Domain Parking: Tips & Tricks to Help You Earn More!

[smurge]

And so it begins!:wave:

My goal is to help people learn more about the parking industry and help them earn more money while spending less of it.

There are tons of tricks,tips,secrets that people use to make money in this business.

Let me say this, I will not discuss illegal or bad practices here so please don't ask.

What will I talk about? How to find domains,with traffic for cheap. Creating long term wealth for yourself and how to do it on a budget. I will answer questions and talk about what I know. If there is something I'm not familiar with or not knowledgeable about I will say so.

I am not here to start flaming wars with other domainers or parking gurus. Everyone has their own set of rules to making money. If you don't like mine, that's okay , but please share your ideas with everyone instead of bashing others.


Myths I want to debunk now:

#1. Parking is dead. (Far from it)

#2. You can't make money doing it. (B.S.- you can make a ton of money in it)

#3. Only the rich can do this. (This is not true!)

#4. Google doesn't like domain parking! (Yes they do, they make a ton of money off it. If they hated it so much why do they continue to support it?)



----

So what's the point of all this? It's to help people with parking.

Please feel free to email,pm, or post your questions here and I will do my best to answer them all.


Thanks!

RJ

(P.S. I'm not the best writer so I apologize for any grammar or sentence structure mistakes in advance.)



--Answers to Questions I'm frequently asked!--

#1. What parking companies do I support/like?

These are the main ones I use and have had great success with. I base my success not only on the amount of money I make but also, customer service and transparency.

In alphabetical order:

- Bodis.com (Supports Foreign Traffic)(Zero Click Model Supported)
- Domainsponsor.com (Supports Foreign Traffic) (Zero Click Model Supported)
- Parkingcrew.com (Supports Foreign Traffic)
- Voodoo.com (Highest Payouts In The Industry)


#2. What tools do you use to help you evaluate domains?

Besides my own "TOOL", which I'm not here to promote I would suggest the following;

1. Push2check.com - Great resource site (I do not affiliated with them in anyway)

If we break down the tools I generally look at the following:

Traffic Sources: (Understand that no tool is 100% accurate but together you can get a great picture.)

1. Compete.com
2. Alexa.com
3. Quantcast.com
4. Verisign Labs: http://domainscore.verisignlabs.com/ ( WARNING: This tool to be used when you have mastered other tools. The information on this site is tricky but can be useful)

History of the domain:

1. Archive.org
2. who.is

Backlinks: ( There are plenty of tools for these but here are some sites I use)

1. Majesticseo.com
2. Google Backlinks
3. Yahoo Backlinks
4. DuckDuckGo.com
5. AHrefs.com: https://ahrefs.com/site-explorer/overview/subdomains/brickbuyers.com
6. opensiteexplorer.org (Enjoy this one. It's the search engine for backlinks)



Keywords:

1. Google Keyword Tool


#3. Where can I get lists to analyze:

I have my own tools that do the work for me however here are a few places you can grab lists from to analyze:

1. Dynadot.com
2. Expireddomains.net - (good site)
3. Namejet.com
4. Snapnames.com
5. Godaddy.com
6. Freshdrop.net - (this covers a majority of the above & more)


#4. Do all your domains make money?:

NO!

I'll say it again : NO! I STILL PICK LOSERS!

In fact anyone who says they make money on every single purchase is lying. No one has a 100% success rate and you don't need to. What you need to do to win in this business is;

#1. Pick 51% winners
#2. Make sure to keep your costs low and make more then your spending.


Understand a single domain can make up the costs of lost ones. I picked a domain that makes me $15.00 a day in revenue. That means I'll make $450 a month with it and it's recouped $300 I've lost on previous domains.

Trust me, the sea of domains is massive and there are ton's of GOLDEN NUGGETS ready to be mined by all.


#5. How much do you spend on domains?:

I've spent anywhere from $.99 - $x,xxx! If I like a domain I will spend what I need, to get it as long as "I CAN STILL MAKE A PROFIT"! That's the key.

