I am very fortunate to have been able to turn this domain blog into a business venture. It’s taken considerable time to make this a business, and it’s usually enjoyable for me to write and have discussions with readers. Even though blogging is just one aspect of my domain investment business, I think many people know me first as a blogger, and I want to discuss what this “job” entails from my perspective.
Because this blog is a business, my job is to write interesting articles that drive traffic and promote discussion. Although traffic isn’t the main driver behind what I write, I think it’s important that advertisers are getting full value. Of course visitors are important, and I assume that if the topic is of interest enough for me to write about it, there will be people who are interested in reading and discussing.
I like to write about things I am learning, doing, researching, and observing. Some of the topics are very interesting and important to my business, and other topics may be less interesting to me personally but will have an impact on my business or the domain investing universe. If there’s a topic I dislike discussing or don’t know enough about to write something educated (ie ICANN governance), I will generally stay away from it and assume others will cover these topics.
There are a number of excellent resources for domain investors and others to learn about domain investing, including some excellent blogs. Each domain blog gives a different perspective on various topics, and that allows readers to learn more about this business to formulate their own opinions. If I see another blog covering a specific topic, I may also write about it if I can give a unique perspective or offer something different. If I am just going to regurgitate what someone else wrote, I probably won’t write something that was already covered by someone, unless I was writing it at the same time.
As I’ve said in the past, there will be conflicts of interest because of relationships with companies I write about. Many people I interact with and learn from are colleagues, suppliers, or advertisers. No matter how impartial I try to be, there are going to be conflicts.
I do my best to be impartial and share news that I think is interesting or will impact my business. As a blog owner, my job is to generate revenue. As a domain investor, I do this by writing things I would be interested in learning about if I was a reader rather than a writer. I appreciate everyone who comes here to learn and share their opinion.
This is the very first blog I go to and read every single morning.
Keep up the great job Elliot! You do it perfectly!
Kevin
Thanks… Haven’t heard from you in a while… hope all is well.
Sir Elliot,
We might have “height” differences but you stand tall in the world of domaining.
Always nice reading your posts and comments. Would like more articles on Geographic domains otherwise bravo!
Thanks!
I sold a couple small city RealEstate.com domain names, but other than that, I am not all that high on them, especially other geo-keyword names. I am going to build out a local one soon – LakeWinnipesaukee.com. Going up there for a long weekend soon.
Curious as to why you are not high on city.com’s?
Lots of competition makes them tough to monetize. I, personally, have only had moderate success with development.
There are many people out there who are doing well, but most either live in the area or have a strong local presence.
I think city/state/region .com names have value (many have significant value), but I am not a buyer unless the price is exceptional.
I, personally, have done better with my other domain name assets than with my geos as a whole.
As Hugh asked, I wrote a post about geo + keyword .com domain names, which I need to edit before publishing.
This is still the only domain industry blog that I make a point of visiting as my normal routine every day, often numerous times a day, which includes a number of other types of sites. The only other one that finally grabbed my interest that way in time was Rick’s blog, mainly because of everything he had to say about the new gTLD phenomenon, but then he stopped posting. All the rest in the domain sphere I only go to if a news link catches my interest, though some of them are clearly run by some pretty gifted and interesting people. It took me a while to get over it, but I can also live with you not wanting for various reasons to cover a few topics I would have wanted, LOL.
One thing I’ve noticed is that in my view you are such a steady and what I would even call prolific blogger that in my opinion there is a strong natural element to your inclination – there is no way you would be doing what you do unless you really and genuinely want and like to do it.
Give how prolific I would say you are, one thing I’ve wondered after your post here is if you actually like to type yourself, or if you use a great voice to text software like the famous Dragon Naturally Speaking. If not the latter, maybe you would like that if you looked into it. Also, if you only type yourself, I wonder if you are a qwerty typer or a Dvorak typer. Inquiring minds, lol…
Your coverage of the industry and related issues has actually gotten me a bit more interested in the idea of returning to my original roots as more of a domain investor looking to sell than what I am now, which is mainly far more of an end user. I’ve always been interested in domain names and acquiring ones I consider valuable, but for years now only for using them and not selling for a profit even though I would like to make a few nice sales along the way anyway, especially as you almost inevitably wind up with “suitors” who notice and try to buy some of your domains. In fact I supposedly have a $5K sale from one such unsolicited “suitor” going on right now, but I’m not sure if the buyer is going to complete it even though the money is already in escrow. Ironically I actually keep many more domains than you have said you keep for now, though I’m definitely also culling the flock as I saw Frank Schilling put it once.
I’ve definitely much appreciated and liked your blog, so thanks for your frequently valuable and interesting articles, info and tips and congratulations on how it has all fared for you.
I appreciate your feedback and always appreciate the thoughtful comments you leave.
When I am commenting via my iPhone, I sometimes use Siri, but only for longer comments. I type by hand use a QWERTY keyboard.
Hopefully your sale goes through!