How to Make a Living in the Domain Business

[danielr]

Currently, I am averaging about $70,000 per year in PPC, revenue sharing, and affiliate programs. And I would like to let some people in on a few secrets. I cannot promise you will do the same, but the following information I could easily write a book and sell (but you are gong to get the best info for FREE).

I currently own close to 1800 domains and close to 1000 of them are poker domains. Yes, I know what you are thinking (all the good poker domains are gone) and its not going to help you… well I have some very interesting news for you. I read an article last December on the internet, and purchased about 10 domains because of this article. 3 of these 10 domains I purchased make an average of $25 dollars per day in PPC. Together that is $75 per day and about 1/3 the revenue that I make on my PPC per day (from these 3 domains). But before I go into this, about getting the best name, I want to discuss how I got where I am today.

When I got into the domain business just more than 2 years ago, I fell flat on my face (just like I see many of the newbees today). But I learned from my mistakes and I learned from my profits. It’s just as important to learn from what you do right vs what you do wrong. If you do something right… can you do it better?

In the first 3 months of my venture in the Domain Business and maxing out one of my credit cards, I realized that about half the domains I purchased were going nowhere. I had them parked at Afternic and moved them to SEDO a few months later. However, there was just one domain that I picked up and it purchased it by accident. It was a typo from a non trade mark site. And I was actually getting traffic and PPC on SEDO with this domain. So I started buying more similar Typos, but I was not the only person buying typo domains and the really good typos domains for PPC were bought up quickly. So I had to came out with a method that really helped me find some great typos and I am going to share this with you…..


1) Use a spreadsheet or text document that you can SORT. I personally use excel

2) Type the name of the domain you want the typo for, over and over and hit the return key after each time you type it. This will have it appear each time on a new line.

3) After each time you type the name, you MUST pick your hands up off the keyboard because it prevents a repetitive pattern.

4) Sometimes I type it about 20 times and rest and save the document.

5) If you can, do not look at the screen when you type, or if you make a mistake do not correct it.

6) After you type the domain about 500 times, then sort out your column of text. Now you are going to be able to see the most common typos you make because the common mistakes will be grouped together.

7) Sometimes I have others (type) it out because I don’t always make the same typos. My cat makes the most typos now.

About the same time learned this method, I started getting more poker domains. And yes I was lucky to grab many nice typos of poker sites. However, I currently own over 400 poker site typos which makes up over 60 percent of my PPC.

After a while I did pick up some trade marked domain typos and even found a way to dodge them (I am not going to go into that now). But if I did pick up a very good trade mark domain typo that makes a large profit, I always do a private registration. It does not stop them from taking the domain; however it weeds out the attorneys that just send the normal certified letter to scare you.


The next bit of information is how to find and get the domains that have potential. This is how I found those 3 domains last December. And in a similar example….. a few days ago I saw this article on the GOOGLE news about how GoldenSpirit is going to get into the online poker business.
http://www.marketwire.com/mw/release_html_b1?release_id=88803

Golden Spirit is a very rich mining company in Alaska and now they want to get into the online poker business. Well they did pick up GoldenSpiritPoker.com but guess who owns GoldenSpiritPoker.Net and GoldSpiritPoker.com. Of course it is just speculation, however, I like my chances with a company who has the money to advertise. Last December I did the same with FullTiltPoker.com and it is really paying off.

The bottom line is reading as much as you can about a domain you are interested in buying can be all the inside information to score big. It does not have to be a poker domain. Big companies make mistakes by only buying the .com and not any similar domains/variations, and that is were domain buyers like us have the edge.

I have said this in other post, and maybe I am shooting myself in the foot by saying it here, but everyday… I read the news on Google about poker. I also always monitor www.PokerPulse.com because I want to know how all the top poker sites are doing. If there is a new online poker site or event, I want to know. Sometimes I wonder if I should be reading about technology more than just poker.

I am not saying everyone had to buy poker domains to be successful, however, the domain industry and technology is NOT stagnated. 2 years ago “POD” was unheard of. What is going to be the next new key words? Well it’s not going to just fall in your lap, but one of the first to know really helps. There is tons of articles just waiting to be searched and read by speculators like me and you, and it’s all FREE.

