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Who The Hell Are You?

Elliot Silver
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2

When you’re getting ready to launch a website, it’s important to keep in mind that your site’s visitors and readers are going to want to know who you are and what your background is, especially if you own the category defining brand. When I first launched my geodomain websites, my About Us pages lacked detail, and a few people emailed me telling me they wouldn’t discuss advertising until they knew exactly who I am and what my objectives are/were.

People crave knowledge and information, and they want to know from where the information is coming. When Frank Schilling started his Seven Mile Blog, he was giving great domain and business advice, and he was also dissecting the news that impacted domain investors. The primary reason Frank Schilling’s blog became very popular so quickly was because of who Frank is and what Frank has done for the industry.

Whether you are developing a site about real estate, cars, the stock market, or even domain names, it’s only fair that you tell the readers exactly who you are and why you are an expert they should trust. Not only does this provide a level of comfort to your readers, but it helps provide a connection between you and your readers, encouraging them to become more engaged with your website.

The more engaged your readers are with you, the more likely it is that advertisers will pay top dollar for your available advertising space.

GeoDomain Development Idea

Elliot Silver
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17

I know a lot of people who own city keyword .com domain names, and I own several of them as well. I want to share a development idea I have, as I have found most of the longer tail geodomain names I own (most are attorney or lawyer names) don’t get much type in traffic and make very little revenue as a result. I haven’t put this idea into practice yet but want to share it with those who might wish to do so.

Using a modified classifieds theme or a directory package, create empty directories that cost anywhere from $9 – 99/year to sign up. The advertiser will receive a full page within the website to promote his business, and the company will be listed on the primary page. It will be very similar to Frank Schilling’s MontrealRestaurants.com. Payment will need to be made via Paypal and should be an annual subscription for easy re-billing.

The idea is that once you create and customize your platform for a few hundred dollars (unless you are able to do the work on your own), you can then version it out to your other similar domain names to lower your development cost per domain name. Contrary to what some people might say, I do happen to think a site like this should look good so potential advertisers are more interested in advertising. I received many more comments about DogWalker.com’s look and style rather than its searchability and functionality.

By doing this, it will help generate revenue, once you’ve done enough SEO work to get it ranked in Google. As a comparison, DogWalker.com ranked #1 in Google for the term “dog walker” within 2 months of launching it, and it had been a Godaddy landing page for a while, so the SEO aspect isn’t as difficult as it might seem.

Like I said before, I haven’t done this yet so I can’t give any feedback about the likelihood for success. I tried to sell HattiesburgAttorney.com, LynnAttorney.com, BozemanAttorney.com, and a few others similar names without much luck, so I will probably try this model out on these names before the end of the year. If it fails to yield any signups, I imagine getting these names ranking in Google for their keywords will at the very least increase their saleability and value.

Feel free to share your experiences with this.

Finding Affiliate Partners for Websites

Elliot Silver
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21

One of the primary reasons I chose to re-design Lowell.com was to change my approach to advertising sales. At the moment, the sales process is manual, and advertisers cannot sign up without contacting me. Big mistake. I am not a great sales person when it comes to advertising, and I don’t like making cold calls or sending emails. As a result, I only have a few advertisers on the site.

With the new site (which I hope to launch within 2 weeks), advertisers will be able to create and pay for directory listings manually in the Yellow Pages, although the more expensive banners will still be generated by me. I’ve had considerable interest in Yellow Pages listings, and I expect the revenue from listings to pay for the re-design within just a few months.

Although I have a few local advertisers (including the Courtyard by Marriott), I want to add some affiliate banners as well (including a new prominent 728×90 spot and 250×250 spot). Finding appropriate affiliate programs is a bit of a challenge because of the broad nature of Lowell.com, but I want to share a few things that I am doing, hopefully starting a bit of a discussion.

Here are a few things I am considering when selecting affiliates from Linkshare:

  • Does the affiliate compete with current local advertisers (like hotels or photography)?
  • What companies are running advertisements on competing websites?
  • What is the commission rate and length of time for cookies?
  • Is there local brand recognition?
  • Will the banners look good on the site?

I think the biggest thing for me will be testing. Since Lowell.com gets between 15,000 – 20,000 unique visitors a month now (despite not being updated in 2 months), there is enough traffic to test different banners. I plan to rotate affiliate banners, testing CTR/Revenue with different banner offers, as well as Adsense.

I know Adsense generates revenue as I have it in select spots on the current site, but I also know it leaves money on the table. I want to see if I can find compelling offers that will blow Adsense out of the water. I don’t know if it will be possible, but I am going to test it.

