Have you heard about domain names
that sold for over a million dollars? Inspired by this,
you imagine registering a great domain name, hanging
onto it for a while, and then selling it off to become
the next multi-millionaire. It could happen, but don`t
count on it!
First of all, many of the truly
great domain names are already taken. Second, the dot
com bust took some of the wind out of inflated domain
name prices. (If you sell your domain name for millions
of dollars worth of stock in a publicly traded dot com
flop, what is the name really worth?)
The cybersquatter buys domain
names totally on speculation. Sometimes he will register
names of famous brands, companies, or individuals. Time
and again, these domain name speculators learn the hard
way that they must respect intellectual property rights.
They hope that some large corporation will pay big bucks
to them for the use of the company`s own (already trademarked)
name. Instead, they end up with threatening letters
from a law firm for their attempts at extortion.
However, you can still make money
from domain names if you are sensible in your approach.
Here are some suggestions on ways to profit.
1. Affiliate Programs: Use your
domain name to promote an appropriate affiliate program.
Either redirect to the affiliate site or write a review
that links to them.
2. Informational Sites: Create
content and then profit from it by earning advertising
revenue through Google AdSense or a similar program.
3. Redirect to Your Own Site:
Some reasons you might want to do this include preventing
competitors from using a particular domain name and
benefiting from searches some users perform by domain
name. (For example, if they wanted to order flowers,
they might just type "flowers.com" in their
web browser. You could get some traffic and sales this
way.)
4. Product Sites: Create your
own or sell someone else`s product appropriate to your
domain name.
5. Park Your Domain Names: You
might feel that your name has real potential for resale
value. There are companies that will allow you to park
your domain on their servers, advertise that your name
is for sale, and split advertising revenue with you.
The trick is to generate traffic
for your domain name. That traffic in turn will create
revenue. Then, when you go to sell your domain name,
you will have a few things going for you.
First, you will have a fully
developed website. A fully constructed building on a
piece of land increases the value of the real estate
property. Similarly, the value of your domain name is
enhanced by a complete and operating website.
Second, you have traffic. Just
as a shopping mall with no traffic results in no sales,
so a website must have traffic to generate income.
Third, you have income. An income
property, such as an apartment building, can be appraised
on the basis of its income (as well as other factors).
Similarly, the gross income, net profits and cashflow
of a website have value. For example, if someone offered
you $1,000 for your domain name and website when it
was generating $10,000 per day in profits, you would
likely laugh at him.
You really can profit
from your domain name investments by adding value and
properly developing your web properties.
About The Author
J. Stephen Pope, President of Pope Consulting
Inc., http://www.popeconsultinginc.com/
has been helping clients to earn maximum business profits
for over twenty-five years.
For valuable Work at Home Small Business
Ideas, visit: http://www.yenommarketinginc.com/
