In All Honesty

[Raz0rBlade_uk]

In all honesty, is the amount of money you make from domaining a sufficient amount in relation to the number of hours that you invest in it?

For me it's difficult to answer this question as I don't take note of the time and money I invest into making a profit. My current gut feeling though is that I am wasting my time.

 

[DomainPromoting]

I don't see it as a waste of time!

I see domaining as a hobby in my case, I like the idea of owning virtual real-estate that others sort after.
Its certainly not my primary source of income, I develop domains (which I spend most of my time doing), and my income, a good amount at that, comes from affiliate programs and advertising revenue.

Anything extra on the domaining front is a bonus!

DP

 

[whatwhatwhat]

definitely

 

[omnia]

In all honesty, is the amount of money you make from domaining a sufficient amount in relation to the number of hours that you invest in it?

For me it's difficult to answer this question as I don't take note of the time and money I invest into making a profit. My current gut feeling though is that I am wasting my time.

From reading that, you are still treating what you are doing as a hobby, but in your mind it has slipped over the edge and has become somewhat of a business. If you are content in your own mind to view it as a hobby than detailed and strict monetary measurements aren't needed, just a check on your spending is adequate. A whole different ball game if you want to treat it as a business, where all your inputs need to be measured in order to arrive at a true profit figure. Especially so in regards to the hours you spend at an appropriate rate.

 

[Phronesis]

In all honesty, is the amount of money you make from domaining a sufficient amount in relation to the number of hours that you invest in it?

For me it's difficult to answer this question as I don't take note of the time and money I invest into making a profit. My current gut feeling though is that I am wasting my time.

No way. I'm a financial planner and every moment I spend on this board I'm effectively losing money. Fortunately, my existing income from my work is excellent. However, I could be spending time adding new clients at around $5k/year each - but I'd rather watch my $0.10 clicks roll in instead.

Hi...my name is Tom...and I'm a domainer...

 

[TestCase]

is the amount of money you make from domaining a sufficient amount in relation to the number of hours that you invest in it?

Well, it does keep me off the streets and out of trouble, which makes my parole officer verrrrry happy. So, yeah, I'd say it's worth it...

 

[peaches017]

Very few industries in which you can do some research, invest $7, do some marketing, and sell for up to 100 times that within an hour or two.

 

[Michelle]

I dont get paid for doing my housework either so may as well spend those hours here... much more fun :hehe:

 

[domainacrobat]

I must admit I have had my doubts. I think the reality of the situation is: It is way harder than everyone thinks! If I had taken all the money spent on domains, then just buy one great name for 1-3k develop it and then resell it, I would have made more money! Its like collecting sportscards! No one wants to buy a single card for a few hundred, put it away, let the guy retire and sell it for thousands... we want to open a $7 dollar pack of cards and find that rare limted uber special card worth thousands! Problem is in most cases we open the worthless packs with nothing but common cards. ALL OF THE GREAT NAMES ARE NOT AVAILABLE TO REGISTER. You have to constantly scan the web in search of the freshest of fresh news and register instantly. The only other way is to buy expired names, which is still difficult with registrars tasting and companies like snapnames amping up these expired auctions. I have found some success with scanning and registering ASAP, recently a typo i registered back in early 06 just started making $100++ monthly and now I make almost $200 a month parking. I get at least one offer every 1-2 weeks and sell a name every 6 weeks. ALL in ALL I think I will have to spend alot more money than I anticipated, but is it is the same with any business. I have only been buying names since 12-05. I have yet to develop any names, I bet once I learn php (already have html down) rent a server and develop my names profit will step up to the next level.

IMHO its worth it.

 

[Lasher]

No way. I'm a financial planner and every moment I spend on this board I'm effectively losing money. Fortunately, my existing income from my work is excellent. However, I could be spending time adding new clients at around $5k/year each - but I'd rather watch my $0.10 clicks roll in instead.

Hi...my name is Tom...and I'm a domainer...

Have to admit, I'm with Tom on this one. I'm self employed and doing fairly well in another area, domain investing is a loss for me at the moment but I still consider myself in the 'investment' part of this side business.

Most of my time is spent finding domains to acquire, not marketing them. A time will come where that switches to actively marketing some domains and developing others. Some of the more "commodity based" domains like LLL.xx I treat more like 'buy and hold stocks' .. there is a much more liquid market for these.

Every hour I spend doing this is XXX not made elsewhere, but I enjoy it, it is something new to learn and master, it is fun. I missed the boat on the glory days of domain investment, but combining zone file downloads, expired lists and a lot of programming experience, I've been able to create a few nice tools that help me catch up.

I would love it to be my main income stream one day and I have a lot of faith in .US domains over the long haul that can still be picked up fairly cheaply now .. but I'm not betting the farm on it either.

Ask me again in 5 years, hopefully I'll have a different answer