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Work.com for sale for $300,000,000
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June 22nd, 2007 by 
Jay Westerdal
Well not exactly. Work.com
is for sale, but it is part of the Business.com Inc. company which currently makes $15,000,000 a year (EBITDA). Business.com the domain has a long history. Marc Ostrofsky purchased the domain for $150,000 in the late 90’s, then shortly after that in 1999, he sold it to eCompanies, Inc. for $7,500,000 in stock. In 2004, they did their refinancing and the $7.5M in stock was valued at $2M which was then paid out to Marc Ostrofsky according to an interview by Newsweek. At this point it looks like Marc was fully paid and has no remaining stock in the company as of 2004. UPDATE: Marc indicated he has stock remaining according to a Paul Sloan interview from today. I will have to ask Marc and clear this up.
According to the Wall Street Journal, the traffic at Business.com and Work.com has risen 50% in the first quarter of 2007 compared to the first quarter of 2006. Jake Winebaum and Sky Dayton look really good in the Wall Street Journal article because it makes them look like they are having the last laugh for purchasing the domain and now flipping it again, but the article doesn’t go into all the details. It looks like people are flipping domain names for huge multiplies but that is not what is happening. The domain was the foundation for the company, the rest was hard work and a lot of sweat. Don’t get me wrong, I think the reason the company did so well was because of the press and branding it got when they bought the domain for $7.5 Million in Stock. It turns out to be $2 Million and if the company sells for $350 Million it would mean that buying the Brand cost the company less then 1% of its final sale price. So in perspective, the domain was cheap at $2M.
This is the reason I like to buy brandable domain names. A lot of credibility is given to a good brand and I don’t think these founders of Business.com would have had that creditability without their good brand. Why do kids of famous actors have such an easy time becoming successful? It is because of their parent’s branded last name, not because they are better actors than kids their age.
Doors open for famous people and good dotcom brandables. You don’t need to have a famous father any more. Just a good domain name.
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13 Comments »
June 22nd, 2007 at 3:46 pm
Dang, dang, dang,
Where was I in the 90’s?! So many missed opportunities. Kudos, to those who had the ability to foresee the future. I hope that I’ve made some good purchases with my domain portfolio, but if business.com
is any indication, which according to domaintools was created in ‘98, it may be another 7-10 years before I see my domain real estate take off.
By the way, Jay, this is a great blog, I really enjoy the posts.
June 22nd, 2007 at 3:49 pm
To throw water on the fire – business.com
is one of the leading Google ‘recipients’ on the web – their results show for the most oblique searches possible (where eBay and Yahoo Answers are the leaders).
I would love for an upstream analysis by Hitwise on Business.com
’s traffic.
June 22nd, 2007 at 4:43 pm
Didn’t mark say somewhere else he has stock in the company?
UPDATE BY JAY: Hmmm, I can’t find anything in writing.
June 22nd, 2007 at 7:02 pm
Jay:
Paul Sloan posted today that he spoke with Marc, and he had the following to say:
—
“I just learned about this this morning the Journal,” Ostrofsky told me. “Needless to say, I’m going to make a lot of money if this happens. I’m having one great day.”
—
It appears he does have some remaining stock.
-PJB-
June 23rd, 2007 at 9:29 pm
1 of the most potentiallest[potential'est];-^)), buyers of Business may b Business2 ,
may[would]have been sending 100.000%
,
may[would] also have been leaking many Business2’s internal secrets to Business.com
Business2.com
free typo-traffics daily+4ever to Business.com
+
Business2.com
via any-email-etc@Business2.com e.t.c.
Business may not know how-to-say-thank-you-Business2 is enough;–^), 2w
June 23rd, 2007 at 9:31 pm
even Business couldnt fetch anything back in this auction-again ,
,
but ,
still , @ this time , Business does have been
still
fetching back the worldssssssssswide coverrage of news e.t.c. ,
many of them being of mainstreams , e.g. : wsj or reuters e.t.c. ,
how many millions USD o’[of] extra worth does that b[be] ??
—————————————————————-
when Business was sold @ USD 7.500.000 @ 1999 ,
then ‘t created the instant worldssssssssswide coverrage of news e.t.c. ,
many of them being of mainstreams , e.g. : wsj or reuters e.t.c. ,
online+offline ,
how many millions USD o’[of] extra worth does that b[be] ??
—————————————————————-
when Business was sold @ USD 7.500.000 @ 1999 ,
then ‘t created that worldsrecord[worldrecord] until recently ,
then
when ever the people[worldswide] were to say something about the most dear[expensive] domain ,
then they referred to Business.com
how many millions USD o’[of] extra worth does that b[be] ??
—————————————————————-
June 24th, 2007 at 8:14 am
http://blogs.business2.com/sloan/2007/06/businesscom-for.html
for $400 Million? Craziness? Not so fast ”
” Business.com
oyes , really ?
may some1 please invite my dear Sir Sloan
to come here
to think it twice n[and] thrice , ThANKye ,
2w