5 ms·

How We Bought easypost.com

107 points by jstreebin 12y ago

petercooper 12y ago
Reading this reminded me of some of the domain negotiations I've been involved in (on both sides) and just how cloak and dagger they are. I can't think of any similar transaction that involves so much mystery and shadowy manoeuvring.. it's almost comical. What also intrigued me is how they got it for less than their initial offer (which was "$10K GBP" - one assumes this is meant to be £10K?) - $15K being less than 10K GBP (recently, though not today).
- jstreebin 12y ago
  He meant 10k GBP. Their initial ask was 20k GBP and we bought it for half that, $15k at the time.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
imjk 12y ago
If the broker did such a good job, why not mention who you used? I can't think of why he'd want to stay anonymous.
- jstreebin 12y ago
  I'm checking with them to see if they mind.
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
- jstreebin 12y ago
  His name is Ritch and you can reach him at Ritch@Acquirable.com.
ThomPete 12y ago
So a broker that actually helps you save money and get what you want. Thats a first. Imagine if real estate brokers where this helpful.
- rgbrgb 12y ago
  The broker/buyer conflict of interest in real estate is exactly what we're working on at Open Listings [1]. It's interesting to think about whether a flat-fee model like ours could work in domain brokering. It's kind of an interesting thought experiment to consider what kind of input you'd need for a program to do the buy-side negotiation. [1]: https://www.openlistings.co https://www.openlistings.co Edit: Not trying to undermine this domain broker's business at all! He's obviously doing an amazing job hustling for his clients and there's no better option if you really want a domain.
  - omarchowdhury 12y ago
    Looks like openlistings.com is for sale: http://openlistings.com/ http://openlistings.com/ ;)
gesman 12y ago
Kudos to easypost for sharing this.
ypeterholmes 12y ago
What an ugly marketplace.
JacobAldridge 12y ago
Possibly the neatest succinct explanation of dealing with (buying from or selling to) corporations that I've read: "you're dealing with a bureaucracy, which means people are heavily inclined to say 'No', and it takes several 'Yes's for a deal to go through." Enterprise Sales 101.
_RPM 12y ago
So after the domain has been bought, the company can obviously see who bought it and find out your true identity. Is this a problem? (an inevitable one).
- escaped_hn 12y ago
  I would guess the main reason for hiding your identity would be so the sellers don't overcharge. After its sold, it doesn't matter.
  - jonah 12y ago
    Correct. Though it't often easy enough to figure it out if it's related to an existing company.
- pan69 12y ago
  You want to avoid price inflation before the deal has been completed.
- puranjay 12y ago
  You'd be surprised how prevalent fake identities are in this business. Years ago, I owned a lot of domains. Some very good ones, in fact. I had someone approach me to buy the domain, claiming they were a tiny 2-person startup. Some Googling and talking to friends who owned domain names revealed that they were actually representing Microsoft. It's very common for even multi-billion dollar corporations to pretend to be broke students/entrepreneurs/non-profits to get cheap prices on domain names.
bhaumik 12y ago
There's a great Reply All podcast episode that dives much deeper into domain selling: http://gimletmedia.com/episode/7-this-website-is-for-sale/ http://gimletmedia.com/episode/7-this-website-is-for-sale/.
wesleyy 12y ago
Hate to be a cynic but this article could've easily been titled 'how naming our startup "easypost" turned into a 15k mistake'. I just can't imagine that the name easypost was 15k better than alternative names. I get that the company already had traction and it'd be cheaper to buy the domain than change the name of the company but I guess what I'm trying to say is domain name availability should probably be the number 1 criteria when picking a new startup name.
- joncalhoun 12y ago
  Easypost launched roughly 2 weeks before a competitor did. The competitor received 16 upvotes on HN. Easypost's Show HN had 157. Perhaps if Jarrett had waited until he found that perfect .com name he wouldn't have launched first, and as a result would have had less initial exposure. Less initial exposure means less initial traction, and that might have lead to easypost not raising their first round, or raising on much worse terms, both of which could easily be worth more than $15k. On top of that, finding an available .com isn't easy. You essentially end up using a non-english word, mashing several words together, or use something like geteasypost.com (which easypost owned prior to making this purchase). Non-english words are harder to say and recall, and could ultimately affect word of mouth growth. Mashing words together puts you in a similar situation, and nearly every company who owned get<company>.com or try<company>.com ultimately ended up buying <company>.com if they were successful. Dropbox did it. Facebook did it. Easypost just opted to get theirs earlier in the company's lifetime.
  - burnte 12y ago
    Indeed, sometimes a good name is worth the cost.
    - jstreebin 12y ago
      We could have used difficultpost.com. We bought that one for $9.
  - PMan74 12y ago
    > The competitor received 16 upvotes on HN. Easypost's Show HN had 157. This is important how? Are these ~150 extra up votes really worth $100 each? Really worth 7.5% of your funding round. Yeah, yeah, yeah, visibility on HN is good but outside the HN bubble I think I'd rather have the 15k.
beeskneecaps 12y ago
easypostage.com is $3k per https://www.godaddy.com/domains/searchresults.aspx?ci=83269 https://www.godaddy.com/domains/searchresults.aspx?ci=83269. I could have saved you $12k!
- joncalhoun 12y ago
  easypostapi.com and geteasypost.com were $10 each. Something tells me you wouldn't have made the sale :D
thomseddon 12y ago
"$10K GBP" Confusing
- Fastidious 12y ago
  Agreed. £10,0000 would have been the correct way. Or 10,000 GBP.
- zhte415 12y ago
  It makes sense if they would like to throw the buyer off the scent and suggest it is a UK-centric service. But a bit non-sequitur with the rest of the email - American English spelling and while Bill is quite common in the UK, Jarrett is an unusual name there.
  - Acquirable 12y ago
    They already knew we were American, we weren't hiding the fact.
fiatjaf 12y ago
You should redirect from easypost.co to easypost.com.

