AN ONLINE guru who bought up a string of websites at the dawn of the internet expects to scoop £1 million by cashing in on his dot.com portfolio.
Tommy Butler, one of Scotland’s first domain name experts, is selling his popular site Glasgow.com after 21 years of owning the domain. But he also owns many other geodomains including Largs.com, Greenock.com and Kirkintilloch.co.uk.
Mr Butler began his working life gutting chickens at a poultry market, but a combination of foresight and luck saw him buy up a number of web addresses when the internet was just taking off.
He sold many of them off for a significant profit before buying the Glasgow.com site in 2001 for a reported £100,000.
He said: “I’ve been totally surprised by the interest in the Glasgow.com site.
“I knew there might be some interest in domain name circles, but I’ve had offers from various people including Scottish businessmen, travel firms, companies and even a middle-eastern member of royalty.
“So that’s got me thinking to offering all of them out there. I’m releasing Glasgow.com as it doesn’t fit with my current business strategy so it makes sense to release the others as well – either to the same buyer or standalone buyers.
“The other thing that has blown me away has been the serious offers coming in so quickly so that means instead of this taking until the end of summer, as I thought it might, I may be able to have this concluded by the end of May.”
It is understood one potential buyer has already tabled a bid of £650,000 for Glasgow.com.
Geographic domains – known as Geodomains – can attract significant interest and fees if a person thinks the site will generate enough traffic.
Popular Geodomain sales include Moscow.com, which went for £200,000, England.com, which was sold for £1.8 million, and NewYork.com, which netted a seven-figure sum earlier this decade.
The businessman is well respected within the digital industry for turning his attention to websites when others were still thinking of buying fax machines.
He bought one of his first sites for £100 and sold it two weeks later for £1200. He also tapped into a government drug initiative Know The Score and bought the domain name knowthescore.com, which he sold for £18,000 within a week.
But his greatest success remains the investment he made in geodomains which organically attract waves of internet traffic.
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