Subscribe

Rick is Right About Development

Elliot Silver
-
11

When it comes to development, Rick made a good point yesterday. One of my biggest obstacles when it comes to development is myself. With domain sales down for me, I have been spreading myself thinly in an effort to build revenue generating businesses on my domain names.

  • In the last two years, my company has built Lowell.com, Burbank.com, and Newburyport.com into full-fledged businesses, which require frequent updates, client meetings, sales calls, and time devoted to city research.
  • I have my domain blog, which I update every day with news, advice, and commentary. This takes a considerable amount of time, but it’s a good outlet to share and learn.
  • I am in the process of building out Torah.com into a fully operational website, which will have a whole host of features that one would expect to find on a website of this nature.
  • I have a bunch of mini sites, which don’t take a whole lot of time to manage, but they do take some time adding content, testing layouts, researching topics…etc.
  • I spend time acquiring good domain names and looking to make deals to sell other domain names.

I find myself going in circles sometimes because it’s not easy to manage all of this. Building businesses takes time and effort, and I am finding myself having less time to do the things I enjoy. There is a fine balance between spending the right amount of time building a solid business and spending too much time getting few things done.

I completely disagree with Rick about his belief regarding search engine traffic, and I can’t understand how his domain names would lose traffic with mini-sites, because one would imagine the type-in traffic would at least stay consistent, however, that’s a topic for another day.

If you are a domain investor, you need to figure out what you want to do with your domain names before you do it, especially if they may be difficult to re-sell quickly. If you are planning to develop them into a business, it might be best to focus on one and make it into the best business possible before you start another project. Staying focused on one project is difficult, especially when you are working alone.

Take it from me, buying and selling great domain names isn’t difficult. Building a business on a domain name is a completely different story, and while I don’t regret any decisions I’ve made, I am finding it much more difficult to gain traction with some of my projects, since I can’t always focus on one project at a time.

Who’s Getting Your Research Secrets?

Elliot Silver
-
6

A few months ago, an acquaintance of mine shared a link with me to a private research tool he was offering,   which I was told that very few other people had access. The information this tool provided was valuable, and I thought it was great. That is, until I realized the primary purpose for this tool – it was something that allowed the tool’s owner to learn about what searchers were searching, giving him an inside peak at what other domain investors were researching in real time.

Every domain investor has his “secrets,” whether it’s a specific type of domain name that’s earning strong revenues, knowledge of a new client buying domain names, tool that can provide traffic numbers for expiring domain names, method for contacting end users…etc. It’s also inevitable that we need to use other companies’ products to do specialized research, such as Whois lookups and traffic tools such as Alexa or Compete.

However, there are plenty of companies out there who offer a host of products and services that can also be competitors of domain investors. These companies could potentially use the information gleaned from your research to help advance their own domain investment strategies. There may not even be a way to tell for certain if a company is using your information for their own domain investment advancement.

Next time you are doing some research, completing a transaction, or using someone else’s tools for your domain investments, keep in mind that it might be a competitor in disguise, and you should do what you can to mitigate your exposure.

Eat Healthy & Get Exercise

Elliot Silver
-
11

Ever since my Dad had a heart attack a few years ago, I have been even more vigilant about my health. Fortunately for my family, my Dad fully recovered from his heart attack, but it served as a valuable lesson for me, and it’s something I urge you to take to heart.

As a domain investor, I sit behind my computer for much of the day – drinking coffee of course. Running a business can be stressful, and with the tough economy, things can be even more stressful. Working on a computer for 10+ hours a day can lead to bad posture, poor eyesight and carpal tunnel. I really don’t think there is anything physically good about working on a computer all day – except the fact that I am not spending my day lifting heavy objects. Coupled with added stress, this can lead to bad health and physical conditioning.

Anyhow, it’s important the we realize how much we need to take care of ourselves. I do my best to eat healthy meals and get enough exercise. Since my wife is a great runner who encourages me to run and work out, it’s not too difficult to stay in shape. However, if she wasn’t pushing me to do so, I would probably never get any exercise, while drinking and eating too much.

This is just a friendly reminder that you need to take some time to look after yourself and stay healthy. Get an annual check up and cholesterol test, and make sure you listen to your doctor’s advice.   Working alone can be somewhat isolating but it’s important to do what you can to maintain your good health.

