LATEST

Welcome to my blog.

Hey guys, and welcome to my blog.

I have spent the past few days getting this all sorted out, and now I am ready to launch it to the public.

On this basis, this is my LAUNCH post.

So, as many of you know.. I am a domain name investor. At the moment I am currently working to slim my portfolio, and develop some of my names.

To aid me in this process, and to investigate a long going interest of mine I decided to sell 40 of my LLLL.com domains on Ebay. Thats not all... In a one day auction.

I have done this on the basis that I need money, and that I want to see the extent to which ebay can be a poweful auction tool. Unfortunately it hasnt started well. With 14 hours left on the auctions, to my dismay I noticed the auctions were not even indexed, and thus noone to this point can find them unless directly linked :(

At the moment, these auctions are at ~$900 collectively, which is only $22.50: an absolute bargain.

I am really hoping that in the next 10 hours there are significantly more bids otherwise someone will get an absolute bargain, and Ill make a big loss

Ill make another post auction report tomorrow.

Those interested in the names:

Good Luck

775 Comment(s) Posted by Tom on February 9, 2008, 9:38 am

My newest aqquisition: CUFO.com

So guys,

I just thought I'd keep you up to date with my accquisitons.

On February 12th 2008, Tom Clowes of the RERS Group....

Ok scrap that. Unlike other domainers I am not going to pretend I am really professional by writing ridiculous press release style articles describing how I am so great, and then proceeding to interview myself. Rather I will simply cut to the chase.

Today I bought the domain name CUFO.com from Amosely Corporation for the grand sum of *haha I have removed the number so that you will have to keep guessing* united states dollars. I think I got a nice deal for the name, and look forward to developing it in the future.

I currently have low $x,xxx left in the kitty, and am actively looking for other nice short domain names.

Best of luck everyone.

Tom

655 Comment(s) Posted by Tom on February 13, 2008, 11:58 am

Scamming In the domain business!

Every single blogger who is also a domainer has written a blog on the recent scams in the business.

When I say every domainer, I immediately lie, rather those who need content for their blog, those who have nothing interesting to say, and occasionally those who are generally concerned/interested in the matter. (I appreciate this sentence is rather blunt. A couple of guys who have written extensive articles about scamming are great people, and I dont mean any offense.)

The reason for this post is so I can post my own view on scamming.

My immediate feeling when I read these posts is simple. Dont complain about paypal, and the registrars not helping you out. Rather move on, and get over it. Admittedly I'd be thoroughly p****d off if some moron stole hundreds, maybe even thousands of dollars worth of domains off me. However I dont think they ever will (this is not a challenge), simply because I am thorough, precautious, and without intending to be arrogant... clever.

From my experience the majority of scammers hang on Digitalpoint. DP is a rubbish forum, it IS scammers. You cant really conduct any decent business there. Those who are not scammers dont know the market. Simply dont use digital point OR if you must, see below...
Use ESCROW.com for transactions with a)anyone at DP b)Any $x,xxx+ transactions
Dont be a stupid idiot.
Use unique passwords at every place you are a member.
A password like abc is stupid. Abc768A is better.
Check TR. Also communicate with the person thoroughly before hand. Without meaning to generalize, if they cant put an English sentence together, dont deal with them. Maybe you will lose a nice deal, but more likely than not you will avoiding a scam.
If they are offering a good domain at a stupidly low price, it is a scam!
If they offer a large offer for your awful domains: scam!

Follow those simple rules, and you cant get scammed, Simple as!

Linking in to point 3, "Dont be a stupid idiot". This is the most important point. Have a bit of common sense, and you cant go wrong. Think, and take your time with every deal. Be honest yourself and the scammers will eventually realise that we are too clever for them.

Sit there crying about paypal all day, and a)you wont get anywhere b)you are trying to shift the blame, when actually it is your own fault, end of.

N.B. I thought I would add, occasionally scammers are exceptionally clever. Do your best. If anything seems dodgy, escrow is the way to go.

The moral of the story, if you get scammed....

blame yourself, NOT paypal.

1222 Comment(s) Posted by Tom on February 16, 2008, 1:44 pm

Nothing ventured, Nothing gained!

All my LLLL.com sales have gone through.

One buyer bought 31 of them. On careful discussion with the buyer they agreed to pay by masspay which saved me $80 of fees. (See my last post).

So the total sales prices of 40 LLLL.com was $2,699. That works out at $67.48 per piece. I am pretty happy with the price.When I tried to sell them on the forum the highest offer I was able to get was $60 a piece. When you subtract the ebay fees etc, that I have missed, then I probably got $5 extra per name on ebay relative to the forums.

Having sold 40, my LLLL.com portfolio is significantly reduced. I still do have quite a few though, and I am struggling with what to do. I have seen similar names sell at $xxx on ebay, so perhaps I should do 5 day auctions rather than 1 day auctions? I have also seen bulk sale on ebay go for significant amounts. Maybe that is the next step? Finally, maybe I should just keep them?

Opinions Appreciated !

The reason I have sold these names is because it is nice to have some funds to pursue any nice opportunities which come up. It seems to be a lot more difficult to sell names when you need $$ there and then, so I prefer to sell in advance and have funds.

My last $x,xxx purchases were funded from the sale of 55 triple premiums with no 'q'. I sold them at $55 a piece in bulk not too long ago. Considering these sales on ebay I am dissapointed as I field I could have got up to $45 more a piece: approximately $2,000 more. Dang!

The one thing that did cheer me up slightly is the fact I used those funds to buy various names which I feel I got on the cheap. I couldnt have bought these if I hadnt made that sale. Lets see which works out as the better investment. Then again there is no point looking back... consider the guys who missed out on LLL.com etc

E.G I read about the owner of cold.com who could have registered travel.com!! but let him pass him by

So yup, thats what has been happening in my camp recently.

Best of luck domainers out there. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

Tom

2093 Comment(s) Posted by Tom on February 12, 2008, 6:36 am

My newest website... Cooking?

So, My 40 LLLL.com domain sales on ebay SOLD at reasonable prices. On average $68 a piece.

I recieved the payment off 4 buyers, so went to check my paypal account. To my dismay I havd lost over $100 !! in paypal fees, and that is on top of the ebay fees. This took my average price down by $4 a name.

That is ridiculous!!

From now on I intend to demand mass pay payments from all ebay buyers. Some of us cant afford to lose over $100 in fees..

Anyway, an analysis of those sales will be posted when they are all done and dusted.

Now onto the bigger news, and the reason for this post. My new website launch:-

MMMM.com

In simple

"MMMM.com is a resource that allows you, the user to share your recipes with the world in a few simple and easy to follow steps. What is more, to really bring your recipe to life MMMM.com provides a simple system to allow you to upload bright, vibrant images of each stage of the process."

I feel this site has the potential to be one of those great sites on the web.

There are thousands upon thousands of recipe websites on the web that simply contain the same boring uneditted, usually incorrect database of thousands of recipes. I personally hate these sites because who wants to search through thousands of recipes to find what they want.

What is more, these sites never have any images so you dont really know what you are cooking.

MMMM.com allows the user to add images, and personalise their own recipes online quickly and easily. This makes it attractive to users wanting to share their own knowledge, and learn from others.

The above, combined with the great design (I would say that wouldnt I ), and the great domain name make me feel this site can be really successful.

Also, quite amusingly on completion of the site I noticed something interesting. I think it is a sign.

Take a look at the image below. Notice how it looks like a face. Spooky isnt it?

Try it out, and tell your friends.

MMMM....

Tom

1929 Comment(s) Posted by Tom on February 11, 2008, 1:04 pm