fbpx
What is a Business Domain Name Worth?

by Brandnic Official 15/06/2018

Domain Name Value

Read Time: 12 minutes

Table of Contents


1. The Online Presence
2. Value your Domain Name
3. Finding Smart way to figure out the value of your domain name
4. Step 1: Finding the other names sold in the name business-related niche
5. Step 2: Use a third-party appraisal service
6. Step 3: Hitting the correct price mark

 

We’ve heard stories of people having specific properties in their care, and they never knew it was very valuable.

There have been cases of people who bought seemingly useless things at pawn shops. Only for them to discover after a while that it is extremely valuable. Sometimes, we may even wish a situation like this would happen to us. How lovely would that be?

The truth, however, is that it’s not just old vases, paintings, antiques, or artifacts that can be surprisingly profitable. A domain name can serve this purpose as well.

You’d be surprised some domain names are worth a lot of money.

A list of some of the domain names sold in past worth millions of dollars and still counting….

Domain names are like a piece of real estate. In this case, it’s digital real estate instead of a real piece of land.

At this time, what you need to do is to find out the value of the domain name in your possession.

Domain Name Value

Valued domain names.

As luck would have it, the process is neither time consuming nor complicated as you might expect. The simple fact is, to estimate the actual value of your domain, you need to carry out detailed research.

That is what we’ll be discussing in this article. We’ll talk about how important it is to value a domain name. We’ll also cover essential factors that determine the worth of a domain.

Lastly, we’ll cover steps on how to estimate the price of a domain. Let’s jump right in.

The Online Presence

If you’re planning to put your domain up for sale or you want to know your domain’s worth, you will have to carry out a domain valuation. Sometimes, this process is called domain appraisal.

In principle, they are one and the same thing. Domain name valuation is simply a way of assessing the value of a particular domain name.

Some terms may sound strange to you, so before we continue, let us quickly explain some basic terms. A domain name is basically the main part of the URL of a website.

This is what is used to access a website’s main page by visitors. A good example of this is brandnic.com

However, a domain name is made up of 2 main components; Second Level Domain and Top Level Domain (SLD and TLD)

SLD and TLD

Understanding a complete domain name.

An SLD is the URL’s main part. This is often made up of the website’s name or the organization’s name. In the example we used above, the second-level domain is “brandnic”

TLD, on the other hand, is what comes immediately after a domain name.

The TLD we used in our example is “.com” which is one of the common on the internet. There are quite a lot of TLDs that you can use; some examples of the popular ones are .com, org.edu, .net.gov, etc.

In order to add a domain to your website, you need to register it with a domain name registrar. Domain names can also be bought from a number of hosting companies.

As a matter of fact, this is the specialty, The company Brandnic offers luxury domain names with a simple and easy user interface.

Brandnic knows the challenges a lot of businesses face in order to design a logo that defines and embodies their business. To overcome this challenge, you get a unique logo for every domain name purchased.

Brandnic is a premium domain marketplace and every logo on the website is provided by the seller and it comes with your domain name purchase.

The logo that comes with your domain name purchase can be freely used as you have all the rights of it as well.

The moment you acquire a premium domain name, the next step is to link it to a website. This can be a little technical for newbies, but it’s not something you can’t handle. In this case, we want to find out the value of the domain name in your possession. There is always a chance that there is a domain name in your possession you are not using or you don’t need anymore.

If this scenario applies to you, the best thing to do is to find out the value of that domain name. You have to do his on time, so you know you are not selling at a loss.

Value your Domain Name

Determining the value of your domain should not be a difficult process, irrespective of your reason for trying to find out.

The most important thing is that you need to know the factors that make a domain name wanted in the first instance.

determining domain worth

Determining domain name worth.

You need to understand that with evaluations like this, several exceptions could easily occur. The value of a domain is strictly dependent on what a buyer is prepared to pay. What we are trying to say here is that in some cases, reality may differ from the things you read in theory.

When you calculate the estimated worth of a domain, you will have a reliable baseline. This way, you won’t sell a domain that costs a lot for peanuts.

With that covered, let’s take a look at the features that are important when considering a domain name. These features include:

TLD’s The Top-Level Domain

The TLD of a domain goes a long way to determine if it will be desirable. Let’s use the .com TLD as an example. It is very popular because of how common and recognizable it is. Naturally, most buyers would always prefer it over others.

However, there have been new alternatives that have become trendy over time, and they’ve become valuable as well.