However, recently I am testing a new program which allows me to buy strictly "HANDREGS". YUP, Handregs! You would be surprised at how much stuff is just sitting on the ocean floor of domains that people think are garbage.


#6. Blacklisted Domains? Revenue Sucks! HELLLLLP!

This is something that's not addressed a lot and something everyone should be aware of: THE BLACK LIST!

This still happens to me this day. I'll buy a domain only to find out the previous owner got blacklisted from Google. This will affect your revenue greatly because Google will not allow Parking Companies to display the proper ad's on your site. If this happens you will need to go to a second feed like Yahoo! or Zeroclick model.

Common Terms for Blacklisted:

1. Faillisted
2. Blacklisted
3. Fail

Check the status of a domain when you park it and you'll see what I mean.

Edit:6/12/2012: Thank You www.ri.sch.edu.sg for this tool!

Originally Posted by www.ri.sch.edu.sg

One thing I can add to this thread is to check if the domain is blacklisted before you purchase them, simply point to:


https://api.bodis.com/domainclassification?domain=(Insert Domain Here)

Classification:

Primary = Google

Secondary = All others but Google (Faillisted,blacklisted, etc from google)

Hope that helps






#7. YUM! YUM! Domain Tasting


If you're not sure what this is it's when you buy a domain and test the traffic for a set amount of time and if your not happy with the traffic you can get a refund or partial refund of your handreg fee.

One thing I see all the time is: Domain tasting is dead! No it's not!

Yes; it might not be as prevalent as it once used to be but there are companies out there that still allow it. How do I know this? Because I do it.

#8. Can I promote or advertise my parked domains?


No, No, No, No, No, No,No, No, No, No, No, No,No, No, No, No, No, No,No, No, No, No, No, No!

If I wasn't clear let me repeat it; NO!


#9. What do all those backlinks mean from different sites?

(Thanks Martiinko for the info)

All those sites "backlink" scanners work by "downloading" the pages all over internet and then searching for URLs in it. Moving from one page to the other over these links. But...

1. There maybe a difference in last time they check this domain for backlinks.

2. There is definitely a huge difference in their databases of pages. That means if one site has smaller DB they don't probably have all the backlinks from as many pages as the other site.

3. Some backlinks are maybe updated, some maybe aren't. The process of "crawling" the web is very time consuming, so not all the backlinks can be verified every day.

To your other question. The links like you described are ok. If you park a domain all the requests go straight to the main page. But what is important is where is the link located. Is it a "spam in comments section", is it in the "blog post" or is maybe a "banner"?

..

So I collected couple different pages (and I'm collecting even more) for you to check if the webpage/domain was ever parked before Some have form input some are just simple url + domain name.
I will make it into a simple web app, so you don't have to go to all of this pages when checking a domain name for parking history. Mostly screenshots.

Was this domain name parked before?
All of them are free. And I don't have any connection to them whatsoever.

Fun fact: This article got to 2th place in google search for Domain name parking history after 20 minutes.




..

*** WORDS OF WISDOM ***

1. Never spend money you can't afford to lose! Consider every domain investment a loss till you make your money back because that's what it is. No one can tell me different on this and the reason why is you are "NEGATIVE" that amount of money till it's recouped.

2. When you buy a domain to park; look to get your initial investment back within 6-12 months.

 

[Quicko]

Great list! I learned a lot from this thread. I felt hopeless on earning with my parked domains at sedo.com. These gave me more info now. Thanks for sharing.

 

[smurge]

Great list! I learned a lot from this thread. I felt hopeless on earning with my parked domains at sedo.com. These gave me more info now. Thanks for sharing.

Glad we could help. Please feel free to ask questions and I'll answer them or some of the other knowledgeable people will as well.

 

[xkuba]

Smurge,
first of all I would like to thank you for your awsome thread about domain parking. There is a lot of valuable info which opened my eyes about this business.