One thing I do know is that direct ad sales will be the most profitable banner advertising. I hope to be able to fully replace affiliate banners and Adsense banners within a few months. However, I am not counting on that since I don’t have a sales representative yet. In the meantime, I will be doing a lot of testing.

Have you run affiliate banners on a general interest website (like Lowell.com), and if so, what has your experience been?

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Please help me raise funds for the Ronald McDonald House

Help Choose a New Logo for Lowell.com

Elliot Silver
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0

As you may or may not be aware, my designer and I are in the middle of re-designing Lowell.com. The new website will be on a much better content management system, and that will allow visitors to submit news and calendar events, create advertisements manually, and post comments on articles. The new site will be much more user friendly.

Well… what’s a new website without a new logo?   Please have a look at the 5 logo typefaces below and let me know which you like best. The site is nearly ready to be re-launched, and this is one of the final elements I saved for last. The color will change (of course), but this is just the base font choices.


Have a Great Business Idea and Need to Raise Funding?

Elliot Silver
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30

One of the things I’ve noticed about domain investors is that they aren’t short on ideas for businesses on their domain names. People seem to buy domain names with a specific idea in mind for them, although many either lack the funding to build out the idea, the drive to build it, or they lack the experience to move forward with their project.

CNNMoney.com has a neat article about 6 startups (which I had never heard of), and the article discusses where the founders came up with the funding to bring their idea to fruition. There are some neat ideas on where to turn if your business concept needs some start-up capital. The CNNMoney.com article covers:

  • AirBnB
  • Makerbeam
  • Boutique Larrieux
  • Everlater
  • Measy.com
  • The Extraordinaries

If you happen to be someone with a great idea that just needs some capital to make it happen, hit me up. I am interested to learn about your idea and may be able to help with funding – or may be able to put you in touch with someone else who can help.

Update on My Mini Site Revenue and Traffic Performance

Elliot Silver
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23

I was going through some of my mini site numbers today, and as I’ve done occasionally in the past, I figured I would give you an update on their performance. Prior to building these sites, none of the domain names had much traffic (under 1 visitor per day average), and a few of the domain names were hand registered by me.

These are all domain names I have wanted to sell, and if they weren’t used for mini sites, they would have continued to receive no traffic and virtually no revenue. Please keep in mind that on the sites I didn’t purchase, I did spend my personal time on them, and those costs obviously aren’t reflected in the overall cost.

Ultimately, as you can see, some of the mini sites did better than others and some look better than others.   When the domain names do sell, all of them are indexed in Google, which may not have happened had I parked them. Also, keep in mind that although the numbers are from March of 2009 through today, many of these sites haven’t been up for a full year.

TobagoVacations.com – Purchase Price < $800 on Snapnames

  • Page impressions Since June: 7,901
  • Clicks: 701
  • Revenue: $201.11
  • Monetization: Adsense
  • Mini Site Built by: I used my developer’s template at a cost of $15.00

HockeyGoalieHelmet.com & BullRidingHelmet.com- Purchase Price < $8.00/each hand registrations

  • Page impressions Since April: 5,261
  • Clicks: 407
  • Revenue: $113.77
  • Monetization: Adsense
  • Mini Site Built by: I used a free css template at a cost of under $5.00 for photos
  • I used the same Adsense channel so I can’t break them out

ChainCatshark.com- Purchase Price < $8.00 hand registration

  • Page impressions in last year: 3,506
  • Clicks: 27
  • Revenue: $3.74
  • Monetization: Adsense
  • Mini Site Built by: I used a free css template at a cost of $0
  • This was my first mini site, and it was more for the learning experience

LynnAttorney.com- Purchase Price < $100.00 on Snapnames

  • Page impressions in last year: 289
  • Clicks: 5
  • Revenue: $3.83
  • Monetization: Adsense
  • Mini Site Built by: I used a free css template at a cost of $0

CabCompanies.com- Purchase Price < $100.00 on Snapnames

  • Page impressions since August: 4,933
  • Clicks: 81
  • Revenue: $47.90
  • Monetization: Adsense
  • Mini Site Built by: BigTicketDomains for less than $300

DubrovnikVacations.com and JerusalemVacations.com, – Purchase Price: private

  • Page impressions Since September: 4,186
  • Clicks: 98
  • Revenue: $59.00
  • Monetization: Adsense
  • Mini Site Built by: WannaDevelop for $99/each

UniqueInk.com – Purchase Price < $1,000

  • Page impressions since May: 10,502
  • Clicks: 511
  • Revenue: $39.60
  • Monetization: Adsense & Affiliate
  • Mini Site Built by: I used my developer’s template at a cost of $25.00
  • This domain name has been sold
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