Bloggings of a Domain Flipper

Domain Forum Auctions

I've been talking a lot about custom parking pages lately. These pages offer a huge benefit over traditional parking pages, but take the time to build the page, create the graphics, and add the advertisements.

I have decided to put one of our recently built custom-parking pages up for auction on DNForum. The domain for sale is DomainSaleCentral.com.

For those new to the process of buying/selling domain names on a forum site, I'll provide a brief introduction. Right now NamePros and DNForum are the top domaining forums online. These are a great place to read the latest news, pick-up some great tips, as well as buy and sell domain names. If you are new to domaining you should be reading these forums on a daily basis.

One big advantage to selling your domain names through a forum is that you don't have to pay any commission. Setting-up an auction is easy to do however it's important to remember to clearly explain the terms of your auction. I have seen a number of poorly explained auctions that end-up as long arguments between the buyer and the seller on what the original terms of the auction were.

To properly list a domain for auction on a forum there are a few key pieces of information that you need to include. First is the start time of the auction - make sure this is clear, not 5PM but 5PM EST. Next is how the auction ends - does it end 24 hours after someone bids? Maybe you want it to end 24-hours after the listing is posted? It's up to you but this must be made perfectly clear if you want to end your auction without a hassle.

Next you'll need to specify a bid-increment. Keep this low if you want people to continue to bid-up your auction. Finally you should provide the payment methods that you accept. The last thing you want is to have someone offer good money for your domain just to find-out they were expecting to pay with a personal check.

By creating a well-explained post for your auction you stand a much better chance of getting bids, and ending the auction with a happy buyer (and you a happy seller).

So if you want to see an auction in action, or interested in bidding on one of our custom parked domains, feel free to hop on over to DNForum and join-in on the action!

Latest Custom Parking Pages

If you've read my book then you know that Domain Flipping is a two-step process. First it is essential to get good organic traffic coming to your name. A standard parking page can't get the job done because they index very poorly with search engines. Building a custom parking page allows you to build-up a base-level of traffic and revenue from a domain before doing the full flip.

Keyword research can go a long way with custom parking pages. By writing your own, keyword-rich, high-quality content you can create a website that monetizes far better than any parking page. We recently purchased an older domain, CheapMercury.com registered in 1999. In the same week we also bought OnlineTravelTips.info which was already making around $5/month. Starting-out with a domain with a history like CheapMercury.com can mean greater search engine coverage and backlinks, which in the end equates to - traffic.

Buying a domain that is already making money is also a common practice of ours. Most of the time the names we buy are being monetized through parking services. I can oftentimes purchase a name making $2-$5 a month and turn it into a site making 10x that in a couple of months. This is before the domain is even flipped - just putting a custom parking page on it!

So you might be wondering what Domain Flipping is then? Domain Flipping is the next-step, once the custom parking sites have matured and are getting regular monthly traffic then it's time to put a full-scale website on the domain. What you create is a valuable asset, a domain name, already making money with consistent monthly traffic and quality backlinks.

If you want to learn Domain Flipping don't forget to read my book!

Buying a Domain? How to avoid being scammed.

As the domaining industry becomes more popular scam artists find a growing market to profit from. With a growing number of places to buy domain names how can you make sure you're really getting the deal you think you are?

If you are buying through a major listing service like Afternic, Sedo or Snapnames then the chance of fraud is greatly decreased. This does not mean though that you can let your guard down. Domainers need to be very careful when buying from online forums or when contacted by interested sellers. As with any investment you make in life - it always pays to do your homework.

When buying a domain based on name-value, the only real information you want to be sure of is that the person selling you the name is the actual owner. This can be verified in a number of ways but the best initial check is to just take a peek at the WHOIS entry. It is amazing how many people will buy a domain name without looking at the WHOIS entry first. It's an early warning sign if the names, addresses, city, etc. don't match. This will give you reason to look a little deeper.

If the WHOIS information doesn not match-up you can tell them to change it to match their own information. If they are indeed the domain owner they can easily make this change. Another technique that I often use just to be 100% sure is ask the owner to make a small change like adding the numbers "123" to the company name. In general you can rest much easier knowing that the seller can edit this information. For any sale in the $x,xxx range this is a must.

For domain names that are being purchased based on traffic this can be much more complex. The first thing you'll want to do is ask the seller for 1-year traffic and revenue stats. If they can't provide this, don't buy. This is a simple piece of information to provide and anyone trying to sell a name based on traffic needs to be able to provide this information.

