Morning Folks!!
This is simply one of the most valuable posts I have EVER made. Today you can plant the seeds of success in a purposeful way. Whatever did not work for you yesterday is now behind you. If you read this, if you study and understand what I am saying, you will turn frustration into success. With this single post and the links I have to some of my key posts over the years, you can be a top tier domainer.....TODAY.
When Berkens and I get together sometimes we talk about how many people keep telling us how wrong we are. How we do this wrong and that wrong. I mean too funny. We compare notes and stories. Like I said, too funny.
A few weeks ago there was a specific comment about one of the domain names in our auction having no value. Well in fact it did sell and it does have value. But the guy pointing to that particular domain never did an ounce of legwork to find out. The domain was ThermalScanners.com. I thought it was a good domain name. Berkens picked it up for $2K. So there is an example.
Go Google Thermal Scanners. They are medical devices and scanners and some can run into 6 figures. But of course this domain has no value according to this domainer. If that was Mike's first purchase, he would be LIGHT YEARS ahead of most. So the path is not difficult. What is difficult is the discipline to stay on the path despite all the naysayers on the sidelines. The discipline say no to a low ball offer. Buy diamonds or buy glass. It's the same effort and the price is not that different when you know what to look for. If you don't know what to look for, you have two choices. Learn or walk away. There are more ways to make millions in domain names than any other industry I have ever seen and it is open to all for a very low entry fee. Below is just the most simplistic way. It gets you there each and every time. It just takes time and discipline and keeping your eyes open for all types of opportunity without losing your direction and being distracted.
- Don’t quit your day job. You will need to finance your first few domains
- Read #1 again and again and again. Don't quit your day job until it interferes with your earning capability.
- Learn here and Learn here what makes a domain valuable and why somebody else would want it. If nobody can ever think of it, probably not going to be very valuable.
- Buy a domain for $1000 or buy several if you can.
- Sell that domain for $10,000. How do you do that? Read #3 and Here and Here. (Give yourself 6months to a year)
- Take that $10,000 and either buy (10) $1000 domains or (2) $5000 names or (1) $10,000 name.
- Take that domain or those domains and turn the $10,000 into $100,000.
- Take $10,000 and go pay something off.
- Take the $90K and repeat #6.
- Have the patience to realize that this may be up to a 3 year journey. But when you get to #9 and do what you did in #6, you will be more adapt at it and you will turn your domains quicker.
- With $900k in your pocket you can repeat #6, quit your day job and in 3 years you can be a millionaire. Maybe less if you are really good at #3.
- Are you asking yourself the right questions? Here are my top 20.
That’s the simple, no brainer, anyone can do it, road map. Now all the clowns come out and tell everyone why that does not work. BULLSHIT! It will work, it does work and it will work everytime if you get #3 right and understand how you really need a rifle today, not a shotgun. It takes patience and 3 years. Less if you figure it out. If you still don't think you can do it or you think it is too late, then READ THIS!
This single post and the links I have will turn you into a first class domainer. Many if not most will just discount and reject it out of hand. What else is new? But this is simply one of the most valuable posts I have EVER made.
Good Luck!
Have a GREAT Day!
Rick Schwartz
-----
Joe
Great post. If this were a forum, this would be the classic sticky post.
Russell Godinho
Thanks a Million Rick. Great Post…
Uzoma
Great post.
Rick can you cite good examples of $1000 domain names?
Rick Schwartz
Uzoma
How about $500
GreatBritain.tv
I think Berkens bought this one as well. Go figure.
luizh
I think that successful people almost always try to avoid the word LUCK because it can tarnish their capacities to be great entrepreneurs, but if ever you were lucky do not to ignore, you deserved it. A spark of luck never will shake several years of hard work and expertise and I believe that your teachings about domains name are the best possible today. Thank you always!
BookFlights.co.uk
Thanks for the inspirational post as ever Rick
congrats on the meet.me sale too. simply incredible
If anyone wants an example of a great domain that is worth xx,xxx range all day and is perfect development potential
then look at my link
currently on no reserve
(disclosure, my domain on auction at domainlore now)
if anyone wants an opportunity to build the next cheapflights.co.uk, this is it
BookFlights.co.uk
Good Luck
Coder
“Uzoma
How about $500
GreatBritain.tv
I think Berkens bought this one as well. Go figure.”
Isn’t there 5k/yr renewal fee on this one?
