How Domain Development Gave Warren Royal Control Over His Own Destiny

[Ron Jackson]

The new December Cover Story is out at DNJournal.com. The plunge in parking revenue over the past year has left many domain owners looking for lifejackets. Many are eying development as the path to independence from Google and Yahoo.

Warren Royal had an even greater motivation to develop his best domains. He was caught squarely in the middle of the subprime mortgage mess and watched years worth of work swirl down the drain last year. This year he acquired Bobbleheads.com and Shreveport.com and set about turning them into real businesses.

He succeeded and his story details the long road Royal traveled to acquire the experience, assets and skill set needed to develop sites that stand out from crowd. You can read all about it here:
http://www.dnjournal.com/cover/2008/december.htm

 

[godinu]

that's a nice article but it leaves out the most important thing: ok, he bought bobbleheads.com and developed it, but in reality, he also built a bobblehead business dealing in physical goods, but it doesn't mention any of that. There's a big difference between just developing a site and deciding you want to create/sell a physical product. I would have loved to read that part of the story because that's a whole other idea.

 

[Premiere]

I thought the article overall was OK, but this one phrase struck me as being unique:

"For example, I bought JobShops.com last year very inexpensively (4 figures), and I love this name."

Even a guy like Warren who's been buying and selling since I don't know when paid about 5k for a domain I wouldn't pay more than $250 for. That isn't to say that it was a bad move, it just points out that domains always have value to an end user, no matter who they are. They just need to love the name.