Make sure to keep in mind that “.COM” domain names hold significant value than any other TLD’s.

Industry and Area of Business

This is very significant if the domain is being used currently for a specific website. The number of visitors that visits the site can play a major role when the domain’s worth is calculated, the reason is not farfetched.

A domain that already has an existing audience can be used as leverage by the buyer to demand a higher price.

An active domain that has been in use for some time will have a good SEO (Search Engine Optimization) ranking. This will make it more appealing to a buyer who, in turn, will like to pay more for such.

Dictionary Words used in a Domain name

Adding the right keyword to a domain is also very important when it comes to SEO. A study carried out by Higher Visibility shows that in a lot of industries, almost all websites include keywords of high quality in their domain.

For instance, when you enter the query “food” into a search engine, the top-rated site that would come up is “www.food.com”.

If there is a wanted keyword in your domain, the value will increase considerably.

Brandable?

The bendability of a domain may be a little hard to define. Surprisingly, it is one of the things several site owners consider when choosing a domain name.

If you look at the most visited sites today, they all have these things in common. Their domain names are memorable, clear and unique.

For example, google.com, facebook.com, twitter.com, and youtube.com. When a domain grabs attention and is very catchy, it tends to get the attention of buyers.

To Know more about: Branding a name? read in-depth information about brandable domain name guide

Dictionary Word or Makeup word?

This is quite obvious, but a lot of people seem to ignore it. The importance of a domain with correct spelling cannot be stated enough. Several buyers will not be motivated to use anything that is sloppy looking and unprofessional.

On the other hand, when you use unexpected spelling sometimes, it can be of benefit to you. In some rare cases, unexpected spellings increase the brand value of a domain name.

Let’s see some examples…

tumblr.com and fiverr.com are technically spelled incorrectly. But they’ve been turned into outstanding and lasting brands.

Number of Characters in Domain Name

One rule you always have to remember is that when a domain name is short, it will fetch a higher price at the market. This rule does not apply to all domains as brevity alone cannot always make a cumbersome domain look appealing to prospective buyers.

For example; zz0xy2c.com does not look appealing in any way.

However, when a domain is concise, it is most times considered rare and unique which makes it more valuable.

Short domain names are the most valuable asset on the internet and believers believe even the most expensive short domain names are still not that expensive, with time they get very precious and hard to get.

The reason is that shorter domains can be memorized easily, they are more marketable and are easy to share.

As you search for the potential value of your domain name, try to pay attention to the above points. Keep in mind that nothing is written in stone, and a domain’s value can dramatically increase or decrease over time.

Finding Smart way to figure out the value of your domain name

We’ve seen the factors that determine the value of a domain. The next thing to do is for us to find out the actual value of the domain.

How much it is worth and how do we carry out a domain valuation. Just like we’ve stated before, this task is very easy and can be done in three easy steps.

You don’t have to try all these steps at once or in a particular order. What you should try doing is to follow the process listed here. As time goes on, you’ll get a comprehensive understanding of how much your domain is really worth.

Domain value in 3 steps

Domain value can be figured out in 3 simple steps.

Here’s how to go about it…

Step 1: Finding the other names sold in the name business-related niche

It is essential to know what buyers are prepared to pay for the domain name in your possession. You also need to know the price other sellers are selling domains that are similar to yours.

Just as we stated before, the value of a domain can either increase or decrease at any point in time. So there’s a huge probability that you can’t use the initial price you bought the domain name as a baseline.

Now that you have gotten this far, you have to do further research to be sure. You need to know the price other domains like yours are sold for. Then you can make a detailed comparison with yours.

As luck would have it, several websites collate data on domain sales. One such site is the DN Journal. The website shows the highest reported sales that occurred in the last 3 weeks.

Another website that provides this kind of data is Domain Name Wire. They have a blog where they talk about the sales of recent and prominent domain sales.

If you have a concise domain name. You should check out a short domain name guide that will help you to understand how short domain name works?. They do the same thing as the above-listed websites, but their specialty is short/concise domain names as you might have guessed.

Note: Short 3 Letter and 4 Letter domain names worth high in price.

With the websites listed above, you can easily track the names that are attracting the highest bids. At the time of compiling this report, when we looked at the current list on DN Journal, we were able to find a number of domain names that fit the criteria we listed.

The features we listed that make a domain valuable are: it has to be clear, memorable, short and it should be filled with keywords.

