Folks,
One of the things I've been wanting to find is a tool that could tell me a fairly reliable estimate of the number of monthly visits to any given generic phrase domain that I am considering buying. I'm not talking about big dollar names with reliable traffic stats provided by the seller or a third party broker. I'm talking stealth statistics here.
Sure, one can ask the owner for such stats (or for access to their control panel at their parking company - good luck with that). But there are times when you don't want to ask for that access, or the seller doesn't want to give you such access, or you don't trust what s/he has told you about the stats, or you don't even want the owner to know you're interested in such things. If you know what I mean.
Now, I know that Overture w/TLD is a stat that some people use to help estimate whether a domain is likely to get any direct navigation traffic at all. But as we know, a.) the Overture Keyword Suggestion Tool is being phased out (or so I have been led to believe), so who knows if OTLD scores are reliable anymore, and b.) if a domain has an Overture TLD score of less than 25, it doesn't even get assigned a score at all. That doesn't necessarily mean the domain doesn't get traffic, but how can one know?
Of course I've also tried Alexa, as well as compete.com and trafficestimate.com. But for "low-trafficked," non-back-linked, generic phrase .COM domains, it's tough to estimate what the potential direct navigation to those names might be (at least it's been tough for me).
At any rate, I have an idea for developing a direct navigation estimation metric/tool that all of us could use, but I will need assistance from certain of you in order to compile sufficient data.
I'd guess this is not a particularly original idea, but I believe that a fairly discernible relationship exists between the number of monthly searches made for a given search phrase and the number of people who actually direct navigate to that non-linked, generic name instead of search the phrase on a search engine.
However, what might be original is to compile data from a number of different domain owners of this specific variety of domain ("generic phrase" domains in .COM) in order to see if any relationships can indeed be attributed. With this new metric for lower-trafficked domains (meaning, those with OTLD scores lower than 25), one could feasibly discern a ballpark range of monthly visitors for any similar domain of interest.
How will the metric be determined? The number of known monthly visitors will be divided by the number of monthly searches on that phrase to determine the domain's Direct Navigation Estimation Percentage (DNEP). As averaged out across 30-50 domains (if I can get that many data contributors), we should be able to determine a fairly accurate average DNEP. This would enable any of us to estimate the number of monthly visitors just by knowing how many people have searched for an exact phrase in the past month, then multiplying that figure by the DNEP.
For example, purely fictitiously, let's say the owner of wheatbeer.com knows that he receives 35 visitors per month. Popularsearches.com tells us today that that exact phrase is searched for in Google and Overture 381 times per month. Therefore, this domain's DNEP would be 35/381, or .091. In other words, 381 people search for that phrase monthly, but 9.1% of that number direct navigated to the domain. Thus, the DNEP for wheatbeer.com would be 9.1%.
Now, after compiling data on 30-50 domains, let's say that we found that the average monthly DNEP across all the domains for which we received data was 5.4%. This would mean that you could use popularsearches.com's results for any given search phrase and multiply that number by the DNEP to estimate the number of monthly visitors to that .com domain. A domain that is comprised of a generic phrase that gets 18,430 searches per month? Well, that would mean approximately 995 direct navigating visitors per month (18,430 X 5.4%).
So, if you own any .COM domains comprised of 1, 2 or 3 (max) generic words -- for example, breasts.com, or CandiedApples.com, or AutoInsuranceRate.com -- and if you KNOW FOR SURE the number of monthly visits to that domain (and itβs a goodly number of visits), then you've got the data I seek. All I need is:
1.) the name of your .COM domain and
2.) the number of visits in the last 30 days.
That's it. I'll do the rest and share the final DNEP metric when I'm finished compiling the data.
Now, I promise NEVER to divulge the name of your domain (even to myself β :hehe: ). And obviously you will need to trust that I am an honest injun and will live up to my end of the bargain by providing everyone here with the outcome of this little research project (but not with the name of your domain). At the same time, I need to trust that you are sharing actually factual data with me for the benefit of us all.
Thus, if you are in fact willing to share that data with me, please PM me at your convenience. I have already collected data on 5 such names (one of which I own). But as I say, we'll need a bunch more for this to be even close to statistically relevant.
For anyone who does provide data, I will share a spreadsheet via email of the individual results. You would be able to see the individual data that went into determining the average DNEP, and I would replace each domain name with its related industry (breasts.com would become "Adult/Sex).
For everyone else (i.e., Namepro domainers who don't own such domains or who are unwilling to provide data), I will report the average DNEP metric in this and/or a new thread so that we can all use it going forward.
Now, I'm sure there will be some who will try to poke holes in this theory, and I welcome those comments wholeheartedly (i.e., if there's an easier way to determine direct navigators to "low-trafficked" domains, fine and dandy by me - what is it??). But if you agree that this idea is worthy of pursuing, and if you have domains that fit this description, please PM me with your data.
PS: I have a number of generic phrase domains that DO NOT receive traffic; I'm not interested in names that do not receive traffic. Your domain must get some decent amount of traffic (more than 50 visitors per month?, but hopefully more than that), and it must be comprised of fairly common search terms (300+ searches per month?, but hopefully way more than that) or the data will not be meaningful. For example, a domain like oralmonitor.com would NOT be useful, as NO ONE has searched for those words in the last month, and I'm fairly certain that that domain does not get squat for traffic anyway.
Now, will you join me in my quest to find the Holy Grail of estimated direct navigation traffic (i.e, The DNEP)? Or will you fart in my general direction and tell me that my mother is a hamster, and my father smells of elderberries?
I await your thoughtful response.