I believe that….. To be successful in the domain business you have to learn from your mistakes, your profits, and with the information I have just provided you it only takes the initiative. I can just see it, I made everyone on NamePros a millionaire.

 

[Badger]

How will we type without keyboard in three years time???

You kiddin me right..........

errr, maybe by doing that thing we were born with i.e. by speaking...

Mind you, i guess by then we'll start regging speako's

:lol:

 

[ThreeD]

How will we type without keyboard in three years time???

voice recognition is the key word..it's already on cellphones, pda's, some kitchen systems and surround sound systems have voice recognition installed

 

[Midano]

voice recognition is the key word..it's already on cellphones, pda's, some kitchen systems and surround sound systems have voice recognition installed

How do you think this will work on hyphenated domains? IDNs? Domains with numbers ("4" or "four")? Different words that sound similar ("four" or "for")?
When you say "IP", will it be recognized as "IP", "eye P" or "I pee"?

Keyboards are here to stay as long as there's no real Artificial Intelligence. And it's not going to happen anytime soon.

 

[primacomputer]

How will we type without keyboard in three years time???

You kiddin me right..........

errr, maybe by doing that thing we were born with i.e. by speaking...

Mind you, i guess by then we'll start regging speako's

:lol:

No, I'm not kidding you. I've been listening to people say the same thing for more than 10 years and we still aren't anywhere near replacing keyboards with voice recognition. We won't be much closer in 3 years time.

What we were born with... You mean fingers I have yet to meet someone who was born with the ability to speak. You learn to use your voice just like you learn to use your fingers.

Keyboards are here to stay. Even in flights of fancy like Star Trek where you have computers you can actually talk to they still have keyboards. I still use the keyboard on my cel phone, even though I got my first phone with voice recognition over five years ago. If people are so inclined to talk why do I receive 20 times as many texts as calls. I even use the virtual keyboard on my PDA to type which is 10 times faster than character recognition.

In addition, my typing is perfectly understandable in a noisy room. I can understand a Glaswegians typing. I can type in a library, or other place where silence in needed. I can execute a sequence of image manipulations in a few seconds that would take a minute to read. Typing rules dude!

 

[equity78]

I agree with you 100 % on that post Prima people always talk like voice will replace keyboards. Your grandchildrens' children will know Keyboards. IMO

 

[Badger]

Nice post prima, well put and a good arguement. But what you are talking of are the frailties of todays standard of voice recognition systems.

But, as i say, you are talking of todays available technology.

You dont take your keyboard into a bar to order a drink, sit around in a room with groups of friends or go about your daily tasks (for that matter). You speak probably 200 times more than you type in a regular day and if you had a situation where you needed a keyboard then im sure you could use one. Im sure sms messages will still be sent and also email too. Sometimes a short message is all you want to convey and i cant see the link between dictating this via a keyboard or with voice rec??

And if you were in a noisy room with a glaswegian, i guess youd still have to revert to the written word. But with your keyboard under your arm..........?

I have seen the new voice rec tech in trial and it is amazing. Without training, you can command the pc to do everything you currently do solely with a computer keyboard but way simpler.

You do not have to sat crouched over a desk, and you can navigate way faster and touch screen prompts and options are cool.

Im not saying that out will go the keyboard and in will come voice rec. My point is that when they become entwined, which THEY WILL, typos will become more a thing of the past, eventually becoming extinct...

 

[Fleege]

how long can this thread keep living and being so damn interesting.

Anyway. I think I will retire from the domain typo bidnis. Tried two and they have not generated much type-in traffic. I am optimizing the same domains at their parking spots to get found of searches for those typo words but it doesnt look too good. liked the experience and the attitude turnaround. a small $16 fee for two doms for a year + they might just get going here soon but not (obviously) from the type in traffic -- which is the only KEy factor to typo domains.

 

[tandiono]

 

[primacomputer]

I'm not talking about the limitations of today's technology I'm talking about what it takes to get the job done. The only thing capable of processing speech is a neural network billions of time more complex than created so far. If Moore's law hold up we are going to be waiting several decades before machines can do this. There's been a lot of hype about the Earth Simulator being the first machine to approach the power of a human brain. So basically when we can stuff that power into something the size of a cel phone we can begin to look at viable voice recognition on a digital platform. Personally I think that long before that people will realise the futility of trying to preform these types of tasks without a true analogue neural net and get on with the job, perhaps shaving a few decades off the delivery schedule. But we won't even have viable technology to think about replacing keyboard in 10 years, let along 3.