If any of your domain has these features, then you’re likely to command a juicy sum for that domain. Also, by using this roundup, you will be informed about the latest trends in the domain namespace.

If you still want to get more information about domain sales that can give you better insight, you’ll have to research further to be sure.

Let’s see how this can be done…

Step 2: Use a third-party appraisal service.

Just as the name implies, a domain appraisal service is what you need to get a better insight into the value of your domain.

This is site will allow you to get more information on your domain. It would also give you a reliable estimate of the value of your domain. You can use this info to compare your domain to similar ones.

By using a service like this, you’ve cut down your workload by half. The appraisal service gives you an automatic comparison of your domain against similar domains. This way you have an idea of the price they sell similar domains.

Another advantage is that it measures how much your domain is worth. It uses several factors to give you an accurate estimate based on the factors discussed above.

For those that want to go the extra mile to get a better estimate on their domain. We highly recommend this method because it is easy and more accurate.

There are several appraisal websites to choose from. We are decided to go with the site that is the most popular and used by all, Estibot.

EstiBot is by far the most popular domain appraisal service. Every day, they perform nothing less than 2 million appraisals. You don’t have to take our word for it when you can try it yourself.

Keep in mind that appraisals are mostly estimated and they cannot be guaranteed a correct assessment of a domain name

To do this, go to their official website and enter the domain name you’ll like to appraise. There’s a field on the site’s homepage where you can do this.

When you’re done, click on the Appraise button. Next, you’ll see a detailed report on the domain you just entered.

The first thing you’ll notice is the estimated value of the domain. You’ll also be presented with basic info about your domain.

When you scroll downwards, you’ll see more details on how EstiBot came up with your domain’s value. In addition, you can also see how many other domains similar to yours were sold for.

There is also a ton of analysis and statistics about your domain that would be shown to you. This would give you a clearer picture of your domain’s worth.

With this info, you should have a good idea of how much you can demand when you want to sell your domain.

Some people don’t just rely on one appraisal tool. They use other appraisal tools to get an average price after several evaluations.

Using additional appraisal tools should offer you significant theoretical value for your domain name. However, just as we have mentioned before, the real value of a domain is what a buyer is willing to pay for it.

This way, the moment you get a definite answer, negotiating with potential buyers should not pose a problem.

Step 3: Hitting the correct price mark

Now that you’ve come this far, this is not a time to rush or be too eager. You’ve carried out quality research. You’ve used several estimation tools at your disposal to know what your domain is really worth.

At this point, you’re pretty confident you can approach a potential buyer with a price without being off the mark. However, the best thing to do is to approach several prospective buyers to get an answer.

It could happen that a domain could meet all the criteria listed above. Still, people may not be keen to buy it. The reasons for this are many. Even though the domain is short and easily memorable, the supply is simply not relevant to a lot of people.

It could also be that it is too similar to the name of a prominent website, or it has a bad meaning, which makes people avoid it.

On another note, the case may be the opposite. A domain name that is not valuable to anyone might be what another person may have been searching for. If this is the case, then you’re about to receive a lucrative offer.

The only way you can be sure is if the domain is put up for sale. It may sound harsh to some, especially when you are not ready to let go of the domain just yet. Luckily, some websites have you covered.

In actual fact, there are several websites that let you buy or sell domains with a layer of protection. They allow you to fix a reserve price for your domain. To those who have been using eBay to sell things, this concept shouldn’t be strange to them.

In essence, a reserve price is simply a sum you fix that serves as the least price you can accept. If nobody matches your reserve price or exceeds it, the auction ends. No transaction will take place in that domain.

This way, you get to put your domain up for sale, at the same time, you’ll know how valuable it is. This is done with little or no risk, and if at any point the reserve price is matched, you’ll be getting good value for your domain.

The only cost you’ll incur is after you’ve successfully made a sale. You’ll be charged 10% of the amount the domain was sold.

If you just want to get a valuation and you’re not willing to sell regardless of the offer that comes in, simply fix an unreasonable reserve price.

Also, make sure you don’t show the reserve price. This way, users won’t know a reserve price has been set. Now, all you have to do is relax and watch as the bids start pouring in.

You can now estimate the value of your domain with better accuracy than before. All thanks to several bids from real users. You can also be lucky, a buyer may fancy your domain and could buy it outrightly.

At the end of the day, you’re in a better position to say how much your domain name is really worth than when you first started.






Keywords

Browse More Brand Names

Submit your name for branding

and we make a brand name for you in .com!