Domain Scam?

[gu1llerm0]

Hi Everyone,
I'm new here - so bear with me. I have a domain name that I'm interested in. Unfortunately, [a company] (out of Russia) owns it and has a bid page up for it. How can I tell if they are legitimate - or simply 'Fishing for Cash'? And, if they are legit, how close to their minimum bid amount should I come?

Thanks for your assistance,

Gu1llerm0

[edited by: tedster at 8:03 pm (utc) on Mar. 30, 2004]
[edit reason] remove specifics [/edit]

[Webwork]

Hmmmm. Hard to say without specifics but ...

Value? Whatever you say it's worth to you. If you want it badly then negotiations are problematic.

As I recall I bought 1 or 2 domains from "the Russians". You can negotiate with them. Offering 50% of the asking price, if it's not an off the wall price, might work. You can always bargain up. You could offer less but that approach sometimes fails miserably. Can't say what to offer without more info, but again, it's also about your wants.

Use Escrow.com. Too many scams coming out of the region to use any other approach.

[SEOMike]

WELCOME TO WEBMASTERWORLD!

You might do a whois and see when it expires. Chances are they will drop it if they don't sell it before it expires. To be really cautious, get a similar name and then wait them out. (this might not be a good idea if it's a really competitive name)

[kreeves]

You can usually backorder a domain. I'm not quite sure what the process is because I've never actually done it myself.

Services like godaddy.com will allow this for a certain price.

From my understanding, all it does is, when the domain is available, they will pick it up immediately for you. Again, I've never done this myself, so I can't say that it will always work.

[SEOMike]

From my understanding, all it does is, when the domain is available, they will pick it up immediately for you.

That would work IF the Russians release it. Then it takes 30 days to expire and re-enter the public domain. I had a nightmare trying to get an expired URL back for a client because of a partner's death. They would NOT let him renew it because he wasn't the person on the tech. contact, nor did he have access to the admin email. What a crock. So we used one of those "snatch it up" services and crossed our fingers. We were lucky... a domain name that wasn't very competitive. You DO run the risk of another company snatching it up.