Live 8 Negotiation

My role assignment for, “Live 8” was the manager of internet development for L.C.A, Inc.  The purpose of the negotiation was to obtain a domain name to replace live8live.com which is being seized lawfully by a Detroit based band named Live8Live.  They sued L.C.A. Inc. for rightful ownership and ICANN found that the band was rightfully entitled to the domain, the process does not allow for an appeal.  As manager, my role was to locate a new domain and at a reasonable price.  The only available domain was live8.org, registered to someone in Turkey, the page is “under construction.”   I reached out to the owner, after confirmation that the individual did indeed own the page.  I provided a brief description as to who I was and what I wanted to purchase the domain for.  I was concise in the request and initially divulged my interest in the page and why, my initial offer to purchase the site was $500,000.  Based on the given budget of 1 million, I knew this was low, knowing there would be a counter, starting low would lead the counter to be closer to both parties resistance point.  The domain owner responded, stating that he would need a significantly higher amount, closer to $1,300,000.  This counter was over the budget I was given even with the possibility of receiving an additional $200,000 on top of the 1 million already allocated.  I attempted to extract the interest of my partner and what his purpose for the domain was.  I further explained that the concert being marketed was for the purpose of charity, that I could offer more but I didn’t want to spend too much and take away from the charity.  Since I was not sure what his plan was for the domain, I asked if he had a business or some sort of service he was selling, or planned to sell using the domain once the website was fully developed.  I offered to place a banner ad on the front page of the site for live8, and informed him that currently 60,000 hits were received daily and we expected that number to double within the next few.  The banner ad would link to the new domain the other party set up if they would agree to sell, driving initial traffic to their site.  I offered $650,000 along with the banner ad on the front page, and he agreed.  Turns out that he sold art and he was launching 3 new galleries.  Since I was unable to get a clear read on his interest, I assume that he accepted the offer since the galleries were startups and he would need to get his name branded.  The offer may seem low based on the budget I was given but once his new site is developed the value of the number of hits from an ad on www.live8.org would have more value, and allow his business to grow quicker. 

Negotiating through email is more difficult than anticipated.  You can see the other person face to face, you can hear their tone, and it’s next to impossible to guess what their reaction is.  If the response to the initial offer is not almost immediate then one wonders if it was too low and borderline offensive.  There is no level of interactivity, or a seamless flow of interactivity. The delay between responses referred to as asynchronous, allows for an undetermined length of time between responses.  Email negotiation also makes it extremely difficult to determine and interpret the other parties’ interests.   Since I was playing the role of someone that had a greater need, I laid out exactly what I wanted and why I wanted it, even asking what the other party’s interests were flat out to avoid confusion.  My partner never really answered my question about what their interests were which made it that much more difficult to read the situation, the negotiation exhibited diminished inter-party process cooperation.   The accuracy in trying to judge the other parties interest was non-existent, and we were unable to identify joint gains.  I feel as though if the other party indicated their interest and what their plans were for the domain in the first place then I may have offered more money along with the advertising to attempt to expand the pie.  It seemed that the offer was accepted just to end the negotiation more quickly.  I can’t really tell if my partner was uncomfortable with the negotiation since it was a different avenue that we have not used yet, or if there was just very little interest to engage.  There was certainly no advantage to exchange information in this negotiation, if my partner were shy or uncomfortable negotiating, one would think that email would have been a means to negotiate more comfortable, more time to formulate a response, digest information, and no fear of giving away their position through body language.  The negotiation was interesting, but I felt like I was constantly trying to extract information, not information he didn’t necessarily want me to have, but information needed to have a successful negotiation.