jeffoverman said:
Hi
I don't know you but enjoy reading solid posts by you and your thought process. Welcome back, missed reading things for a few days
Thank you for the kind words. The reasons for my absence are numerous. I initially focused on learning as much as I could on the forums. That and maintaining allthings.tv consumed too much of my time. I finally decided to focus on the development or continued development of my sites and have not looked back.
Prior to this, I had become comfortable with domaining and I decided to do a little solo development without partners. Because of my experience, a number of people began contacting me and asking if I would consult with them on the development of their sites, which actually led to another partnership. I never got to develop the website for the consulting business I was involved in although I did acquire a domain for it: DomainArchitect.com (do you like it?), which remains parked as my current workload is substantial.
At the same time, a company frequently mentioned on this forum approached me to come work for them.
Because a conflict of interest existed if I continued to own my developed sites, the company felt it would be better for them to acquire the sites. The negotiations fell through and I continued down the path I was on before they approached me. During this entire time, a few other companies approached me about those same sites. However, not one of the companies put an offer on the table that made me want to jump. I know there will be a second and maybe even a third round of offers as more companies look to scoop up developed sites.
When I looked at some of my keyword domains and the number of offers received on them versus the number of offers on developed sites, it confirmed my initial belief that developing sites is where the game is and has always been at. That is where the big plays made. That is why I continue to return to this site and stress development to those seeking advice. The only exception might exist for keyword domains with traffic.
If you plan on flipping names to make money (and are looking for advice), then I would not recommend that you rely on commercial websites to get the big fish interested in your names. I suggest doing some heavy research to find the big fish that should be interested in your name and send them targeted emails followed up by phone calls. While this will not work for all names, the keyword names will be attractive to big fish. The ones who get this Internet game will be interested.
Don't sell short unless you need to. If you can't do this yourself, then find a domain broker.
The reason I think the initial tipping point sits two years ahead of us because there are a lot more websites in development at the moment than were in development one year ago. News.tv sold though it is at a parked page, which is sad, but when existing .tv sites gain more traction and the new .tv sites come online and Demand Media roles out the rest of what is in the works for the extension, I think we will be miles ahead of where we are today.
It is VERY important to note that anything you can do with a .tv, you can do with a .com or any other extension. The brandability of .tv is unparalleled as compared to any other extension but it will take time for the public to realize this. That alone will be several years after the tipping point in my opinion. It really requires educating the public, which seems to forget easily. However, the public is getting smarter primarily because the globe is turning out younger more savvier kids, teenagers and adults. The cost to educate the public should therefore be decreasing albeit at a much slower rate than any of us like.
Everything today is niche marketing. Even most niches can be broken down into subniches. As more niches are developed, there will be incredible opportunities to cross-promote across different verticals. If you think you can cover more than two niches, you are crazy. You can't cover more than two niches well. If you can, PM me your resume. You can never find enough great people to work with in the web world.
If you want to really make sure you develop right the first time, then look at what others are doing and be creative in finding ways to adapt those things you like to your own niche vertical. The biggest competition that anybody faces in starting a site today are the existing sites that cater to your same niche. New sites require new content and frequent layout changes to remain to continue attracting repeat visitors.
The most important point you should know about people is that they don't like change once they have become established. Leaving an established site and habitually visiting your site requires offering something significantly more attractive than the other site. Once you have a repeat visitor, integrate layout changes in such a way to preserve familiar elements. Explaining that point requires that you see a before-and-after. Picture this, if Google changes its home page to something drastically different you would probably be annoyed. The only reason you would revisit that site is because of the strenth of its offering/service. The key is to not upset your existing users while integrating new features/content.
You can buy traffic any number of ways, but if your website lacks gravitational pull to attract someone back to your site (once they land there) then you greatly diminish your chances of success. I always set my goal to visitor retention in the beginning, which requires a significant amount of interaction with the audience/visitors to find out what they like, dislike, and what they are not getting at the moment.
Great ideas and domains are bountiful, but only those who can execute on their ideas and domains will succeed. We can all sit behind our keyboards and criticize what other companies are or are not doing for us, but is relying on them really going to get you closer to your goal at the end of the day? I asked myself that and the answer was an emphatic "No!" So I began looking at all the technologies available to those starting a website...and there are some really good technologies out there that can help us be successful.
I am doing my best at the moment to beta test as much software as possible. Unfortunately, domainers seeking to develop sites face an uphill battle. No software is perfect. No software is flawless. And no software will meet all of your needs. Most software does a lot of things good, but not everything good. I typically run with the software that has the greatest strengths in the areas that are most important to me.