I do take my keyboard to the pub. I always have the virtual keyboard on my PDA, and if I haven't stopped at home after work I have the virtual keyboard on my tablet as well as a tiny USB one in the bad with it (in the event I need I need really high speed input). I can't remember the last time I was in the pub where I didn't type something. A note, a number, a URL, an IM, whatever.

I use my keyboards a lot, as do other people whose work and lifestyle requires it. Typists, secretaries, programmers, and IM addicted teenagers all type far more than they speak. And most are happy and comfortable doing it. I don't crouch over a desk I relax in a chair. And I like it.

I have tried nearly every type of voice recognition since I got my first covox for my C64 in the mid '80s. There has been steady slow improvement that shows no signs of delivering real natural voice processing any the foreseeable future. I can give my computer simple commands in a quiet room just like I could 20 years ago. And in a quiet room with a high quality microphone I can dictate a document with 50% accuracy at 20 WPM if I speak to my computer as if it were a mentally retarded puppy. And yes this will improve This time next year I will be able to speak to it as if it were a mentally retarded fully grown dog.

Voice recognition has it's uses, even now. Turning off everything in the flat and dimming the light by putting on my best Patrick Stewart voice and saying “Computer! Night Mode!” is just oh so cool. And if I had to drive I could see the voice commands and “magic word” features of my cel phone being useful. But we are so far off from it being anything more that this that speculating on it's effect on typos pointless. Who knows what technology will be around by that time. Will your 100 years NSI registrations have paid off, or will domain names be simply remembered as despised relics of the three great dotcom busts of 2000, 2015 and 2032?

 

[Venolus]

Let any technology replace todays gadgets, but they will all have some potential limitations that will continue to urge human kind to invent something else
Thats special about it....lol

 

[MistaPrimeMinista]

Yo, danielr !

I must ask you something again.

Can you hook me up with some typos that you think might be interesting to register ?

Something like 30 Hits a day ?

If your interested in any of the names in my signature id be happy to exchange them for a working typo lol
Exept www.air.sc cuz its my lil fetish

 

[Badger]

Im not saying that out will go the keyboard and in will come voice rec. My point is that when they become entwined, which THEY WILL, typos will become more a thing of the past, eventually becoming extinct...

full circle

 

[danielr]

Yo, danielr !

I must ask you something again.

Can you hook me up with some typos that you think might be interesting to register ?

Something like 30 Hits a day ?

From my experience in finding typos, it is more important to determine what kind of typos you want to find. The reason why I say this is because the highest traffic typos I own actually do the least amount of revenue compaired to some of the others. I am talking about the following:

Yahdoo.com
Googmle.com

The traffic is untargetable, which means most of the poeple are looking for Yahoo or Google and when they dont get there... they dont hang around.
But when you get domains like ipodL.com ("L" key is near the ".") you can target that traffic with Ipod links.

So my suggestion is... before you go out a pick a fight, pick somebody or something you can beat (make a profit). I would rather get steady low targeted traffic that high untargeted traffic. But if it is traffic you are looking for, regardless of what type, You have to go after the highest traffic sites; unfortunately, others are and have taken advantage of that.

I strongly suggest that you read the google news, on a subject that you are intersted in finding traffic, and speculate on getting domains that you think will be high traffic sites or new to technology. I believe that there will be some breakthroughs in technology in the future that will wind up being very high keywords in the years to come, and that is the best way to find domains that have potential to be very high traffic.

hope this helps

 

[Vonna.com]

Yes i understand you now!

The 5 test domains i purchased to test this out, is bringing in $2.30 PER CLICK @ sedo, i will still publish the traffic and earnings of the test typo domains when they have been running for 1 month ( 1 week to go ). so you all can see what the best typo is.

 

[traffictaxi]

Can someone tell me how it's possible to do a search in Alexa and list it in site rank order? I looked all over there site and just can't find the option after I perform a searh on a keyword to list it based on the sites rank.

