James Booth : Domain brokering in the heart of Asia

Domain broker, James Booth.

Domain broker, James Booth.

James Booth belongs in a class of his own; the younger brother of domain investor, Andy Booth, enjoys stepping out of his comfort zone often.

The young Briton emigrated to southeast Asia to seek new challenging opportunities. Four years ago, at the young age of 22, he moved to Singapore to work in the financial sector.

Currently based in Manila, Philippines, James Booth enjoys both the extended benefits of living in a multi-cultural, pro-western country, and its challenges.

James has achieved several milestones in his career as a domain broker, and this is an opportunity to learn more from him directly.

DomainGang: James, please tell us a bit about your personal background and how you started.

James Booth: I am 26 Years old, from the UK and currently based in Manila, Philippines and have been for the last year. Previous to Manila I was based in Singapore for 3 years.

My background has always been sales and investments and have spent the last 7 years working in Wealth Management and Investment Management until my recent change in to Domain Brokering.

DomainGang: What is the current market focus of your domain brokerage?

James Booth: Being based in Asia, 95% of my client base is in China. The main areas I am dealing with are 2, 3 and 4 letter .com and also 2 and 3 number .com

DomainGang: Are you actively seeking out owners of particular portfolios, or do they come to you?

James Booth: A bit of both really. I have made contact with several owners and agreed to offer there names to my contacts in China. Some people have actively approached me and asked me to see what offers I can get them also.

DomainGang: Are you mostly a buyer’s or a seller’s broker?

James Booth: Both, If a buyer has a specific request I will go out and find them what they are looking for and vice versa.

Being a domain broker is essentially being the middle man and finding what both buyer’s and seller’s want and having the client base to be able to do both.

DomainGang: How aggressively do you price the domains you broker?

James Booth: I don’t price aggressively. If the seller has a price in mind that they want I will add a little on top as it gives me room to negotiate and means I can achieve the owners price as the main objective is to get a sale done for everyone.

DomainGang: What are some important sales that you could share?

James Booth: I have been very lucky since I started brokering and have managed to achieve $3m USD in sales in my first 2 months.

All my sales have been LLL.com apart from 1 LL.com that was sold this week.  I brokered 12 LLL.com for $210k, and also names such as TST.com, PMS.com, KNN.com and several more.

The total I have sold is 27 LLL.com and 1 LL.com. I am hoping I will be able to release the sales price of the LL.com this week.

DomainGang: What does the future hold for domain brokering?

James Booth: I think Domain Brokering has a good future as long as the market is still fluid and there is activity.

When I speak to my Chinese clients about Domains there feedback is always that if the banks in China are giving up to 5% P/A they may as well invest into asset classes that are likely to give them much higher returns and are not tied to the Chinese banks.

I think the internet is going to keep growing and .com will remain king for at least the next 5-10 years.

I think the issue is once the Asian Market have gained control of the majority of LL, LLL etc they will only have each other to sell to as Western companies will not pay the prices the Chinese sellers want which could then resort to the new gTLDs but only time can tell.

DomainGang: Many thanks James, for this exciting opportunity to learn more about your domain brokering services.

To get in touch with James Booth for domain brokering inquiries, email him at james@booth.com.

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