I bought ActingCoach.com several months ago hoping for a quick flip. I posted it for sale on forums, and I also received a few inquiries from end users (from the parking page), including one nice (profitable) offer. I passed on that offer hoping to receive more from another end user company, and when a better offer didn’t materialize, I decided to get back in touch with that acting coach to see if he was still interested.
As it sometimes goes, the acting coach who made the offer had opted to buy another name in the interim, and he wasn’t able to buy ActingCoach.com when I came back to offer it to him. Se la vie. In light of this, I decided I would develop it, although I wasn’t willing to spend the same amount of time (or money) it took to build my other directories.
In lieu of a full development project, I opted to work with WhyPark and the company’s new DomainApps offerings. I used the directory option along with videos, Twitter feed, and article feed, and I incorporated it all with a customized template in similar fashion to DogWalker.com. You can either pay $200 for them to build a custom theme, or you can probably pay a bit less at a place like eLance and select a designer to build one for you (give the designer one of their templates to use the code for the WhyPark modules).
Because I had WhyPark customize the design for this project, the site was put together by Craig Rowe and his WhyPark development team, using the interface and tools they have for everyone to use. If you (or your designer) has any trouble setting it up, I would think Craig and his support team can help… it’s one of the nice things I’ve found about working with the company.
I also worked with Acroplex, LLC (better known by many as Acro) to create the site’s logo, which gives it more character. For a relatively small investment, a logo like this can make a world of difference. I also worked with a copywriter found on eLance to add custom articles, and the plan is to continue adding articles. It’s an inexpensive way to drive traffic to the website.
To market the new site, I intend to reach out to the same acting coaches and companies that opted to not buy the domain name. I will see if they’d like to be listed on the site for a small monthly fee. I know the market is smaller than DogWalker.com, but I paid less for the domain name than DogWalker.com. I also know the market is competitive, and acting classes are expensive.
One of the best things about this and working with WhyPark is that I can use this template on future directory development projects, which was what I first said when I learned about the new Apps. Having a good website is important, but being able to scale my business is more important. Additionally, unlike my WordPress-based websites, I am not responsible for data management, security updates, or plugin updates with my WhyPark site, which relieves me of a big burden.
WhyPark takes $1.00/month for every paying directory client. I charge $5/month so that’s an 80/20 revenue share, but I have the ability to charge whatever I want. Depending on sign ups, cancelation rate, and the competition, I will probably play around with the listing cost as the site gets more traffic.
For those who are interested and want to track the success of this site, here are its current SEO rankings (I’ve had a coming soon page up for a little over a month):
Acting Coach: #24 Google #10 Bing
Acting Coaches: #93 Google #113 Bing
I would not endeavor on a project like this if I owned a name like GreatActingCoach.com, ActingCoaching.com, or some other non-exact match domain name that would be difficult to rank in search engines. I chose ActingCoach.com because this is a profession that advertises online (competitively) and people are searching for acting coaches every day.
Disclaimer:
WhyPark is an advertiser on the RSS feed of my blog. The company did NOT ask me or pay me to post this article. I am NOT making any additional revenue if you or anyone signs up as a result of this program or builds websites using WhyPark. I am posting this disclaimer because it seems there are always going to be people who think there is nefarious intent with positive blog posts.
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