DomainSherpa interviews successful domain name investors and entrepreneurs – people we call Sherpas – who share their strategies and tactics to help you be more successful. Hosted by Jonathan Tenenbaum.
Latest Interview
How do you leverage 8,000 domain names to create the largest buy-local network in the world?
Colin Pape, president of ShopCity.com, answers this question and more as he describes how he built ShopMidland.com – serving a town of only 16,000 residents – into a $100,000+ business, and is now scaling it across thousands of Shop[CityName].com domain names. Pape is also taking on Google by filing a U.S. Federal Trade Commission complaint for anti-competitive behavior.
Michael Cyger November 28, 2011
How do three college students go from developing a software game to creating the largest domain name marketplace in the world?
Find out in this interview as the CEO of Sedo, Tim Schumacher, describes how he and his co-founders assembled the world’s largest database of domain names for sale, with more than 15 million listings, and grew the company’s revenue to over $135 million.
Michael Cyger November 21, 2011
Recognizing in 2005 that there would be an oversupply of condominiums in the United States, Richard Swerdlow saw an opportunity to build an online market to buy and sell condos. It would be modeled on the stock exchange and intended as a transparent place to allow buyers and sellers to connect with one another.
His online real estate empire started with the acquisition of Condo.com and continued with Houses.com and Property.com. As the owner of what are arguably the most premium online locations for real estate, Swerdlow shares his plans for continuing to connect buyers and sellers through his virtual marketplaces and how others can apply his strategy to their own development projects.
Michael Cyger November 8, 2011
Fred Mercaldo understands geographic domain names (geodomains) better than most other domain name investors. He has built multiple companies and platforms in the geodomain space, including a software company, a marketing services company and a call center.
In this show, Mercaldo describes his experiences building successful geodomain name properties and shares tactics others can use to develop geodomains profitably.
Michael Cyger November 1, 2011
Page Howe did not start domaining in the mid-1990s like so many other mega-domainers who have sold domain names for millions. Instead, he started just when the market was crashing in 2001 by buying the assets of a dot-com burnout through eBay for $105,000. He later sold those assets for $1.8 million.
As a regular “Joe Domainer” – in fact, he named his domain name marketplace JoeDomains.com – Howe uses a very structured approach to successfully buy and sell domain names in the under $5,000 range. The entire interview is packed full of great tips, so be sure to grab a pen and pad of paper before watching this show.
Michael Cyger October 25, 2011
While in college, Thomas Smale was looking for a way to earn extra cash. When he stumbled upon the concept of buying websites that needed work and reselling them for a profit, he realized he had found his niche. His first website flip returned $500 on an investment of $100; now Smale is co-owner of a business that brokers and flips websites, grossing $1 million in annual revenue.
In this show, Smale shares his insider tips for flipping websites – from finding undervalued assets, to improving them, to determining valuation, to ultimately selling them to another person.
Michael Cyger October 18, 2011
In July 2011, the Nokta Domains sales team closed the highest domain name sale in Turkish history: UcakBileti.com, which means “flight ticket” in Turkish. The domain name sold for a quarter of a million U.S. dollars.
In this show, Arif Şengören and Merve Engin, a sales specialist and a portfolio specialist with the Nokta Domains sales team, share how the domain name was acquired, valued, marketed and sold for top dollar.
Michael Cyger October 11, 2011
As a degreed and lifelong student of economics, Rob Monster understands better than most the science of how wealth is produced, consumed and transferred. And he is making good use of that knowledge.
Monster draws from his experiences – both the victories and the disappointments – as he works to define a scalable domain development theory that will lead to consistent profits with domain names.
Michael Cyger October 4, 2011
Evan Horowitz learned about the Internet and honed his sales expertise early in his career. Doing so helped him develop one of the leading domain name brokerages and create an affiliate network worth millions in annual sales. Along the way, Horowitz invented the system and method for Affiliate Pooling, a patent that last year alone brought in $1 million in licensing fees.
In this show, Horowitz shares how he built his businesses, how he enforces his patent, and his views for the future of the domain name industry.
Michael Cyger September 27, 2011
Jason Davis’ wife called him crazy when he bought Recruiting.com for $75,000 in 2002. But four years later Davis sold it to Jobster for a six-figure price. He realizes that his end users – the people who buy his job- and recruiting-related domain names – don’t wake up in the morning thinking about spending five figures on a domain name that day. He knows he must give them a reason to do so – and he does that by framing the price of the domain in terms the buyer best relates to.
In this show, Davis describes how concentrating his efforts on a single domain name niche helps him make stronger industry connections, earn more in sales and find more entrepreneurial opportunities in his area of expertise.
Michael Cyger September 20, 2011