What country are you based in?
India
Do you feel your location has an effect on your domain investing?
I don’t do outbounds and I price my names reasonably so most of my sales are BIN, so most buyers don’t know the country of origin of the names they are buying 🙂
Other than that it is just the auction timing. I have to stay up till wee hours, which has worked in my favor because it doesn’t affect my other activities much, except my sleep. I am sleeping a lot less than I am used to and I need to be more disciplined about auctions so I don’t have to participate actively and plan them ahead with strict Proxy. I definitely need more sleep, but auctions, especially last minute bids, still excite me, so I will have to see.
How long have you been involved in domains?
I discovered domaining in June 2020. Sold my fist names in November 2020. But I have build and flipped a few web properties so I have been involved with “buying” domain names for my own use(I used to hoard names just like everybody else lol, buying a name whenevr I had an idea) but I only started selling names in 2020.
I didn’t know that there even was a market for the low end names. I thought godaddy auction was where people go to buy premium names. Of course I knew of DomainKing and the sale of s3x.com etc, but never knew about the thriving business of brandable names that you can buy cheap and flip for 4-5 figures. I still can’t figure out why though, since I have even bought a name from Sedo back in 2012. I am glad I discovered them eventually though. We are still early 🙂
Are you a full time domainer?
No and yes. No because it is not my main gig, and yes because for the past one year, I have never thought of anything else but domain names. Names that are currently in auction, names that are dropping the current week, names that are in closeouts that I wait till they get to $11 or $5. It has totally taken over my mind lol.
How did you find out about domain investing?
I have always used fake whois back in the day or privacy and later I strictly use privacy because I hate spammers. And I thought people emailing to buy name names (I used to get a lot of offers on my 4Ls as I own a lot of 4Ls which I bought for my business) were scammers trying to do appraisal scams on me, and i never took those emails seriously.
But in June 2020, I got an email from a Godaddy Broker with a godaddy email making an offer of 8K on one of my 4L.coms
Since it was from godaddy, I knew it was legit, but why would anyone offer 8K on a 4L that means nothing (it is a pronounceable 4L the type that go for 3-4 K in auctions now but I didn’t know there was a demand for such names then). It was very surprising to me that somebody would offer 8K on a domain name that I never even touched. It had no sales lander and no contact details. It got me curious and I asked in one of my Affiliate SEO groups what the heck it was, somebody suggested I ask in Namepros. And so I tried to register on NP and it said the email was registered, I did my reset password and you could say the rest is history.
How many domains do you currently hold?
What's your favourite non .com tld/nTLD/gTLD?
dot io followed by .co
What's the best advice you've been given by another domain investor, either directly or through something they've said on twitter or in an interview?
I like what Deepak Daftari said in an interview. That he wins only about 10% or less of the auction he participates in because he has a strict proxy and because of which all his wins are value buys. How I wish I can follow that. Even if I have a proxy I keep checking if somebody broke it and then I swoop in as if I am personally being attached when my proxy gets broken. I am still a child when it comes to auctions.
What kind of goals do you set yourself?
I would like to own at least 10000 keeper domain names in the next 2 years.
Who are your top 3 domain investors?
Braden Pollock, Brent Oxley, Mike Carson
What's the toughest part of domain investing?
Delegation of menial tasks. How long can a single pair of eyes go through the unending lists. I still enjoy it and for the path I have set for myself, I still need to own 10,000 + names, but sometimes I think how much better it would be to have a lean portfolio of quality names. So yeah all the tasks that I need to do that cannot be delegated. I will be automating certain things. I need to streamline more processes.
How do you structure the domaining part of your day?
Not very structured unfortunately. I start by adding my names that I bought/won the previous day to marketplaces, and then go through my lists which is a pretty exhausting task as I try to find needles in the haystack.
How do you manage your portfolio?
For now I use Google Sheets. And expireddomains.net, thank god for their bulk features.
Do you also have any NFTs or Crypto in your portfolio?
Yes.
What's the most you've ever spent on one domain?
The most I spent was $1850 on a dot “in” as a rank newbie. But this year, I have bought several names in the 300-1500 range this year for my keeper portfolio.
Have you ever done outbound? If so, were/are you successful?
100% of my sales have been inbound.
You're given $10k to spend on domains, how do you spend it?
Outside of domains, what other business/wealth/personal growth figures do you look up to?
Mostly people trying to make a change. The unsung heroes who are selfless in their pursuit of bringing equality, human rights etc. Not so much in business, wealth, personal growth. I am content with what I am.
What do you do when you're not domaining?
I have a small web publishing business and I operate in some highly competitive niche so it keeps me busy. Before the Pandemic I was a fitness freak and actively into powerlifting. But the whole lockdown situation and this sudden discovery of domaining has kept me glued to the chair more than I want to. My 2022 goal is to get back in shape, at least to my pre-covid-era shape.
What advice would you give to people just starting out in domains?
Take your time to learn. Show up everyday. Don’t get too bogged down with pricing and appraisal. And unless you are doing GEO Outbound and wholesale reselling, don’t focus on selling. But focus on buying and learning to buy right.
And read books. Read a lot of books. If I were to attribute my modest success in this business to one thing, it would be my habit of reading. I read every day. Read something. Be it long form articles, or even listening to audiobooks. As you read more and more, it becomes easier to connect the dots. When I started domaining, I revisited books on Branding, Copywriting, and even books about “words” like Elements of Eloquence and The Etymologicon.