I have some questions regarding to your thread and experience so I hope you don't mind:

1) what is your ratio between expired domains you backorder, handregs and domain auctions?

2) do you take also domains in foreign languages like chinese/germany etc. or strictly US?

3) I would like to know what exactly are you watching when choosing expired domains. I mean how do you evaluate if their backlinks portfolio is great for expired traffic or not. Are you looking for exact domains like ehow, youtube etc. or different patterns? Do you automate it or manually check?

4) what are your main criterias and qualifications when you decide about domain purchase?

Thank you

 

[crunchyg]

This may have an obvious answer, but what exactly is the reason that promoting parked domains is not allowed? If you are directing targeted traffic (via redirecting or other means) in order to get it to advertisers, which is what they want, what is the problem?

 

[ibidu]

This may have an obvious answer, but what exactly is the reason that promoting parked domains is not allowed? If you are directing targeted traffic (via redirecting or other means) in order to get it to advertisers, which is what they want, what is the problem?

This is the exact question that any logical person would ask or should ask.

It's a bit like a company asked you to sell its product on the condition that you did not use any media to advertise its brand. It would be understable in terms of adults' materials but other than that it's just plain daft.

 

[pablohc86]

I think that ex blog or ex portal websites catched for the parking purpose never earn money... Anyone agree with my idea?
Smurge do you agree or do you earn also from this kind of domains?

 

[Kate]

This may have an obvious answer, but what exactly is the reason that promoting parked domains is not allowed? If you are directing targeted traffic (via redirecting or other means) in order to get it to advertisers, which is what they want, what is the problem?

It all has to do with traffic quality.
It is assumed that type-in is valued and qualified traffic because people know what they are looking for.

Parked domains have no contents, just ads. It's not like promoting a bona fide website with some adsense on it.

Promoting a parked domain would be like advertising for people to visit your billboard.

 

[steve88]

Park the domain is best way of advertising.

 

[JB Lions]

-edited out- wrong thread

 

[TopJimmy]

Park the domain is best way of advertising.

Can we get a mod???

---------- Post added at 02:04 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:25 AM ----------

Apparently this got me G Slapped. Poof it's gone!! That sucks. Think the listing in here killed it??

That's what I get for jumping on the soap box for 2 minutes. G must have spies in here!!

JB -
Here is an example of one I own.

Details:
excavatorleasing .com

It has been sitting in my Godaddy account doing nothing since 2005. I reg in 2004 - original owner, I think.

I decided to add it to my Voodoo account on JUNE 7th and it has already been indexed and is in the 8TH SPOT on the FIRST PAGE of Google when you simply type in Excavator Leasing - No Quotes, NO .com, Nothing. This is out of 728,000 results.

I am impressed only after 12 days at Voodoo and with it's history of just sitting parked at GD.

Try it and see where it shows up on Google for you, I would be interested if it is different on someone else's browser.

Jimmy

 

[martiinko]

@Smurge

So I collected couple different pages (and I'm collecting even more) for you to check if the webpage/domain was ever parked before Some have form input some are just simple url + domain name.
I will make it into a simple web app, so you don't have to go to all of this pages when checking a domain name for parking history. Mostly screenshots.

Was this domain name parked before?

All of them are free. And I don't have any connection to them whatsoever.

If you like Smurge you can add this article to the first post.

Fun fact: This article got to 2th place in google search for Domain name parking history after 20 minutes.

..

 

[homerundomains]

If this was answered, sorry.....does pagerank have anything to do with the success of expired domains you're getting? i know you've said backlinks/traffic are essential, but i hear alot about PR as well and i'd like to know more. thanks

 

[smurge]

If this was answered, sorry.....does pagerank have anything to do with the success of expired domains you're getting? i know you've said backlinks/traffic are essential, but i hear alot about PR as well and i'd like to know more. thanks

PR plays a role in development only. Since I really have no plans to develop I don't care about PR.

 

[ngenme]

Seems like a good thread. I always buy brand new domains but only those 2-3 years old produce good income.