Uzoma
One thing we can all agree on, is successful people have a hard working trait. In this industry, we can see it very clearly. I often marvel at the time Rick, and Berkens for that matter, put in writing blogs, being very helpful, when they really don’t need to ever work again. Rick is particularly inspirational, and very kind to give all of us invaluable insights and lessons, almost on a daily basis. Just reading”Morning Folks…” from Rick is priceless. This particular post takes the cake. I don’t see how anyone loses following this advice. The difficult thing is determining what grade of domain name anyone following this should start with. We all have an idea, but it is still very risky for some putting their $1000 to $5000 in one name, instead of 10 to 50, even tho the former is the ideal way to sure banker. Let’s hope we get more and more examples of lower end better quality domain from Rick. Perhaps, this is the place to ask if Rick has some $1000 or less names that he would be willing to auction here soon, perhaps registered when he first started? :-)
Emil @ KING.NET
This is a great post Rick.
thank you for sharing.
Em @ king.net
Kickyourace
Rick, as always, something to learn from you. Closed minds and empty wallets seem to go together from the naysayers. Regards
Phil
Rick ,
I have been following your posts for years, and you always do share the same things about nouns verbs and adjectives and type in traffic. It is a very simple process to do what you share if we all just truly listened and entered at the level we each can afford. One question that I had would be for example FallFlowers.com , it has a epik appraisal of 50,000 an estibot value of 26,000 … It has type in traffic.. Is this a name that should be bought for 500.00 , 1000.00 5,000 , 10,000??? Or is it just junk?? From a investors stand point not an end user like FTD or 1800 flowers that buy ads under that term?
Thanks
Mary
I think you should patent your method as it is so original that deserves some copyright. OMG! I can’t believe I just learned how to make $1 million dollars today.
Maybe you can post how to make $2 million dollars in some follow up post?
em
Wow. There’s a guy who puts it out there. It’s funny that the penniless critics come out to criticize those who understand simplicity and persistence in the business world. Great post, Rick. Unfortunately, I think your teaching is so right on, but will be shunned by the doubters. What a Sh*t that is. Thank you for the lesson. I appreciate it…
ForexStars
Rick, great post! really really great system outlined here. What you are doing to help is immeasurable
adam
you saying a lot about selling domains but I remember exactly when you said during interview with Michael Cyger(Domainsherpa.com)that you sold 15 domains in your all life. I know you sold quiet good domains for a good money but still you did not sold many so your experience is not very large in this area.
Ted
All good comments but you sure can smell the sh*t! Mary and Adam you are the idiots nobody has to hear from anymore. Just posers and nobodies and fakes.
Tony
Rick,
I’m the domainer you cite as saying thermalscanners.com is worthless and I still feel that way. It gets almost no searches on google which tells me very few people have an interest in looking it up let alone buying one. You always say you’re a numbers guy but in the same breath you say you don’t believe in using google metrics, etc. You can’t have it both ways.
I see dozens of domains each day expiring that are about as good and I’d be broke if I picked up all of them for reg fee let alone $2k each.
Just because MHB was willing to spend 2K does not make me wrong about my opinion. He’s made millions off domains over the years and he can afford to spend $2k on a gamble which this is. When he turns around and sells it for $20k or even $10k, make another post at that time and I will concede I was wrong about this particular domain. Until then, I consider this a $2k loss for MHB.
No offense to MHB or RS intended in this post. Just keeping it real as always just like my original post about thermalscanners.com.
P.S. I’m honored in a way to be indirectly mentioned in this post. I’ve been in expired auctions with MHB many times and I know he’s a very disciplined bidder.
Domains, Oil, Gold, Land, and Food
@Tony….IMO ThermalScanners.com is not a good domain to start off with as a 1st domain for a domainer, as I suspect is has little to no direct navigation traffic, and doing a cursory review looks like much of the traffic that is there would be coming from India at this moment.
However, as an established domainer I do believe this is a great buy, although I would probably have paid a bit less than Mike as I am cheap domain buyer, meaning very tight with my money.
Almost any product that has a $1000 + purchase price as an average price can be a blockbuster domain if developed, and is the right product regarding customer demand, ease of shipment, etc….. ThermalScanners.com has a really high purchase price and are small enough to send easily by mail, therefore a real biz can be built around this domain.
The problem with this domain being a first buy for a domainer is that there will be no real cash flow because of a lack of traffic, so in that way I disagree with Rick in that sense, but it is still a”home run” domain. I think a base of cash flow domains is necessary at the beginning before moving more into speculative domains or domains with little to no traffic. After that, finding a balance between the two is key.