Bob (a.k.a. DKH)
One of the things I've been wanting to find is a tool that could tell me a fairly reliable estimate of the number of monthly visits to any given generic phrase domain that I am considering buying. I'm not talking about big dollar names with reliable traffic stats provided by the seller or a third party broker. I'm talking stealth statistics here.
Sure, one can ask the owner for such stats (or for access to their control panel at their parking company - good luck with that). But there are times when you don't want to ask for that access, or the seller doesn't want to give you such access, or you don't trust what s/he has told you about the stats, or you don't even want the owner to know you're interested in such things. If you know what I mean.
Now, I know that Overture w/TLD is a stat that some people use to help estimate whether a domain is likely to get any direct navigation traffic at all. But as we know, a.) the Overture Keyword Suggestion Tool is being phased out (or so I have been led to believe), so who knows if OTLD scores are reliable anymore, and b.) if a domain has an Overture TLD score of less than 25, it doesn't even get assigned a score at all. That doesn't necessarily mean the domain doesn't get traffic, but how can one know?
Of course I've also tried Alexa, as well as compete.com and trafficestimate.com. But for "low-trafficked," non-back-linked, generic phrase .COM domains, it's tough to estimate what the potential direct navigation to those names might be (at least it's been tough for me).
At any rate, I have an idea for developing a direct navigation estimation metric/tool that all of us could use, but I will need assistance from certain of you in order to compile sufficient data.
I'd guess this is not a particularly original idea, but I believe that a fairly discernible relationship exists between the number of monthly searches made for a given search phrase and the number of people who actually direct navigate to that non-linked, generic name instead of search the phrase on a search engine.
However, what might be original is to compile data from a number of different domain owners of this specific variety of domain ("generic phrase" domains in .COM) in order to see if any relationships can indeed be attributed. With this new metric for lower-trafficked domains (meaning, those with OTLD scores lower than 25), one could feasibly discern a ballpark range of monthly visitors for any similar domain of interest.
How will the metric be determined? The number of known monthly visitors will be divided by the number of monthly searches on that phrase to determine the domain's Direct Navigation Estimation Percentage (DNEP). As averaged out across 30-50 domains (if I can get that many data contributors), we should be able to determine a fairly accurate average DNEP. This would enable any of us to estimate the number of monthly visitors just by knowing how many people have searched for an exact phrase in the past month, then multiplying that figure by the DNEP.
For example, purely fictitiously, let's say the owner of wheatbeer.com knows that he receives 35 visitors per month. Popularsearches.com tells us today that that exact phrase is searched for in Google and Overture 381 times per month. Therefore, this domain's DNEP would be 35/381, or .091. In other words, 381 people search for that phrase monthly, but 9.1% of that number direct navigated to the domain. Thus, the DNEP for wheatbeer.com would be 9.1%.
Now, after compiling data on 30-50 domains, let's say that we found that the average monthly DNEP across all the domains for which we received data was 5.4%. This would mean that you could use popularsearches.com's results for any given search phrase and multiply that number by the DNEP to estimate the number of monthly visitors to that .com domain. A domain that is comprised of a generic phrase that gets 18,430 searches per month? Well, that would mean approximately 995 direct navigating visitors per month (18,430 X 5.4%).
So, if you own any .COM domains comprised of 1, 2 or 3 (max) generic words -- for example, breasts.com, or CandiedApples.com, or AutoInsuranceRate.com -- and if you KNOW FOR SURE the number of monthly visits to that domain (and itβs a goodly number of visits), then you've got the data I seek. All I need is:
1.) the name of your .COM domain and
2.) the number of visits in the last 30 days.
That's it. I'll do the rest and share the final DNEP metric when I'm finished compiling the data.
Now, I promise NEVER to divulge the name of your domain (even to myself β :hehe: ). And obviously you will need to trust that I am an honest injun and will live up to my end of the bargain by providing everyone here with the outcome of this little research project (but not with the name of your domain). At the same time, I need to trust that you are sharing actually factual data with me for the benefit of us all.
Thus, if you are in fact willing to share that data with me, please PM me at your convenience. I have already collected data on 5 such names (one of which I own). But as I say, we'll need a bunch more for this to be even close to statistically relevant.
For anyone who does provide data, I will share a spreadsheet via email of the individual results. You would be able to see the individual data that went into determining the average DNEP, and I would replace each domain name with its related industry (breasts.com would become "Adult/Sex).
For everyone else (i.e., Namepro domainers who don't own such domains or who are unwilling to provide data), I will report the average DNEP metric in this and/or a new thread so that we can all use it going forward.
Now, I'm sure there will be some who will try to poke holes in this theory, and I welcome those comments wholeheartedly (i.e., if there's an easier way to determine direct navigators to "low-trafficked" domains, fine and dandy by me - what is it??). But if you agree that this idea is worthy of pursuing, and if you have domains that fit this description, please PM me with your data.
PS: I have a number of generic phrase domains that DO NOT receive traffic; I'm not interested in names that do not receive traffic. Your domain must get some decent amount of traffic (more than 50 visitors per month?, but hopefully more than that), and it must be comprised of fairly common search terms (300+ searches per month?, but hopefully way more than that) or the data will not be meaningful. For example, a domain like oralmonitor.com would NOT be useful, as NO ONE has searched for those words in the last month, and I'm fairly certain that that domain does not get squat for traffic anyway.
Now, will you join me in my quest to find the Holy Grail of estimated direct navigation traffic (i.e, The DNEP)? Or will you fart in my general direction and tell me that my mother is a hamster, and my father smells of elderberries?
I await your thoughtful response.
Bob (a.k.a. DKH)