The next thing you need to determine is where the traffic is coming from. If a seller is claiming that their domain gets 5,000 hits a month but 4,800 of those hits came from a paid traffic blasting service you'll need to know this information. By getting a year of stats you should be able to see if there is any suspicious increases in traffic.

The best way to verify if a seller is being truthful about traffic is by asking them to put a piece of tracking code onto the site. You can then monitor the traffic through your own tracking software and see exactly where the traffic is coming from.

On NamePro's a seller recently sent me details on a domain name he claimed was making $20/month in revenue. I asked for 1-year traffic and revenue stats. He provided data but only for March of 2008. Thinking this was a bit fishy I took at look at the WHOIS - the domain was registered less than a month ago! This domain hasn't even been in existance for a full month but the owner is already claiming consistent $20/month revenue. These are the types of scams you can avoid by doing just 2-3 minutes of research.

There is no doubt about it - we are all on the verge of something great. This is truly the very beginnings of what will be a huge thriving market. As with any market, more people and money changing hands eveyday draws scam-artists in. Do you homework and understand exactly what you are buying. By being proactive and making informed decisions you will get the best deals and scam artists will find it harder and harder to make money. 

Sedo Pro - Domainers Beware

As you most likely have heard by now - Sedo is offering a new parking service called Sedo Pro. Targeted towards "Domain Professionals", rather than just accepting any old domain they want to know about your portfolio and the kind of traffic your names receive.

With any new service I like to see the first round of reports before deciding whether to jump on the bandwagon or not. I'm glad I did this with Sedo Pro as the results so far look to be a disaster.

A post in DNJournal yesterday from a Sedo Pro user tells of the sad story as he watches his revenue shrink to nothingness. [Read Full Post]

One of my favorite posts in this thread reads:

"Why didn't I listen to myself when I said, "Don't do it!"

03/09/08    
55 Views
1 Clicks
2.00% Click rate
$0.09 $/Click
$0.09 Revenue"

As the thread goes on the problem is discovered - Sedo's new auto-landing algorithm is failing to pick the right parking page for the domain. It seems that the automatic keyword selection is very off-target. Thus, entire portfolios that once earned a nice monthly revenue suddenly take a steep drop.

The Sedo Pro user here had a medical billing site that made close to $10/month. Once he switched to Sedo Pro the parking page showed links for Dinnerware and Fiestaware!

Here comes the crazy part - Sedo says that it can take between 1-4 weeks for these landing pages to adjust. This means that you might have to lose an entire month's revenue just to use the service. If you're making $x,xxx a month with parked domains this is not a hit you'll want to take.

To me it would seem that Sedo Pro would fail to deliver on it's #1 mission as a parking service - to provide a way for domainers to effectively monetize their domains. Making a service for "Domain Professionals" means catering to a crowd that might make over $xx,xxx on parked-names. Asking them to sacrifice one-month of revenue seems like a steep cost.

Domain Graduate - An Essential Book for your Library

I had the chance to read Sean Stafford's new book, Domain Graduate recently and was very impressed. There are a very limited number of resources in the domaining community and this is one of the most complete resources I've ever found.

Just so you know, this is not a shameless plug for the book - on this blog I have always put my own views and opinions above keeping people happy. I rustled some feathers early on with my posts about Sedo and Afternic and will continue to share my thoughts and opinions freely with my readers.

That being said, this is an absolute must-have book. For those new to domaining this book will save you months, if not years of time learning how to do things the right way. It's true that if you spend ten-hours a day for six-months straight reading DNForum you'll probably be in pretty good shape - but why spend that time?

Sean is a leader in the domaining industry and one of the key people working on DNZoom.com where I actively manage our domain portfolio. For more experienced domainers I think you'd be surprised by how many ideas the book will stir. I had a few great inspirations while reading the book that are already saving me money.

There are few domaining eBooks out there I'd recommend along with my own. This is a book that I can honestly say is worth every cent of the price. So whether you're a new domainer looking to learn the tricks of the trade, or an old hat looking for some new inspiration Domain Graduate will have something for you.

.in - The Sleeper TLD of 2008

.in has been around for a bit now and I'm still finding some great .in and .co.in names. It has become difficult to know where to place your bets with so many TLD's on the market right now. I hear a lot of buzz on the forums about .us and .info, and .Asia is all over the place with it's Landrush getting ready to end.

So what's so special about .in? Well, first-off India is one of the most rapidly developing countries in the world with a growing middle-class. With a population of 1.12 billion there is a very large available market.