I am now training for a biathlon, so it’s now time to go for a run at the gym and then take a 12 mile bike ride in the park. I challenge you to challenge yourself physically. It will stimulate you mentally and gives you time away from your computer to de-stress.

Thoughts at the End of the Week

Elliot Silver
-
4

As the week is coming to a close, I wanted to write a little bit about a few things that I thought about this past week. I bet some of you are thinking the same thing, and I welcome your thoughts in the comment section as always.

I booked my flight to New Orleans for Domainer Mardi Gras in February. For those of you from New York, Jet Blue is offering round trip tickets for around $229 after taxes – not a bad deal at all.

I wish DN Journal accepted comments. There are so many great articles and news stories posted by Ron, and it would be great if we had the ability to discuss some of them on site. I bet this would surely be a big traffic driver and would be interesting to many.

It really annoys me when bloggers and other news outlets have a comment section and don’t approve them – or they only approve the favorable comments. I wonder if these people are naive enough to think that nobody notices this – or if they simply don’t want to feel put down by people that disagree with what they are saying.

I don’t think people should develop domain names simply because others are doing it. The reason I develop mini sites is that I am a full time domain investor, and this is a way to build/add value to my domain assets in a down market. The reason I fully develop geodomains – and will be developing Torah.com (very soon) is to build businesses on them so. Anyone can sell a good domain name, but not everyone can build and manage a business. I want to challenge myself while building a revenue stream for the future, and this is an ongoing process.

If you are going to make it as a domain investor, you need to look outside of the typical domain “hang outs.” Check out webmaster forums, browse SEO websites, read up on new technology, and think about things differently than others.

I believe there are many good potential domain deals in the high end of the industry, but most of the low hanging fruit under six figures has been picked, and there aren’t nearly as many deals to be had in that area. You need to have steel stones to invest in 6 figure + domain names these days without a development/business plan, and you need a back up plan if your primary plan is to flip them.

    Buy Domains in Bulk to Save Money

    Elliot Silver
    -
    3

    This might be obvious advice, but I’ve used it many times and want to share it with you to get a better deal on a domain acquisition. Oftentimes when I inquire about a domain name, the owner will mention that he has others. More often than not, the name I inquired about is heads and shoulders above his other names. On occasion, there is more than one name I want to buy, and I use it as leverage to get both names at a better price. The owner is happy making more money, and my cost per acquisition is less.

    If a domain owner doesn’t come out and tell you he has other names for sale, you might consider asking – especially if a Whois lookup reveals that he has other domain names. Here are a few ways to find out if a person has other domain names that could possibly be for sale:

    1) Ask if the owner is selling other names. This one is obvious.

    2) You can do a Reverse IP search to see if other domain names are hosted on the same server, although that won’t do you any good if he has his name(s) parked or if he uses a popular hosting company and not a VPS or other dedicated server.

    3) Search Google for the domain owner’s name and “Whois” or the domain owners name and address. Sometimes Google will cache a page that has Whois information that other people searched

    4) Search Google for the owner’s name + the domain name you want to buy. Perhaps he has a domains for sale page containing this name and others.

    5) Do a Registrant Search to find names that are currently owned (or perhaps once owned) by the owner. This is great because a domain owner may have privatized a domain name years back, and now you can see what else he may have.

    It’s almost always better to have this knowledge before beginning a negotiation. Get a price for the name you want first, and then say something like, “would you sell xyz.com and abc.com for $x,xxx” where the price of both takes into account a discount on the first name you want.

    See Kevin Ham Speak at the Vancouver Enterprise Forum

    Elliot Silver
    -
    1

    Reinvent Technology’s Kevin Ham recently spoke at the Vancouver Enterprise Forum, a series of meetings and events for members of the technology enterprise community in British Columbia, Canada. Internet marketer Adam Killam posted a bunch of videos of Dr. Ham’s September 15th address on his You Tube channel.

    With Kevin’s company having such a huge presence in the domain industry, it’s important to listen to what he has to say. Check out Adam Killam’s You Tube channel when you have some time.

    1...165166167...211Page 166 of 211
    © Newspaper WordPress Theme by TagDiv