It's one of those things where only a few people in that business space would have an interest, but someone could be willing to pay a tidy sum. We are not interested in it if the price goes high, and so I need to correctly convey this to the seller lest he misinterpret our desire and try to hang on for more than we're willing to pay. I don't want to misstep and create a loose-loose situation.
Experience with similar negotiations makes me expect the seller will ask us to set the starting price. That seems to be an OK idea in this situation, as we would get the opportunity to establish a starting point.
Any comments on what our initial overture should be? Also, what due dilligence shoiuld I consider? Things that come to mind are trademark search, maybe wayback look-up. Can I reliably check for prior SE penalties?
If you can't tell, I'm new to this game and would really appreciate any tips!
Come up with a range of value and make an offer in the midpoint of that range. Tell the registrant that's exactly what you did.
Take the lead. Other versions of the domain dance, if not handled with particular science and diplomacy, often come across as efforts to play the other person for the fool. Not good.
If your seller is a wise businessman all will go well, at least as well as can be expected. If your seller is uninformed or immature or otherwise daft nothing you do will make things work better. So, what's the risk of being open and honest? If you are you will soon know who you are dealing with. ;)
Good luck Ross.
P.S. Just one man's opinion and experience, so I'm prepared to watch the fur fly.
P.P.S. If I'm the one who has the domain parked the answer is that I'm daft . . so forget it. :-P
[edited by: Webwork at 9:29 pm (utc) on Jan. 3, 2007]
Show honesty and intelligence
That's the hard part :) Having to start with first offer is always tricky. If the seller expects you to go first, I would usually offer at the bottom end of the range I came up with. After all, they did ask you to go first, so it's quite natural you are not going to highball the offer. Unfortunately, a lot of sellers get offended with anything they consider to be lowball offers. They won't even respond in many cases. But that just tells me what kind of people they are and they probably have unreasonable price expectations and probably will be unwilling to negotiate too much. They'd rather sit on the domain rather than turn it over. Me personally, I don't get offended when I receive lowball offers. Sometimes I even accept them if they're not that unreasonable :)
I also try to avoid, my offer, their counter-offer, my counter-offer, their counter-offer type negotiations with just figures. I try to include some reasoning with each of my offers. I like to understand from an early stage If I'm dealing with a reasonable person or not. Someone who counters with 100 times your offer without any reasoning, isn't going to cut it as a negotiating partner. They're not serious sellers. They're daft :)