107 points by jstreebin 12y ago

Reading this reminded me of some of the domain negotiations I've been involved in (on both sides) and just how cloak and dagger they are. I can't think of any similar transaction that involves so much mystery and shadowy manoeuvring.. it's almost comical. What also intrigued me is how they got it for less than their initial offer (which was "$10K GBP" - one assumes this is meant to be £10K?) - $15K being less than 10K GBP (recently, though not today).

jstreebin 12y ago
He meant 10k GBP. Their initial ask was 20k GBP and we bought it for half that, $15k at the time.

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

imjk 12y ago

If the broker did such a good job, why not mention who you used? I can't think of why he'd want to stay anonymous.

jstreebin 12y ago
I'm checking with them to see if they mind.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
jstreebin 12y ago
His name is Ritch and you can reach him at Ritch@Acquirable.com.

ThomPete 12y ago

So a broker that actually helps you save money and get what you want. Thats a first. Imagine if real estate brokers where this helpful.

rgbrgb 12y ago
The broker/buyer conflict of interest in real estate is exactly what we're working on at Open Listings [1]. It's interesting to think about whether a flat-fee model like ours could work in domain brokering. It's kind of an interesting thought experiment to consider what kind of input you'd need for a program to do the buy-side negotiation. [1]: https://www.openlistings.co https://www.openlistings.co Edit: Not trying to undermine this domain broker's business at all! He's obviously doing an amazing job hustling for his clients and there's no better option if you really want a domain.
- omarchowdhury 12y ago
  Looks like openlistings.com is for sale: http://openlistings.com/ http://openlistings.com/ ;)

gesman 12y ago

Kudos to easypost for sharing this.

ypeterholmes 12y ago

What an ugly marketplace.

JacobAldridge 12y ago

Possibly the neatest succinct explanation of dealing with (buying from or selling to) corporations that I've read: "you're dealing with a bureaucracy, which means people are heavily inclined to say 'No', and it takes several 'Yes's for a deal to go through." Enterprise Sales 101.

_RPM 12y ago

So after the domain has been bought, the company can obviously see who bought it and find out your true identity. Is this a problem? (an inevitable one).

escaped_hn 12y ago
I would guess the main reason for hiding your identity would be so the sellers don't overcharge. After its sold, it doesn't matter.
- jonah 12y ago
  Correct. Though it't often easy enough to figure it out if it's related to an existing company.
pan69 12y ago
You want to avoid price inflation before the deal has been completed.
puranjay 12y ago
You'd be surprised how prevalent fake identities are in this business. Years ago, I owned a lot of domains. Some very good ones, in fact. I had someone approach me to buy the domain, claiming they were a tiny 2-person startup. Some Googling and talking to friends who owned domain names revealed that they were actually representing Microsoft. It's very common for even multi-billion dollar corporations to pretend to be broke students/entrepreneurs/non-profits to get cheap prices on domain names.

bhaumik 12y ago

There's a great Reply All podcast episode that dives much deeper into domain selling: http://gimletmedia.com/episode/7-this-website-is-for-sale/ http://gimletmedia.com/episode/7-this-website-is-for-sale/.

wesleyy 12y ago

Hate to be a cynic but this article could've easily been titled 'how naming our startup "easypost" turned into a 15k mistake'. I just can't imagine that the name easypost was 15k better than alternative names. I get that the company already had traction and it'd be cheaper to buy the domain than change the name of the company but I guess what I'm trying to say is domain name availability should probably be the number 1 criteria when picking a new startup name.

joncalhoun 12y ago
Easypost launched roughly 2 weeks before a competitor did. The competitor received 16 upvotes on HN. Easypost's Show HN had 157. Perhaps if Jarrett had waited until he found that perfect .com name he wouldn't have launched first, and as a result would have had less initial exposure. Less initial exposure means less initial traction, and that might have lead to easypost not raising their first round, or raising on much worse terms, both of which could easily be worth more than $15k. On top of that, finding an available .com isn't easy. You essentially end up using a non-english word, mashing several words together, or use something like geteasypost.com (which easypost owned prior to making this purchase). Non-english words are harder to say and recall, and could ultimately affect word of mouth growth. Mashing words together puts you in a similar situation, and nearly every company who owned get<company>.com or try<company>.com ultimately ended up buying <company>.com if they were successful. Dropbox did it. Facebook did it. Easypost just opted to get theirs earlier in the company's lifetime.
- burnte 12y ago
  Indeed, sometimes a good name is worth the cost.
  - jstreebin 12y ago
    We could have used difficultpost.com. We bought that one for $9.
- PMan74 12y ago
  > The competitor received 16 upvotes on HN. Easypost's Show HN had 157. This is important how? Are these ~150 extra up votes really worth $100 each? Really worth 7.5% of your funding round. Yeah, yeah, yeah, visibility on HN is good but outside the HN bubble I think I'd rather have the 15k.

beeskneecaps 12y ago

easypostage.com is $3k per https://www.godaddy.com/domains/searchresults.aspx?ci=83269 https://www.godaddy.com/domains/searchresults.aspx?ci=83269. I could have saved you $12k!

joncalhoun 12y ago
easypostapi.com and geteasypost.com were $10 each. Something tells me you wouldn't have made the sale :D

thomseddon 12y ago

"$10K GBP" Confusing

Fastidious 12y ago
Agreed. £10,0000 would have been the correct way. Or 10,000 GBP.
zhte415 12y ago
It makes sense if they would like to throw the buyer off the scent and suggest it is a UK-centric service. But a bit non-sequitur with the rest of the email - American English spelling and while Bill is quite common in the UK, Jarrett is an unusual name there.
- Acquirable 12y ago
  They already knew we were American, we weren't hiding the fact.

fiatjaf 12y ago

You should redirect from easypost.co to easypost.com.