Critics of .in make a good point, broadband penetration is very low in India so it's not really 1.12 billion people actively using the Internet everyday.

What I can say is that people in India are already using .in and .co.in when searching online. I own the domain name CricketGames.co.in which steadily receives about 10 hits a day, all type-in traffic. If it's getting that kind of type-in traffic now, I can't imagine how this will grow over the course of the year.

As more and more people in India start using .in (just like we expect people here to use .us) the domain values should see a quick jump as the true value becomes apparent. This happened with .mobi almost overnight! I'm not saying you're going to be a millionaire by scooping-up every .in you can find, but I do think that we should all keep a very close eye on .in because it could just be the sleeper TLD of 2008.

Sedo vs. Afternic Category Listing Showdown

On February 19th I listed two domains as category listed with Sedo and two with Afternic. I did this to better understand how much traffic (and bids) a category listing upgrade would create. Here are the results so far:

Sedo:
Category Listed .com -> 122 views, 0 bids
Category Listed .mobi -> 129 views, 0 bids

Afternic:
Category Listed .com -> 51 views, 0 bids
Category Listed .mobi -> 46 views, 0 bids

With Sedo I decided to list CollectWealth.com and with Afternic ForumsBusiness.com. The .mobi is the same for both - PhoneSounds.mobi. Originally I was going to use the same .com however at the last minute decided to give Afternic a bit of a handycap so gave them a more valuable name for the test.

From the results above it is quite clear that using a Sedo category upgrade will get you more visits to your listing. It is *very* important to notice though that none of the vists to listings on either Sedo or Afternic enticed anyone to bid on the name.

All of the names listed are set to "Make Offer" to encourage bids of any price.

For those reading my blog who are new to domaining, the lesson here should be clear. Selling a domain name isn't as easy as putting it up on a domain listing service and watching the money roll in. Even upgrading listings does not give any guarantee that the given name will sell. 

My biggest advice to beginners is to be proactive and use a number of different mediums
for selling their domain names. While I have many names in my portfolio listed on Sedo, Afternic, and Snapnames, I still sell through 10+ channels on top of this!

If you want to learn more don't forget to read my eBook at: DNFlipping.com.

If you are interested in viewing my full portfolio, you can see the names I have available for sale at: LintonInvestments.com.

Top 3 Resources for new Domainers

I get emails from a lot of new domainers looking for a list of the best domaining websites and forums. I thought it would be a good idea to share what I think are the top three resources for new domainers.

1) DNForum.com
DNForum is the main domaining forum. This is the best place to learn from experienced domainers on absolutely every topic you can think of. I always say that the best way to learn is to talk to someone who is doing it - this is your chance.

2) NameNewbie.com
Website by domain legend Ron Jackson publisher of DNJournal.com. This is the best place to learn everything you need to make money with domain names.

3) Domaining.com
All of the top domaining blogs in one place. If you want to stay on top of what's going on in the domaining world today, this is the place.

With these sites in your arsenal you're on your way to becoming a successful domainer!

Latest custom parking pages

I have discussed custom parking pages on my blog before. The rule is simple: building a custom website on your domain name with Google Adsense and basic content will make you significantly more money than ANY parking service.

For those who didn't read my earlier post on this, I'll explain. When using a parking service you are sharing the commission from the click with your Parking company. These ads are usually served by Google to begin with. Suppose someone clicks a link on your parked page, then you, the parking company, and Google are all paid by the advertiser.

By creating a custom parking page you stop sharing your click revenue with the parking company and you and Google get to split the winnings! On top of this, I have found that custom parking pages have a significantly higher click-thru rate than parked pages. Higher click-thru rate also means more money. Putting this all together, a custom parking page gets you more money per click, and more clicks - I'd call that a win-win situation!

I just finished three new custom parking pages generated from the template that I built. While it does take some time to put together an initial custom-parking page, the payoffs are well worth it.

Just one final clincher here - custom parking pages can list very well in search engines. This means that your domain's value will grow over time as it get more traffic and more people linking to it, finding it in searches, etc. So not only do you make more money while you own the domain, but in the process you are dramatically increasing the value of the name. Now that is win-win-win!

New Custom Parking Pages:

RegisterGreatNames.com

DomainSaleCentral.com

HappySticks.com

** All of these domain names are for sale with custom parking page included. **

Feel free to send me your offer if interested.

Have a great weekend everyone and happy domaining!