Thanks,

- TrafficTaxi

 

[Vonna.com]

Just use the Alexa directory ( not the search ) , you find it there

All Poker sites is listed in the "Poker" directory.

Can someone tell me how it's possible to do a search in Alexa and list it in site rank order? I looked all over there site and just can't find the option after I perform a searh on a keyword to list it based on the sites rank.

Thanks,

- TrafficTaxi

 

[Michelle]

After only being around a week not learning an awful lot but alittle more than I started out knowing :hehe: After buying lots of no good domain names I have come to the conclusion that all the real good names have already gone, those that are still around, I cant afford those that I have parked are not earning any money and I cant re-sell the few that are ok'sh enough to make up for the loss :blink:

Really need to make a friend here that knows what they are doing :hearts:

 

[matt247]

Dan, can you tell me if you register names other than .com/.net, do you register all types of extensions?

 

[tolkein]

Voice recognition is far from perfect - I've worked with a leading voice recog. comany before. There're too many words, so many ways to say something, so many different accents, pitches, environmental sounds, etc.

Regarding typos, I find that you have to be very careful. I think it's risky for poker sites and news sites for example. Because people frequent these sites very often, they'll probably just bookmark it!

 

[Jimmy Changa]

After only being around a week not learning an awful lot but alittle more than I started out knowing :hehe: After buying lots of no good domain names I have come to the conclusion that all the real good names have already gone, those that are still around, I cant afford those that I have parked are not earning any money and I cant re-sell the few that are ok'sh enough to make up for the loss :blink:

Really need to make a friend here that knows what they are doing :hearts:

It appears everyone goes through a peroid of stupid mistakes and bad domain purchases. It's how you learn from this that makes all the difference.

 

[savillor]

Thanks !

Great comment. Thanks.

 

[worldstar]

good learning,thanks

 

[Callmoney]

Nice Thread :kickass:

Well.. for you guys starting with typos the only think i can say is go slowly...
Do a lot of research before you buy a typo and you will avoid mistakes

I've registered two typos, one from a well ranked art website and other from a celebrity.The CTR is awfull so, probably, i'll let the names drop... :td:
What i'm trying to explain, is that there is no Secret Formula do find typos so, you must learn with your own mistakes.

Best Regards,

CallMoney

 

[danielr]

After only being around a week not learning an awful lot but alittle more than I started out knowing :hehe: After buying lots of no good domain names I have come to the conclusion that all the real good names have already gone, those that are still around, I cant afford those that I have parked are not earning any money and I cant re-sell the few that are ok'sh enough to make up for the loss

When I got into the domain business about 2 years ago i was told the same thing, and after my first 9 months of not selling a single domain out of the 200 I registered... I felt the same way. In a way it is true that the premium names are taken; but the only way to make the big money is to speculate on what is going to be the future keywords. Dont wait for an article to hit the front page of USA today or the front Page of Yahoo/MSN news. Try to search the news about something you know about and use what you know as leverage. I am sure if you just searched about "Fuel Cells" which will be the power source of the future you can find something domain related. I just happened to be lucky that I know a lot about poker and used what i know to purchase poker domains... but I dont only own poker names. I believe we each know more about a subject that most and use what you know to get the edge.

Voice recognition is far from perfect - I've worked with a leading voice recog. comany before. There're too many words, so many ways to say something, so many different accents, pitches, environmental sounds, etc.

Regarding typos, I find that you have to be very careful. I think it's risky for poker sites and news sites for example. Because people frequent these sites very often, they'll probably just bookmark it!

I am going to let everyone in on another big secret about typos..... Go after typos that are advertised on TV. If a web surfer sees a link/banner and clicks on this link... there is NO chance for a typo. But when they see a commercial on TV, then typos are going to happen. Last year when FreeCreditReport.com was running ads on TV I bought FreeCREport.com (which has an overlay typo for CRE) and I did very well.

The major PokerSites are always running ads on TV, esp on the poker tournaments, and now ever the smaller pokersites are running ads. Some sites dont advertise on TV but just from word of mouth or surfers just seeing the banners, they might just type it in at a later date.

 

[Don]

lol... I just wanted to say congratulations dan...

This thread has been active almost the entire time i've been a member.

Quite impressive! :hehe: