Suspicious Inquiry

[audubon]

Received the following email:

Hello,

My name is Thomas Shaw and I have a client who is interested in
purchasing xxxxxx.com for an upcoming project. Would your company
consider a sale? If so, what price expectation do you have in mind?
I look forward to discussing a potential deal.

Sincerely,

--
Thomas Shaw
[email protected]
Office: +1.201-204-9195
Mobile: +1.973-412-6815

A few red flags:

1. the use of whois privacy on beckerconsulting.com

2. setting robots.txt to disallow all:
User-agent: *
Disallow: /

(why would a legit company do 1. or 2.?)

3. no company address or phone number on the website

4. unattributed testimonials on the website (they supposedly help clients buy domain names;
how clients find them when the website doesn't allow indexing and contains no contact
info is unclear)

5. found a recent press release for cashadvance.com, with [email protected] as contact

6. something about the statement that the domain is needed for an "upcoming project";
in my experience, inquiries that use similar phrases have come from lowballers or worse

Has anyone ever received emails from, or ever heard of "Thomas Shaw" or "Becker Consulting"?

 

[Rico]

Did you call him already?

 

[audubon]

Did you call him already?

Negative.

 

[katherine]

2. setting robots.txt to disallow all:
User-agent: *
Disallow: /

(why would a legit company do 1. or 2.?)

LOL I have seen it more than once. Sometimes the webmasters forget to remove the robots.txt file for the beta version when uploading the site

no company address or phone number on the website?

All too common alas.

At least one positive sign: their domain name is ten years old.

 

[audubon]

At least one positive sign: their domain name is ten years old.

That's very interesting. The domain name used to belong to a Florida corporation, Becker Consulting, but
in 2004 the company changed its name to Becker Public Relations and got a new domain name,
beckerpublicrelations.com (note that they seem to have forgotten to update the admin contact email,
which still points to beckerconsulting.com).

If you compare the two websites, it becomes clear that these are two unrelated entities.
Furthermore, beckerconsulting.com is hosted at bluehost.com, which appears to be a budget
host, offering $5.95-per-month hosting, while beckerpublicrelations.com is hosted at netexus.com,
who are actual web developers, as well as hosts, and this is evident from the appearance of the
Becker Public Relations website.

So I don't think Shaw is the original owner, and I'm not quite sure the age of the domain name
is a positive sign in this case (note that if the name had been picked up on a drop, as I
suspect, the creation date would not have changed).

 

[domaingeneration]

Respond and see if they reply with more info for your consideration.

When I receive low-ball $xx offers, I usually respond and explore further.
There maybe hungry buyers on the other side. Sometimes they will increase
they offers up to 10 times or more. Most potential buyers don't want
to start with a high 4-5 figure offer.

Good luck,
Alexander
Domain Educator
www.NicheResearch.com/tiny

 

[BostonDomainer]

It doesn't hurt to just reply. I have had some very simply inquiries only to find much later that it was a stealth buyer and the new owner ended up being a big company. Few seconds to reply with a price may prove worthwhile.

 

[Raider]

He's a LOW-BALLER... Stay away unless you want to give your domain(s) away for pennies on the dollar.

His initial email is similar to yours;


Hello,

My name is Thomas Shaw and I have a client who is interested in
purchasing ******.com for an upcoming project. They are prepared
to offer USD $2,000 for ownership of the domain name and they
looking to close on a purchase in the next few weeks. I look
forward to discussing a potential deal.

Sincerely,

--
Thomas Shaw
[email protected]
Office: +1.201-204-9195
Mobile: +1.973-412-6815



I can unload the domain for $25K EASY to a reseller.. I replied back with my price, he replied with;

"I may be able to get my client up to the 5-7k mark but I cannot see them coming up into the five figures. Let me know if anything changes on your end and I will try to get a deal done."

HIM as in YOU?

Interestingly, I received an offer today for the same name for $32K, which I'm in negotiation with and considering.

 

[audubon]

Suspicions confirmed. Thanks, Raider; will steer clear. Good luck with your domain deal.

He's a LOW-BALLER... Stay away unless you want to give your domain(s) away for pennies on the dollar.

His initial email is similar to yours;


Hello,

My name is Thomas Shaw and I have a client who is interested in
purchasing ******.com for an upcoming project. They are prepared
to offer USD $2,000 for ownership of the domain name and they
looking to close on a purchase in the next few weeks. I look
forward to discussing a potential deal.

Sincerely,

--
Thomas Shaw
[email protected]
Office: +1.201-204-9195
Mobile: +1.973-412-6815



I can unload the domain for $25K EASY to a reseller.. I replied back with my price, he replied with;

"I may be able to get my client up to the 5-7k mark but I cannot see them coming up into the five figures. Let me know if anything changes on your end and I will try to get a deal done."

HIM as in YOU?

Interestingly, I received an offer today for the same name for $32K, which I'm in negotiation with and considering.

 

[Raider]

Suspicions confirmed. Thanks, Raider; will steer clear. Good luck with your domain deal.

NP.. And thank you!