Markus Schnermann

By Ron Jackson 

German domainer Markus Schnermann is the picture of good health. By any measure - physical, mental, financial, you name it - he is at the top of his game. Schnermann founded a very successful business at KeywordDomains.com, is a partner in another (Domain Invest S.A.) and co-founded the biggest German language domain forum at ConsultDomain.de. After watching him soar to the top of the industry, domainers in his homeland often refer to Schnermann as a "superstar." Heady stuff - especially for someone whose parents were once told they would have to care for him for the rest of his life.

Schnermann spent most of his youth battling spastic cerebral palsy, a condition caused by a shortage of oxygen at birth. It triggered an average of 30 convulsions a day and left him in need of constant therapy. "As a little kid it took much longer to learn to speak or walk," Schnermann said, adding that his medical issues led people to reach the wrong conclusions about him. 

"When I entered a standard school the teachers told my mother that they were sorry but her son would just be dumb," Schermann recalled. When a new school for handicapped children was opened Schnermann was sent there for the next four years.  At the age of 11 doctors gave his parents the bad news - Markus would not be able to make it on his own. 

The Schnermann family needed a miracle - and they got it. "During adolescence I showed fewer and  fewer symptoms of convulsions and my wish to attend a normal school grew bigger and bigger." When his chance finally came he made the most of it. When Schnermann found his way to the gymnasium he found his previously missing physical skills were now blossoming. By the time he completed his Abitur (final exams) Schnermann said, "I realized I could easily catch up with other standard school students and I proved that I knew a thing or two. From that part of my life I learned how much I could accomplish if I just try hard enough and believe in myself. I owe my parents and especially my mother so much for supporting me in these difficult times."

"My mother came from a big farmer's family with 10 kids," Schnermann said. "She taught us to treat people with respect, all the soft skills you need in life to deal with challenges and problems and how to communicate openly and frankly. She supported us in everything we did and gave us the love and support that made us believe that we can achieve everything in life."

After surviving his childhood struggles, Schnermann's next challenge was deciding what he wanted to do with his life now that he was an adult. "I started working in construction, building houses, then got a job as a lifeguard at a big public pool. In 1994 when I met Susanne, the woman who would become my wife, I realized that there has to be more in life for me. Trying different jobs in manual labor was fun and taught me an important perspective on work in general but I never felt challenged enough."

"Registering domain names was very expensive then so the first homepage I tried to publish happened to be on Geocities.com. In 1997 I registered my first .de domain when I wanted  to publish a private travel site dedicated to India after I had taken a long trip there. I realized that all of the generic keywords that came to my mind to register were already gone. Most of these were owned by individuals whose names I saw again and again when doing a Whois search."

"While I ended up with a lousy domain name for my India site (Alles-ueber-Indien.de, which means "All about India") I instantly got infected by the "domain virus", started to register as much as possible and as I could afford. I taught myself programming and designing websites, got a degree as a webdesigner and spent nights researching and learning on the Internet about SEO and online marketing."

Schnermann and his wife Susanne (center) with a family friend on a visit to India in 1995.
His fascination with this country led to his first domain registration, Alles-ueber-Indien.de 

"In 1999 I applied for an internship at an insurance company which had just launched a new unit for the Online Business. After a few months they offered me a fulltime job as an Online Marketing specialist, followed by a job as a Project Manager to build the company Intranet. I continued to invest in mostly .de domains and started listing them for sale on Sedo in early 2000. I also exchanged ideas and fantasies with friends online about all the stuff we would buy once we start selling these names for ridiculous prices!" Schermann laughed.

"It took another year though until I sold my first domain for 3,000 Deutsche Marks and I had to learn about buying valuable names or catching dropping names to be able to make real money. My first purchase was Diaet.com (diet.com) for 700 Euros. Selling this domain three months later for five figures to a German Duke was the real kickoff for my domain business as I reinvested all the profits again and again and cumulated the success."

"Soon I made more money with my hobby than with my fulltime job, so I founded KeywordDomains.com and decided to focus on this business instead of working as an employee. This was the first time in my life I had the feeling that I found my profession, with all the challenges and excitement I was always looking for," Schnerrman said.

Schnermann added, "Although I own far  fewer gTLDs than ccTLDs, they had a huge impact on building my business. Without flipping decent keyword domains like Base.com, Fitness.org or Medicine.org I wouldn´t have been able to raise enough money to fund the growth of my company."

Schnermann's knowledge of both the U.S. market and his home market in Germany gives him a unique perspective on the differences between the two. "The German domain market is probably the most mature one of all ccTLDs in the world," Schnermann said. "Both published and unpublished sales have reached levels lately that most people have expected only from .com (kredit.de, poker.de, shopping.de, etc.). The core German domainers are very savvy and professional in what they do. A lot of them can cover at least two markets, for example the German and the English speaking ones. It is also no surprise that the leading domain sales platform, Sedo.com, was established in Cologne, Germany," Schnermann noted.

"Still I think there is plenty of room for growth in Germany as many potential investors, espescially end users and Fortune 500 companies don't get it yet, so we deal with the same situations as the .com market. The current recession and environment will probably have a positive impact on this situation - from what I can tell the sales volume has grown significantly lately. A lot of brick and mortar businesses are starting to move online because they have to. This must have an impact on future values as there is a limited supply of good keyword domains and a growing demand. New investors into .de can still find lots of opportunities if they have enough cash to invest and can consolidate the market. Hand registering potentially valuable domains is nearly impossible now as all keywords that make sense are gone already," Schnermann said.

Despite the current global recession, the past year has been Schnermann's busiest ever. "In June 2008 I began working as a Managing Director, together with Frederick Schiwek and Xavier Buck, for a new domain investment fund, Domain Invest S.A. I commute every week between my home in Muenster, Germany and Leudelange, Luxembourg. We have a very strong team of founders and investors and believe we can accomplish a lot being based in Luxembourg in the heart of Europe. The quality of people involved in this is amazing and timing for investing couldn´t be better than today," Schnermann said.

Domain Invest S.A. partners (left to right): Frederick Schiwek, 
Markus Schnermann and Xavier Buck.

His friend and partner in Domain Invest S.A., Frederick Schiwek told us that having Schnermann on their team gives them a huge advantage. "I am impressed how straight forward he is, if he wants something he works for it until he is successful. He is a very intelligent person who knows a lot about many things. This is part of why he became such a successful domainer. Knowing a lot about many fields gives you the advantage of understanding search terms much better and he was and still is an early bird."

Schiwek added "Markus, inspired by the American domain industry, started the first big domain community in Europe and that made him a kind of a superstar - someone who always has his finger on the pulse of the domains business. Many very good decisions brought him to where he is today. I am very proud to have him as a partner and friend."  

"Using keyword domains for these kind of campaigns had a big impact on the CTR (click through rate) and conversions, something that has also recently been backed up by Edwin Hayward's studies about the impact of keyword domains in PPC campaigns. Of course Domain Invest is benefitting from the domain intelligence we have build at KeywordDomains.com and will continue to do so," Schnermann said.

There are still so many opportunities in the domain business that it is difficult for many in the industry to tear themselves away from work, but Schnermann tries his best to stop and smell the roses whenever he can. "I love spending time with my family, my wife Susanne and my kids Leander and Valentin," he said. "We all have a passion for travelling. Last year we did a long vacation in California and Hawaii and my sons keep asking when we can go there again. I laso like playing golf or riding my motorbike, a BMW 1200 GS."  

Clearly most of those decisions have turned out to be the right ones. As successful as he has been, for Schnermann, who is still just 41 years old, the best is almost certainly yet to come.

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