Nice Guy or Sucker - You Make the Call

by palms
16 replies
  • SEO
  • |
So, I bought this really nice PR5 two weeks ago at auction, and it was obvious the guy simply forgot to renew his domain because it was the official site of a documentary film company.

Since they had a really cool site, I decided to call them before I switched the name servers to make sure they had a copy of their site to put on a new domain. The guy said "yes we do, thanks for letting us know," so I switched them over.

I got the domain all set up with hosting and new content, then the guy emails me saying "I forgot to renew..." and "we're a non-profit..." (they are, I checked) " and "we just had DVDs of our film printed up to be distributed to classrooms and it would put us out of business if we had to re-print the covers with a new domain name on them..." and blah, blah, blah ..."is there any way we can get that domain back..."

So, being the nice guy that I am, I agreed to transfer the domain back to him if he would reimburse me for all my expenses.

Nice Guy or Sucker - You Make the Call...
#call #guy #make #nice #sucker
  • Profile picture of the author crissie
    Maybe I misunderstood but did they not know they'd ordered the DVD's before deciding to put the site up for sale?
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  • Profile picture of the author footfoot
    expired auction
    my vote:
    Nice Guy
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  • Profile picture of the author alistair
    I think you done the decent thing. I wouldn't want to put anybody out of business even though it was their fault they didn't renew the domain. I might have asked them for a backlink on the site or something just as a thankyou or something though.
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  • Profile picture of the author palms
    Exactly => expired auction.
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  • Profile picture of the author DJL
    When faced with such a dilemma I always ask myself, "What would Vlad The Impaler do?"
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  • Profile picture of the author cogapartments
    Its not your fault.You can contact him,everything will be good.
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  • Profile picture of the author mosthost
    I did something very similar a few years ago and I'm a decent guy so I think you are too
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  • Profile picture of the author ElMundodelExito
    That's the right thing, congratulations.
    Just make sure you put a link in the homepage before doing the transfer .
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  • Profile picture of the author fairbjosh
    I would say your a nice guy
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  • Profile picture of the author Dinospider
    Banned
    Nice guy, I'd still try and at least make a little profit on it. There own fault at the end of the day.
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  • Profile picture of the author MikeFriedman
    You did the right thing.

    I would have asked for a link off of their site though. It's the least they can do.
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  • Profile picture of the author paulgl
    I think they were pulling your leg. The amount of DVDs they would
    actually distribute to classrooms would be small at the moment.

    They had second thoughts about the domain and website, that's
    what happened.

    I could have bought thousands of stickers to just slap on each
    DVD for a few bucks. Very, very easy. I've used to buy software
    when it came in a box, with a plethora of stickers. Ditto DVDs.

    Visit barnes and noble. All the discount books have stickers.

    The moral of this story is to think. Really think.

    You could have been a nice guy and spent $20 on the stickers.
    If they turned that offer down, boom. You got 'em.

    You have to learn that the online world is a dog eat dog world.

    Seriously. Even reprinting a piece of paper would have been quite
    small.

    You want to be a nice guy? You could have sprung for an alternative
    for pennies on the dollar.

    Want another alternative? You could have kept the website, with a link
    to their new website, front and center. Make the page an informal
    advertising page, with links to all inner pages. Tell them you'll keep
    the link up for a year.

    So many more things that could have been done.

    Paul
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    • Profile picture of the author Blue445nm
      Originally Posted by paulgl View Post

      I think they were pulling your leg. The amount of DVDs they would
      actually distribute to classrooms would be small at the moment.

      They had second thoughts about the domain and website, that's
      what happened.

      I could have bought thousands of stickers to just slap on each
      DVD for a few bucks. Very, very easy. I've used to buy software
      when it came in a box, with a plethora of stickers. Ditto DVDs.

      Visit barnes and noble. All the discount books have stickers.

      The moral of this story is to think. Really think.

      You could have been a nice guy and spent $20 on the stickers.
      If they turned that offer down, boom. You got 'em.

      You have to learn that the online world is a dog eat dog world.

      Seriously. Even reprinting a piece of paper would have been quite
      small.

      You want to be a nice guy? You could have sprung for an alternative
      for pennies on the dollar.

      Want another alternative? You could have kept the website, with a link
      to their new website, front and center. Make the page an informal
      advertising page, with links to all inner pages. Tell them you'll keep
      the link up for a year.

      So many more things that could have been done.

      Paul
      Karma
      Signature

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  • Profile picture of the author yukon
    Banned
    You did the right thing, heck it's only a single PR5 link, not that big a deal, IMO.
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  • Profile picture of the author Tiiberiuss
    Well, if he reimbursed you for your expenses, I think you did right.
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    Do you need kick in the SEPRs?
    These *magic* links will do just that for you!
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