What Gives A Domain Purchase or Selling Value?

[Bec]

In your mind, what things would be most important to you when evaluating a domain for possible purchase, or for assigning a value if selling one?

The PR?

Google Listing positions

Keywords

Niche

.... other?

[Lee]

Personally it depends on what im looking for when it comes to buying or selling a domain.

If its something adult related, typically ill always go for an unregistered domain over buying an existing domain unless, it has a site with some added value included with it.

For mainstream, it depends on the age, history and brandability of the domain in question for me.

Also, without exception, it must be a .com domain name.

Regards,

Lee

[deanb]

Traffic, PR, Inbound links, and also the content on the domain.

[Lee]

Oh and when it comes to actually 'selling' a domain, i have found that it typically works best if you never list a price for the domain in question.

I have actually sold domains that have gone for far more than *i* expected to make from the domain name because someone valued it higher than i did.

Regards,

Lee

[Lee]

Traffic, PR, Inbound links, and also the content on the domain.

Wouldnt that make the domain a 'site' though?

If it has traffic, PR, inbound links and content thats stuff that makes up a site, a domain typically is just that, the domain.

Regards,

Lee

[deanb]

Wouldnt that make the domain a 'site' though?

If it has traffic, PR, inbound links and content thats stuff that makes up a site, a domain typically is just that, the domain.

Regards,

Lee

But typically a domain wouldn't have PR or keyword rankings by itself either.

[Lee]

But typically a domain wouldn't have PR or keyword rankings by itself either.

Which is why typically those items arent considered when purchasing solely domain names.

Regards,

Lee

[Bec]

Ok, to clarify, lets say the domain would have pr, inbound and outbound links, (some abc), high google position for several keywords and keyword combinations. And content (not a paysite type).

That help?

[PierreAGD]

Interesting question
If we speak strictly of a domain name (not buying an existing website), I think it really depends on what you want to do with the site you will create.

A domain name that contains the word(s) it relates to is important to be well listed in major search engines.
Example (may exist or not): gaycatering.com, if you want to create a site about your business, is a very good name for search engines, even though it is a bit "generic". Few such names are still available of course...A second choice will be gay-catering.com, keeping in mind that you will sent a fair amount of traffic to the owner of gaycatering.com........

There are many people who buy domains only to try to resell them.
I received in the past several messages offering to sell me my own domain name, with a .net or .org instead of my .com I never replied.

There is also the "trendy ones", when everyone is trying to take advantage of an existing successful website such as youtube.com, thus the near-impossible task of finding something available and not too stupid that inlcudes "tube".

As a rule, I would say you should try to find a balance between:
-something easy to remember
-something related to your subject matter
-something as SE friendly as possible
In the case of a gay paysite, the name is somewhat irrelevant, and the most successful paysites these days have names that are not related to the content they offer (Seancody, Corbinfisher, Badpuppy,etc). They gain popularity based on quality (and marketing of course), and get little traffic from SE, unless they pay for it.

Let's remember that the names Yahoo and Google may have seemed a little weird when they were created. It did not prevent them from becoming the most famous sites in history so far...

[Bec]

Interesting information there Pierre, and appreciate your contribution. However I'm still trying to assertain how people arrive at a value for a domain and/or website when selling one.

What are the key points that add value or purchase interest?