Parking Domains
Parking your domain is probably the easiest way for you to monetize a domain in terms of time spent versus income potential, but how efficient is it really, let us take a deeper look at domain parking.
If you own a domain name that you are currently not using then you have the possibility to park it and monetize the existing traffic it enjoys. The only thing you have to do is point the DNS servers to a specific address given by the parking provider and they will create a simple website for you filled with paid links (ads). If a visitor clicks one of those links it will initiate a payment (paid by the advertiser) which you, the parking provider and normally also an ad network like Google Adsense will have to share. That way you can generate a little income based on a domain name that would otherwise have been a liability to you. If the domain earns more than 8$ per year it is generating enough revenue to pay for its own renewal fee. Everything above 8$ is profit for you and people that are good at finding domains that are profitable when parked regard this practise as an investment.
But let me tell you beforehand, it is not as easy as it sounds to make money parking domains. When you park a domain it will be seen as an empty site in the eyes of the search engines. There are normally no content at parked domains, it is all pure ads. Therefore the domain will not generate any traffic for you, the domain should already receive steady traffic before you park it. Furthermore most parking companies forbid you to market your domain while it is parked. How can a domain receive traffic without having any content? Most successful parked domains are former developed domains or formed by 1-2 generic words that people type in directly in their browsers followed by a .com. The latter category are the most expensive types of domains and if you do not already own one you will need a large sum of money to get one, it is domains like: candy.com, parking.com, buycars.com and names like that. The first category is normally composed of formerly active sites that have now expired. As a domain investor you can specialize yourself in buying expiring domains that are likely to still receive some traffic. Factors that matter are a domain’s Alexa rank, backlinks (other pages linking to this url), Google Page Rank, overture and age. You should also always check the way back maschine to see how the site used to look like, if it looked professional it will increase the probability that it still receives some traffic. You can use tools like freshdrop.net or Estibot.com to evaluate expiring domains.
There are a lot of different parking providers and different domains will perform differently from one parking company to the other, so you will have to experiment in order to find the perfect parking provider for your specific domain (move it a couple of times and compare performance). Within the next few days I will talk a bit about the different parking companies and reveal which one I prefer.
Domain parking became really popular some years ago, but the last year or so domain parking revenue has declined. Partly due to the economic crisis the pay per click industry has suffered lately so many professional domainers have begun developing more of their domains into mini niche sites which will increase search engine traffic and thereby income. There is, however, still money to be made parking domains and if you have some domains lying around doing nothing you should definitely think about parking them instead.
Next time I will talk about parking companies.
Have Fun - Solid Namer
2 Responses to “Parking Domains”
Leave a Reply
We spent most of our time in sessions learning about the company, mail, domain parking accounts, etc. Park Domain
Great article - thanks! It is so important for people to do their homework when starting domain development. If you’re interested in learning even more, here is another great site to visit http://BeyondDomaining.com