I think I should just buy old domains too.

If domains were once dropped, do they rank better than brand new domains?

How much old expired domains cost?

I have some old domains that's not making money (though having 100k index in google). Should I just keep it or let it go or sell it?

How in the earth parked domain got ranking from search engine anyway? It shows nothing. You said you park straight and you keep getting traffic?

You mean the traffic don't drop? It comes from search engine rather than the backlinks?

 

[ibidu]

I have an adult name that has a 60% ctr, about 20-30 clicks a day. Had I based it because it was a sexual link then I would of missed it. While I understand some people choose not to buy these types of domains for moral obligations I do not discriminate against any for of money. lol.

@Smurge,

Where do you park this domain and would you say what sort of RPC you've been getting on it?

 

[smurge]

@Smurge,

Where do you park this domain and would you say what sort of RPC you've been getting on it?

I park it at Voodoo and it ranges from a few cents a click to .15 cents or so. It just depends on the day.

 

[ibidu]

I park it at Voodoo and it ranges from a few cents a click to .15 cents or so. It just depends on the day.

Do your ads resolve to your keyword(s)?

The reason I say that I did test the keyword ***, but the ads resolved to Forex & currencies!

My taking after having fiddled around with Voodoo's software as regards this particular keyword, is that Voodoo may not be the best place for parking this type of names. I've been trying to find out the best place for them but to no avail so far.

 

[ndotreviews]

Understood completely

 

[smurge]

Do your ads resolve to your keyword(s)?

The reason I say that I did test the keyword ***, but the ads resolved to Forex & currencies!

My taking after having fiddled around with Voodoo's software as regards this particular keyword, is that Voodoo may not be the best place for parking this type of names. I've been trying to find out the best place for them but to no avail so far.

Make sure to have it listed as an adult name. That way you have adult ad's that pop up. If the wrong ad's are showing I would send voodoo a support ticket.

 

[key-word]

I do not park domains anymore to me it's a pointless exercise.

used to make 1000's a month in parking. Those days will never be back!

Google killed domain parking I now develop.

 

[ibidu]

@Smurge

The only options that can be changed are the keywords, title, page title, meta tags. The option you mentioned I can't find. That should be under category I guess, but does not exist on the system.


@key-word

Are you making mini-sites or fully developed sites? What's been the earnings on those?

 

[lrjflying]

One thing I can add to this thread is to check if the domain is blacklisted before you purchase them, simply point to:

https://api.bodis.com/domainclassifi...YOURDOMAIN.com
would you like to show the whole url above, I found it incompete.

---------- Post added at 11:01 AM ---------- Previous post was at 10:28 AM ----------

can you tell me what does "referring domain" mean?

 

[TopJimmy]

@Smurge

The only options that can be changed are the keywords, title, page title, meta tags. The option you mentioned I can't find. That should be under category I guess, but does not exist on the system.

Click on the name you want to check from your list of domains in Voodoo, then click on the tab "Domain Options". It will read "Current domain status" and next to that will be "Clean" or "Faillisted" or "Adult". If it doesn't read Adult, then request Voodoo to change it to Adult if you want Adult ads, if it can be categorized as an Adult name.

---------- Post added at 06:21 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:15 PM ----------

One thing I can add to this thread is to check if the domain is blacklisted before you purchase them, simply point to:

https://api.bodis.com/domainclassifi...YOURDOMAIN.com
would you like to show the whole url above, I found it incompete.

---------- Post added at 11:01 AM ---------- Previous post was at 10:28 AM ----------

can you tell me what does "referring domain" mean?

1) The full url is on page one of this thread.

2) "referring domain" is the domain/website where the traffic is coming from to your site.

 

[ibidu]

@TopJimmy,

Yes, I did mean the category cannot be changed like some other parking platforms.

It's a bit of a nuisance to keep emailing Donny every time you want to change this option.

 

[NameAgency]

Just on question:

It is permitted to make some self-searches in parked domains using the main keywords to help optimization without clicking on any add?