However, you say you see dozens of domains like this dropping every day. I’d contend there are not tons dropping every day like this that hold such a high price tag to acquire, so I do think it is somewhat special in that sense.
ViewDNS.info
Thanks for an awesome post Rick. As usual, very descriptive and informative! Cheers!
jazpo pissnar
That was a pathetically bad article. I made several million buying new regs. Only took me 6 months.
craig
I disagree: Thermalscanners is a pure generic for an expensive technical product being purchased by the THOUSANDS. The fire service alone is spending MILLIONS on these things.
Medical,industrial, and guess what – I have two in my home.
One I use to check my truck and trailer tires, every time I stop. One I use in the house – what for? I check bath temperatures, MY temperature, use it for cooking, and just snap it at the window and you know how to dress for the day. Handy as hell, big market. I offer 2,500 right now……Craig
Poor Uncle
Hi Rick, can you drop me an email next time you see a name that sell for $1k and is worth $10k in 2-3 years? who knows, maybe I will get lucky and get an email from you. Do you own Lucky.me ?
mike
This is probably the best post I have read from the King. Although it’s not going to be anywhere as easy as this, it is certainly not impossible. The catch is #4. If you buy 5 names for $1,000 each you may be waiting a long time to flip one for 10k. If you buy 30, your chances go up considerably. But you could go a year without flipping any for 10k. So I would say you need at least 30k to put this plan in motion. And I think you would have a better chance of buying 3 10K names and flipping them for 50k each. Then you are off and running. But if you start with just five 1k names, chances are it’s going to take a long time to get any momentum.
You probably have just as much of a chance to make a million by buying a 10k – 20k name and building a great site/brand on it.
Alexander
While we may not 100% agree with Rick, no doubt what he shared is valuable. From experience, we pros know it’s achievable to buy domains at a $x-$xxx price and sell later (in a few years or less) for 5 figure. Thank you for a great post.
Ian
Yes, there is a stage 2 in the life of an entrepreneurial domainer. But running a business off a domain is exponentially more difficult (In terms of knowledge required) so I can understand why most would stick to flipping, simply because its easy and not that time consuming.
Tony
Craig, did you know that the more popular terms for this product are”thermal imager(s)” and”thermal camera(s)”?
No one searches for let alone types in”thermal scanners”.”Thermal Scanner” gets some decent searches and that one I’d pick up for reg fee or even backorder for $59.
Again,”thermal scanners” gets no organic searches, isn’t the term that the general public knows it as and is a gamble for $2K.
For comparison, here are some domains I’ve bought for $1K+ in recent months to elucidate my approach to domaining:
ServerColocation.com $1651
AssetAllocation.com $1411
RebornDolls.com $1601
Each of those is vastly more valuable than thermalscanners.com. I know there are a lot of domainers who feel the same way but don’t want to step on the toes of the domain godfather. That’s their prerogative.
luizh
Hi guys, I agree with some posts here. However(nowadays),
people like Rick are the best indicators of value of a domain, they can enjoy the bargains (potentially good names whose owners are indebted or they do not have the notion about the value of a domain name),then, after that they can leverage the price of these names in the future. This is not so different of a speculator in the stock market . In various activities, with about 50k available, knowledge, patience,vivacity, discipline and hard work you can be a successful person. When you start from-scratch and you’re not a visionary man like Rick so you will need lots of luck (laughs) and also the biggest defiance is not getting rich but to manage a lot of money, you need to be prepared for it and many people never will be. What do you think that Rick? (laughs), Good debate!
Ted
@tony, Rick is just picking that domain as an example and showing a path. Of course you want the best domain at the lowest price. You can find better for cheaper the better you pick. But compare that to the sh*t people register. That is his point and you seem to be missing it. Which domain is better etc is debatable. First guys need to get on the right path and then they can refine from there.
Rick Schwartz
Elliot just made a great blog post related to this. The takeaway is he used this path. Many successful domainers used this path and continue to use it. It is tried and true. It works IF you know what domains to focus on and have value to others. No one blog post can cover everything. But think of it as the first day you rode a 2 wheeler. You just get better as you learn and refine. You don’t get on a bike and become a world racer. Same with domains. It is NOT rocket science. You don’t compete with Lance Armstrong. You only compete with yourself and how deep you dig.
http://www.elliotsblog.com/my-addendum-to-ricks-article-1811
Tom
Fantastic post, Rick.
