I came across an interesting article about the Yellow Pages on Walletpop.com.

Hmmm, what does this mean for domain names?

You can read about it HERE.

BTW – Another article about Yellow Pages of which Andrew from DNW and I share the

same sentiments. HERE.

Stephen Douglas wrote an article and posed some questions that are very relevant to domainers and invited us to come up with a solution to marketing to endusers. Here’s my response:

“This is the very thing I’m working on.

Here is something to always bear in mind.

The prospects human brain shuts down and goes into defense and cautionary mode which leave absolutely no room for introspective and logical thinking ESPECIALLY when they don’t know you from Adam.

Domain names are still a bizarre concept to most endusers.

The key here is to educate them in a non-threatening way.

Remember also, they’re buying “you” not just the domain name.

I’m gonna make a statement that million dollar salespeople do not ever want the world to get comfortable with , and it is this:

(Shortened with my own words)

Repetition breeds familiarity breeds trust.

Here’s an example of something I did in my life years ago that I’m going to start adapting to domain sales:

I was in sales for a janitorial company. I took the above concept and applied it. What I did was to visit 100 businesses over one week. I didn’t do anything. I simply visited them, looked the decision makers in the eye and asked “if I could do anything to help them with their business or solve a problem for them, no strings attached, I just wanted to learn more about the companies I might be able to service in the future.” and left my card and literature.

Thats it.

I came back for another three weeks and simply visit. I didn’t try to sell a damn thing. Sometimes I’d offer suggestions to boost their businesses. I left my card and my literature and sometimes industry newsletters. The suspicions on their part eventually faded.

Soon, something happened.

They no longer became defensive around me.

I got asked to supply bids. Then I got the accounts because they trusted me, they saw me every week, the others? Just once…

I got so many accounts this way that the company (multimillion dollars) I worked for ran out of money for janitorial startup cost for the businesses, not to mention ran out of the commissions owed to me before the invoicing even started… I had to quit, but not before they said that this kind of sales explosion has never happened to them in the history of the company before…

Do you see it?

The biggest mistake is selling RIGHT NOW. The best thing is to start a meaningful contact and dialog with numerous mid-size businesses with healthy revenues (check dun and bradstreet references)

We can send hard hitting understandable facts about domain names, case studies, and the cautionary tale that you’ve mentioned above.

We can send the dnjournal sales report and the some facts about the increase in business for companies that bought the names.

“The domains are priced high because YOUR COMPETITORS WANT THEM TOO, here’s why -” blah blah blah blah.

You’ll be the domain broker with “special insights” about gaining an advantage in advertising with domain names…

It does take a little time and some work.

Do you want rejections on the first calls?

Or do you want to reap benefits at the earliest a few weeks later.

Any questions?”

AND:

“Lets try this for the approach you were taking by contacting adword advertisers.

Call and tell the decision maker you are sending a FEDEX/or manila envelope with some breakthrough info for their business and that their competitors will receive it as well. But first ask this “are you open to new ideas?”, If they say no, thank them and call someone else. It becomes easy when there is no convincing or arguing.

Those that say “yes” Put info in the FEDEX/manila about companies getting more business and cutting their online advertising substantially (to that effect). Call back a few days later to make sure they got it. Wait. In another week send more articles and stuff about domain names and about businesses that “got it”. Also say somewhere in the literatures that businesses will soon wake up and “smell the coffee” which will cause domain cost to skyrocket…

and so forth – you’ll slowly build relationships with the ADword advertisers…”