Sometimes you can do more harm trying to sell a domain during a news frenzy, than any other time.

I make this statement based on perusing various domaining news bytes and coming across an article entitled, “‘Ebola.com’ can be yours for $150,000”.

The article, written by CNBC’s Jeff Daniels, focuses on Jon Schultz, the owner of premium domain Ebola.com, and his interest to sell the domain name after purchasing it for an undisclosed amount in 2008.

Not only is Ebola.com mentioned, but other domains owned by Schultz and partners have been cemented into the article as well: BirdFlu.com, PotassiumIodide.com, and GreenCoffeeExtract.com.

Personally, it is interesting and maybe ill timing that the article has been written during one of the worst Ebola outbreaks, rising death toll a nearly 3800 people. It’s my belief that pharma firms and biotech companies of any size don’t want to associate themselves with such a domain right now at the height of this epidemic. But that’s just my humble opinion.

Now to Schultz’s defense, the current website does educate visitors about the Ebola virus in general. However, the educational information is quickly undermined by affiliate links from Amazon and other affiliate programs. In addition, the domain is cast in a moderately priced light in comparison to Whisky.com fetching $3.6 million and MI.com’s $3.6 million price tag.

Not that there is anything wrong with any of this, but personally, I’m not sure that writing about selling a domain in association to such a deadly disease is benefiting anyone, or creating any goodwill for the domain and domain owner.

But that is just my question: Does it do a domain owner and domain more good or harm to try to sell a news-related or current events domain name?

What are your thoughts?

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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.