Regarding GreatBritain.tv. I don’t think that’s a great domain and it will be interesting to see who Mike Berkens eventually sells it to.
“Great Britain” as a commercial term isn’t really used much over here in the UK.
SDM
Makes me feel pretty good about BrainScanners.com – which I picked up for about $8.00.
domain guy
i,m going to be curt and direct to the point and its going to be ugly……thermalscanners.com is a six figure domain. and any domainer that fails to realize this fuck off and get out of the domain business today…and do not write on any boards you are a fuckin idiot…
now why the domainer is a fuckin idiot…I have been taking energy courses in the lull time gearing up for the future.In the classes
thermal scanners was constantly talked about. the use, price,value,
what a thermal scanner does.what it replaces I could go on and on.
I saw the domain and knew it had value but I own many of my own domains and am working on them.Berkins has an eye that is equavelant to ricks,,there is a reason these 2 lead this nascent industry. superior job berkins we will see thermalscanners sold for 6 figures in less trhan 36 months. it reminds me of motorcyclehelmets.com it is ureal what a guy can learn reading these 2 blogs and anything that does not add value to the blog conversation should be culled out…
Nameclerk
It appears ThermalScanners.com sold for $5k in the Oct 2011 TRAFFIC auction. Not 6 figures but still a $3k profit.
BENJAMIN
Hello thank you for your information i have so many domains more then 7 years but i have one it is gold or be to be gold domain
http://www.visaqatar.com the next world cup after this world cup is in Qatar so what you think abut it thanks if you answer me
Regards
Benjamin Armani
Tony
@ domain guy: your post is as worthless as your real identity.
@ Nameclerk: MHB bought thermalscanners.com for $2,000 at that TRAFFIC auction. The only profit from that name was from the seller who probably got it for reg fee.
Rick
that domain was hand registered in July 2011. Plus Visa will sue you, it’s more than useless!
BENJAMIN
Rick visa cant B is not visa card 2 it is renew on July 2011 in new company 3 if visa want to sue has to every company which start whit visa like http://www.visaus.com visacanada.com it is noting to do whit visa why?? but any way thanks i am waiting to visa sue me or some one give me good money
Ebooks
Thanks for the inspiration Rick. But surely there is a problem with buying a dotcom for $1K – if someone is willing to let it go for $1K what would make it worth $10K ? Or have I seriously missed the point here?
tonecas
Hello Rick,
I was the one who sold that great domain for $2K.
I find it somehow sad that you took this example as a case study for your kind of”reference post”.
It’s sad because, as you know, the domain was sold on TRAFFIC which for any guy in this industry, including newbies like me, means respectability and the place to go for selling good domains and, specially, find good buyers. At least it was what i thought, silly me :)
TRAFFIC is”co-hosted” by you and Howard Neu. You and Berkens have other partnerships in the domain industry.
Some guys more naive like me, may see this as a conflict of interest and it is puzzling how you find this as a good example to put on your blog. But hey, this is me, a small fish on the ocean.
Anyway, the TRAFFIC event were your bud bought this great domain was run without me knowing about it until I received an email from Neu saying the domain had been paid. No email saying that the domain had been accepted for auction, no email saying that it had been sold, nothing, zero, nada. Only a”please transfer the domain now since we have received the greens”.
I had the opportunity to tell Neu how I was surprised that your team manage to sell this great domain name at this great event for my minimum reserve price of 2K, when I know I could relatively easily sell this for at least $4k to any of the owners of a business that”some can run into 6 figures”, if I had the time and will to waste it in a few targeted emails. But i thought that that would be part of your work for accepting a domain to be sold on such a fine event. Again, silly of me.
Moving forward, I could have shown you the little finger but my word has value, at least to me, and then again no one force me to list the domain on your event and for such a bargain price as you seem to refer. Even if you had delivered 0 value for your service.
I even do not give much attention to the fact that you and your buddy may resell the domain for 10 or 100x more. I really do not care! It’s life. It’s business.
Even if I am confident that the domain had more value, the fact is that I have bought the domain in an expired auction were i paid the great sum of $240 in 2010 (by the way, i did not see you but your bud was there) against 18 other bidders, and during more than a year that I had it passively parked I got 0 offers.
To wrap it up, I wish you and your bud all the luck with the domain, but please don’t try to fool others. In the end, it is bad for the industry that you are trying to sell.