At the same time we were working through a list of names for our company we were also looking for proper domain names.  We landed on FreshCrop and naturally wanted the .com address. Going to the address we ran in to a typcial squatter landing page…loaded with Adsense ads.

It follows that a good domain name should be short, easy to remember and hopefully not already taken. In 2010 this is getting harder everyday as domain squatters buy up hundreds of domains at a time in the hopes of selling them for profit. One big sale can pay for thousands of domains.

The FreshCrop.com landing page had a “This Domain is for sale” link. I clicked that and ran in to a domain squatter who wanted $5,555.00 for FreshCrop.com. Ouch.

If you want the domain in question you have to approach this carefully. Don’t come in lessening the value of the domain. This is what I did and was immediately sent packing. I didn’t think it was worth much more than a few hundred dollars.

Be careful about using your company domain name email address when contacting the domain owner. The price will automatically go up. It is far better to use a gmail or Hotmail address. Additionally it would be best to use only your first name in the From address and sign the email with only your first name.

After being rebuffed we waited 4 weeks before trying again so as not to raise suspicion. We approached this more carefully the second time around by having an employee contact the squatter using his personal email address in a more soft, friendly manner.

As a backup alternative we registered variants of the domain. You can do this by adding on co or inc or use a tagline as a domain.

The second time around we were able to negotiate the squatter down via phone to meet in the middle. Although still expensive we felt the .com address was important for our company long term.

The best way to secure the domain is to use an escrow account like Escrow.com so that both sides feel safe and are protected. Make sure to take a look at what details are needed several days before you will need the service. Sometimes the services charge less for wires vs funding by credit card.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 27th, 2010 at 9:11 amand is filed under Guide. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.