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How Microryza Acquired the Domain Experiment.com

priceonomics.com

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Re: How Microryza Acquired the Domain Experiment.com

#21

Post by jameswburke »

primitivesuave wrote: post #14
sneak wrote: post #9

All domains should really cost $1000/year from the registrar at a minimum to stop this idiotic "I'll buy thousands of them and sit on them forever until someone offers me enough for one of them to make the whole enterprise worth it".

Expensive domain registration would make it cost prohibitive for average people to start a website. The better thing to limit is how many domains you can own, or at least how many domains you can park.

Treat domains like a trademark registration. You have x amount of time to show that you're actually using it for something. And that something has some kind of value.

There's issues with what's considered value, but our existing system is nonsense.

Re: How Microryza Acquired the Domain Experiment.com

#22

Post by eli »

simonw wrote: post #7

"The broker would help them find the owners of domain names, negotiate the price, and handle the transaction in exchange for a 10-15% commission of the price of the domain." The incentives there seem misaligned to me. The person negotiating the price for them gets paid a higher commission if the price ends up being higher?

Like buying a house, no?

Re: How Microryza Acquired the Domain Experiment.com

#24

Post by sheff »

dchuk wrote: post #8

I'm actually just about to go through the process of acquiring a somewhat recently dropped domain from BuyDomains.com for my new project. The current asking price for the domain is around $4,000 on their site. Anyone worked with them before? I'm prepared to negotiate with them but also want to make sure I don't shoot myself in the foot and cause them to raise the price on me. I would ideally like to not spend more th…

I have bought domains from them in the past.

I would start off by offering half (as a maximum, less if you can) and sticking to the offer. The thing to remember is that they may have acquired the domain for registration price so even $2000 will be a large profit, and they may not have another buyer for years.

If that goes nowhere, you can always go back later and pay the full price or whatever they have come down to.

IIRC, they also sell domains which they don't own, and have less leeway for negotiation on those.

Re: How Microryza Acquired the Domain Experiment.com

#25

Post by stillsut »

eli wrote: post #22
simonw wrote: post #7

"The broker would help them find the owners of domain names, negotiate the price, and handle the transaction in exchange for a 10-15% commission of the price of the domain." The incentives there seem misaligned to me. The person negotiating the price for them gets paid a higher commission if the price ends up being higher?

Like buying a house, no?

For a house it's 2-5%. At this Rate, it's usually better for the broker to just close the sale whether it's $400k or $500k.

This was an example in Freakanomics Vol 1 I believe.

Re: How Microryza Acquired the Domain Experiment.com

#26

Post by avalaunch »

dchuk wrote: post #19
avalaunch wrote: post #18

Am I the only one that likes the name Ryza more than Experiment? Experiment just sounds so bland to me and will be harder to rank high with.

Rank high for what? The term Ryza? It's easy to rank high for a made up word, but if you're ever in debate over whether to use a domain with ambiguous spelling or a standard word...go with the standard word.

Yes - rank high for Ryza vs Experiment. It's pretty bad if you aren't the first result when someone googles your company's name especially for a company relying on word of mouth.

Re: How Microryza Acquired the Domain Experiment.com

#27

Post by keerthiko »

uptown wrote: post #12
Ricapar wrote: post #11

> [...] but their budget was $12-15K [...] > .... > After weeks of gentle negotiating, they came to an agreement: $54K in cash for the domain. Yikes. That's 3.6x the max budget they were hoping to spend. I really do hope that in the long run it pays off.

It's a strong-enough name to be considered an asset. Worst-case ... just resell it.

I doubt anyone with a semblance of a conscience in their shoes could do that, except back to the benefactor, for cheaper (which would also be pretty lame)...the man turned down 6 figure offers and gave it to them because he believed in their mission. That they would go "whoops, it cost too much, gonna sell it to whoever offers me the most while we bail from our failed startup" would make the benefactor feel like total shit. I would never do that to a guy. I'd probably go work a 9-5 for a year and keep the domain for my next stab at a dream in the space.

Re: How Microryza Acquired the Domain Experiment.com

#29

Post by dchuk »

sheff wrote: post #24
dchuk wrote: post #8

I'm actually just about to go through the process of acquiring a somewhat recently dropped domain from BuyDomains.com for my new project. The current asking price for the domain is around $4,000 on their site. Anyone worked with them before? I'm prepared to negotiate with them but also want to make sure I don't shoot myself in the foot and cause them to raise the price on me. I would ideally like to not spend more th…

I have bought domains from them in the past. I would start off by offering half (as a maximum, less if you can) and sticking to the offer. The thing to remember is that they may have acquired the domain for registration price so even $2000 will be a large profit, and they may not have another buyer for years. If that goes nowhere, you can always go back later and pay the full price or whatever they have come down to.…

Awesome, thanks for the reply. Do you know of any way to find out if they're brokering the domain for someone or selling it themselves?

Re: How Microryza Acquired the Domain Experiment.com

#30

Post by ThomPete »

simonw wrote: post #7

"The broker would help them find the owners of domain names, negotiate the price, and handle the transaction in exchange for a 10-15% commission of the price of the domain." The incentives there seem misaligned to me. The person negotiating the price for them gets paid a higher commission if the price ends up being higher?

Works excellent for NY real estate brokers.
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