to make sure I leave a little money, or value, on the table for the next guy involved, mainly the customer.

However, if I’m not able to find information in search engines or social media using the phone number and email submitted by the person inquiring about the domain, then you can beat my asking price is going to be as high as kite.

It’s well known that companies will create fictitious names and personas to buy highly-valued domain names.

Most companies do such a thing to try and purchase domains for pennies on the dollar.

These same companies can more than pay for the true worth of a registered domain name, but they try to fly under the radar and cheat the domain aftermarket pricing schemes.

This is no different than a celebrity hiring a regular ole’ person to buy a house for them as a buyer.

If the seller knows the name of  a high-profile person is buying, then the price doubles, triples, quadruples or takes a rocket ride to the moon to say the least.

I can’t blame the buyer, but speaking for myself, honesty goes a long way with me lowering the price and not raising it.

The more you lie and try to be the invisible or elusive domain buyer, then get ready for a rocket ride!

True Story: domain inquiry leads to a “win-win” sale

For instance, I had a domain name that I just sold a few weeks ago.

When I saw the email and number submitted in the domain inquiry, I searched high and low for the person.

Fortunately, this person used real data and I was able to find out that they were a CEO for a company.

Based on the information I found about the person, I began to understand why he wanted to purchase the domain name he was inquiring about.

So, how did the buyer being a real person impact the price of the domain? Well, I’m glad you asked.

Because I was able to determine how much annual revenue the company made and talk with the CEO over the phone a few times, I was more than willing to lower the price and meet the buyer in the middle of our pricing negotiations.

I lowered the price because I was able to prove this buyer was not another domainer, looking to rob me blind for a highly-valued domain only to turn around and sell it for 10 or 100 times what they purchased the domain for.

Long story short, I knew the buyer of this domain was the best buyer for it, and I sold it for a reasonable amount for myself and the buyer.

In fact, I knew they were the perfect buyer for the domain because I was unwilling to devote the time it would take to develop the domain.

I had never considered the domain’s use the way the buyer was planning to use it.

So, why not sell a domain to a real buyer that will legitimately use the domain for their business?

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Written by Alvin Brown
He's an experienced and passionate serial entrepreneur, founder and publisher of Kickstart Commerce. Alvin possesses a great love for startups dominating their market using profitable digital strategies for greater commerce.