If you wait for the silver bullet, you will be too late. We can spend the next ten years waiting or testing different software, but its really those that get started now who have the greatest chances of succeeding in the development game. I know it sounds crazy but it takes quite a bit of time to truly develop a site that has a decent amount of traffic.
Oh and guess what, you will not be out of the woods once you get past getting a developed website up that you like. The next phase of this learning curve involves learning about how the Internet, networking, site administration, and monetization work.
I can certainly say that I have learned more in four years than I could if I went to school for this stuff. Even then, I don't know a school that can provide the education I have experienced by doing.
Even after I wrote this, my whole network went down for 12 hours because my hosting company took my site offline without any prior notice to me, it was offline for 4+ hours, and then they never bothered to tell me to update the internal IP addresses associated with the domains hosted on the server. Now, it took me almost all 12 hours of communicating with them via support tickets, online chat, and phone calls to learn everything that I just explained in two sentences. They took my site offline to install a firewall, which had problems, then when it went back online, there was a problem with a network cable they subsequently replaced, and then nobody bothered to provide me with notice that I had to update the internal IP addresses for all the sites. It might sound like I know what I am talking about but I only learned that in the last 12 hours that I spent pulling my hair out.
This just proves to me that the Internet is still the wild wild west and that buying a domain is the easy part. Everything that comes afterward is when the level of difficulty goes exponential and the real challenges begin. I guess I love it to deal with the sort of the problems that come up.
Hope development is going well for you.
Keep us updated and miss reading your posts!
LOL.
As I alluded above, development continues to challenge me for different reasons.
Technology constantly evolves and there new developments you and I will not hear about until its old news. There is a whole world taking place online that nobody can possibly report on because it takes place so quickly and its not limited by geography. Generally, we follow it through message boards, email newsletters, and the persons or companies responsible for pushing the envelope online. There are not enough reporters, writers, and editors to sit in every place something new and important is happening online. Only the most significant things related to the largest companies are reported in mainstream outlets.
Today, it is up to the Internet user to find the outlets that serve his/her needs and niche interests well. If the user is lazy, he/she just ends up watching vidoes on YouTube. It is our job as niche site developers to help the users find our sites, which will do a better job of meeting their needs/desires/wants. Creativity, guerilla marketing, and viral marketing rule.
Unless you have monstrous traffic, I think domain parking could be dying if it is not dead already. I am not the first or the last to say it. Developing random names is costly so that is why companies like keywords. Even if you have a keyword, it takes knowledge/skill, time, and money. If you have money, you can buy the skill and the time but if you lack money then you must learn the run-and-gun game if you are to succeed.
A lot of success stories you hear about involve a lot of luck, but you never hear how much luck is involved in someone becoming successful. I by no means consider myself a success yet, but I still see how lucky I am in certain respects to occupy the shoes that I do. The only thing that got me here is the willingness to take calculated risks that average people would not...not necessarily because they were bad risks but because most people are truly risk adverse though few people like to label themselves in that way...it is sort of uncool sounding.
Look at HotNames.tv / FreeNameExchange.com. They were failures. They never returned their initial investments. To even have the hope of any return, they would require two additional rounds of investment of the original amounts. I plan to do it, but my cash flow is directed at the properties that are more likely to deliver greater returns in a shorter period. That is another point...work on the sites that return the greatest returns in the shortest time periods. This is a short run game that will extend indefinitely. If you can make 1000 in six months, why rely on the play that may make you 100,000 in 5 years especially when there are no guarantees. Of course, if you can do both, then do it. Time is the only limiting factor to our success...not money.
Allthings.tv is another failure. While all of these sites are failures now, they can experience success in the future with the right combination of money, time, and skill. Currently, those three things are limited in quantity. There are not enough hours in the day and I have yet been able to find someone I could pay to do what I do so I could focus more on the things that grow my properties. Even if I did, that person would probably want more than I could pay them.
The point I am getting at is the development gig will stretch your patience, it will test your resolve, and most of all it will test your risk tolerance. Domaining and development is a bit like going to Vegas. You can play the slots, roll the dice in craps, or play roulette. Different games offer different odds and attract people with different risk tolerances.
Success comes when your domains sell for high amounts, your sites throw off a decent income stream, or your sites sell for ungodly amounts. Either way, we have seen a lot of people who have had success in all three areas. Learn what you can from those who are willing to share and start evaluating where you are wasting your time/money so you can focus on getting to success quicker.
I will stop now that I feel as though I am rambling...
EDIT: As I read my post, I realize that some may feel as though I am trying to tell you what to do. I assure that all I want to do is share my knowledge and experience with everyone and hear about how they are finding their way through this confusing labrinth of evolving information.
