Any domainers here?

jamesrobins

I have made a few small sites so have some experience buying domains and I can see it must be very difficult to make any money in this now. You would have to be going for pretty long tail EMD which only small time niches marketers are going to be interested in and they won't spend any money so will just find an alternative.

The early adopters (like most things internet) must have been p$%&ing themselves because this must have been easy back in the day...

Lighthouse_in_the_dark

right sorry I havnt responded to this thread.

domaining for the little guy has changed significantly.

Im being breif because im in a rush, (i dont think i ever stop but thats beyond the point)

#1 a domain you think will be worth money to someone 90% of the time is of no use to anyone. look at your market before buying a domain. (as a rule of thump avoid payday loan domains, estate agent domains and make money online domains - these are all ultra competitive industrys and most will have a full time web team)

#2 dont buy to park on sedo, if you are lucky enough to have brought a one word .com fair play and go ahead, but other than that I personal view is that sedo scares the hell out of people because the see doman price $xx,xxx

#3 .com's and local domains, .co.uk (uk) .ca (canada) are the only onces worth targeting, again unless its a 1 word domain in which case its usally worth somthing to someone (i brought plumber(african country domain) and skateboarding (african country domain). not to sell in those countrys but because i new although they had an unusal domain ending they would sell to the write people. ended up selling plumber to a guy in texas for $600 and skateboarding to a skate shop in seattle for ($1.4k)

#4 aim to buy a domain and flip it in a month! this means contacting the business owners related to that domain, if you wait more than a month chances are you will lose interest in selling it and you'l let it expire.

#5 when emailing a prospect never put the price in the first email, explain to the why your domain will make their business money, and how there current domain is ok (dont slag it off) but why yours is better. easy to spell search engine friendly authority domain ending blablabla. also explain to them that you have also contacted their competitors (name a few) and that anyone interested should respond by email or phone by (give a date 2 weeks away)

#6 dont target dentists in the uk. my mother dated a dentist for a little while and when i told him what i did, i found out that all dentists get harrased by seo and web proffesionals trying to sell them this that and the other.


easy domain ideas are "location business" ie birminghamironmonger (no hyphens it lowers the value) another good one I found recently which is technically parking is (commonname commonname wedding) seems to be a craze at the moment for people to have a website for their marriage.


#7 americans are unimaginitive when it comes to naming citys use this to your advantage - when going for location business domains, try and get .com locations which are also citys in the states, birmingham crys out but there are a lot more

#8 expired domains are great for ideas, when buying one check to see if all other domain extensions are taken, if this is the case chances are it has at least some value.

#9 have bbc news 24 on always in the background if you can, the bbc made me over £5k when they streamed the world cup tumbolar thingy. - well worth the licence fee!

#10 dont spend money you can afford, at the end of the day their is an element of risk and i dont want to be responsible for you not being able to pay your rent because you've got a backlog of domains.

jamesrobins

Cheers for the info Lighthouse, another avenue for me to explore in the future.

Any resources you recommend to learn more?

Is this your full time income?

Lighthouse_in_the_dark

Dont think i can post links, but here goes

dnjournal search it on google if you want they have the what the weeks top domains sales went for, you will be stupidly impressed and what sells for $10k+

expireddomain net has all the domains which have expired that day just search in the top right hand corner, use the filter function and tick "only free domains" stops all the sedo links coming up

godady auctions, I cant stand go daddy as a business i find them deplorable however the godaddy auctions are a necessary evil, you have to be a member (i think its like $6 a year) but you get access to bid on all the expiring domains people have registered with go daddy, be very wary of the upsells and always look for a coupon first!

as for forums i try and stay away from them, domaining is a cut throat business and i feel safer not letting people know which domains i do currently own especially high value ones

as for income, 60% of it, I also own clickbank products and ppc marketing seems to be becoming more and more of an income stream for me

jamesrobins

You mean you have your own products on clickbank?

I've been skirting the edges of this world for a while but am only now putting in the time to learn it, currently cutting my teeth building nichesites.

Lighthouse_in_the_dark

I do indeed, I'm not going to post them here as it would seem like advertising.
I mainly do it to generate sales get the gravity up and flip them, the more i hear about clickbank in recent months the more i think they are in trouble however

if your main traffic is organic search, I would really consider making them authority sites as opposed to niche, with the new algos google keeps pumping out they seem to be hitting niche (well micro niche sites) harder and harder.

jamesrobins

Niche sites do seem unstable and I want more under my belt. My plan is build the best ones up to affiliate and then authority sites if it's something I feel I can expand. I'll also look to diversify which is why I was interested in what you are doing. Got to start somewhere and learn the basics.

NigeWick

Lighthouse_in_the_dark wrote: »

domaining for the little guy has changed significantly.

Thanks for your thoughts.

directdebiter

Hi,
I have what I consider I high value domain - but sedo dont seem to handle anything too high (above £10k) or just value it very low? Is there any advice of where to go or is it best to contact prospects direct? Thanks.

Lighthouse_in_the_dark

the age old quote when it comes to domains is

its worth what someone would pay for it?

its all about finding the right person,

Nigewick: well i believe it has at the end of the day its getting harder and harder with the traditonal methods, and unless you own very high value domains a more proactive approach to selling them is often the best way.