I’m looking at buying a domain name for one of our e-businesses at the moment. I found a suitable domain name and asked the owner “How much?”
“$3,000 US,” said he.
I said, “Thanks, but no thanks. It’s not worth that to us. We can do without it.”
“Okay then, how about $1,500.”
“Nope'” said I.
“If you look you’ll see that many companies use the domain name in product names,” he said.
“Still no. We’ll give it a miss,” I said.
A sophisticated negotiation
That doesn’t seem like a particulary sophisticated negotiation, but it has some good examples.
# 1: I was in a great negotiating position. And the reason for that was that I didn’t really, really want the domain name.
# 2: No reason to buy. The seller didn’t do a couple of things that would motivate me to buy.
a. He didn’t demonstrate the value of the domain name.
b. He didn’t create a sense of urgency for me to buy.
To demonstrate the value of the domain he could have provided proof of related/similar domain names along with their selling prices. He could have provided statistics on how often the domain name is searched for directly. Those 2 things alone would have reassured me that I was getting a great deal
The seller could also have provided me with a good reason why he was selling – after all, if it’s such a great domain name, surely he’d be keeping it?! And that’s a good questions to ask when someone is trying to sell you something – “If it’s so valuable, why are you selling it?”
Create a sense of urgency with a time sensitive offer
To create a sense of urgency he could have made a time sensitive offer, “I can let you have it for $1,250 US but only if you buy by tomorrrow at 5 p.m.” Deadlines get people to act. They provide that fear of loss. That’s a very powerful motivator for many people.
# 3: He who talks first loses. What I mean by that is the person who makes the first offer is in the poorer negotiating position. With the first number tossed up, that person has provided a huge amount of information.
If they are the seller, the price they say is the highest you’ll have to pay (but usually a lot less). That can mean great things for you, if you were going to offer $100 as your opening offer and they come in first and say, “$80.”
If the buyer makes the offer first, the number they offer is the lowest they’ll go to. That’s great information to have and puts you in a position of strength.
BTW, I didn’t buy the domain.
Regards
Brendon
Negotiating a domain name buy……..what does the buyer want
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