Parking domains a joke

[VisionEdger]

this has to be the ultimate scam pulled off by these companies! What a waste of time and energy. I realize domains can generate some traffic and uniques while waiting to be developed (if at all) but this has to be one of the biggest scams on the web today in this business!!

ppc fraud is a self perpetuating scenario due to the terms and conditions laid out by the parkers.

This must be one of the biggest jokes on domainers in the history of domaining.

In time we wil look back at this ludicrous methodology in domaining and wonder wtf was i doing?

whos fed up with the limited options we as domainers have in making $$ with our domains? there must be another alternative. I know of a new domain stock exchange where they will sell shares of youre domains.

 

[Varon]

Nothing is over yet. Domain parking is all about the right effort put in with proper research. No point buying domain names by the hundreds. Its better to own 50-100 high CPC keyword domains and monetize them to the max. Try different templates, keywords, color schemes. Track your CTR with different combinations. Use pleasing web safe colors, keyword rich text (if possible) and so much more. Try your best to work within the limitations of a parking page, yet create a lander which attracts people. Like, if you own a debt consolidation site, use a trusting smiling human face to greet your visitors rather than some picture of a bank or teller handing out cash. Colors like blue/green work very well with finance related sites as it exudes trust.

If you are using arbitrage, write your campaign ad with no frills like "Get Great Deals" etc. Use such words only if you are having some discount deal ads on your parked page. Use some of your Site keywords in your Campaign Ad. Tell your visitor exactly what he/she will find on arriving on your site. These can definitely help conversions.

There are still huge fortunes available to be made. But you have to find those niches. The only difference being that, these days you have to really work hard to find those niches. It was easier and less competitive earlier. I'm glad I joined the domaining group this year when competition is at its high. This has taught me to learn at a rapid pace and grasp as much possible from the Gurus. Every minute is precious. Its a dollar gained or lost.

Considering that today traffic arbitrage is still accepted and prevalent, I can't see why a domain can't make atleast 100-200 bucks a month. Its really straightforward. Its just like the job market. There are a few jobs and twice/thrice those many applicants. The best applicants find a way to win those jobs. The rest give up or end up applying for social security. Its a choice you make.

 

[Agent-007]

Considering that today traffic arbitrage is still accepted and prevalent, I can't see why a domain can't make at least 100-200 bucks a month. Its really straightforward.

Thanks for your good points Varron. I use PPC for traffic and make over $200 net per day on some domains. Just 30 domains can make me $500-$1,000 profit per day. It's certainly allowed PPC traffic that helps me to achieve that at all.

In time we wil look back at this ludicrous methodology in domaining and wonder wtf was i doing?

You must have got burnt bad. I only made $24,000AUD net profit last month in only my 3rd month in domain parking. And that's just with 28 domains promoted. So I guess you're right, that money in my bank account is just a scam and I should quit today. :yell: .......not!!!

Domain parking companies aren't perfect by far, but find one that allows PPC traffic and you should make a 2-3x spread on your ad cost.

 

[VisionEdger]

lots of great stuff. thx

Thanks for your good points Varron. I use PPC for traffic and make over $200 net per day on some domains. Just 30 domains can make me $500-$1,000 profit per day. It's certainly allowed PPC traffic that helps me to achieve that at all.





You must have got burnt bad. I only made $24,000AUD net profit last month in only my 3rd month in domain parking. And that's just with 28 domains promoted. So I guess you're right, that money in my bank account is just a scam and I should quit today. :yell: .......not!!!

Domain parking companies aren't perfect by far, but find one that allows PPC traffic and you should make a 2-3x spread on your ad cost.

well i am sure we are all thoroughly impressed. where do tell do u park these golden eggs??

 

[Shaggy]

Thanks for your good points Varron. I use PPC for traffic and make over $200 net per day on some domains. Just 30 domains can make me $500-$1,000 profit per day. It's certainly allowed PPC traffic that helps me to achieve that at all.

So what I got from that, is you are paying for the traffic going to your names? I don't know of one PPC company, ie - Domainsponsor.com, that allows that.

 

[Mike]

:imho: Parking domains is actually not a bad business practice. No hosting fees, near zero labor, no maintenance, no support, etc. Parking companies in itself are merely a gateway to get us, the domainers, a few more bucks. If we didn't have parking companies, many domainers without development skills would show 404 pages, and that can't really be desirable?!

The real culprit is Google and Yahoo has just stepped up their game as well, i believe. Their "quality" traffic evaluations and calculations which are mainly a very well guarded secret are the true cause of headache.
A feed provider can easily tell a parking company which clicks are acceptable, which are not, tweak the results/stats accordingly, price points are suddenly being adjusted and undergo drops that, for the educated mind leave nothing but questions.

For the record, I am thoroughly against parking, but unfortunately lack the development skills to make a revenue driver out of a domain. Like many others, my skills end with designing a decent landing page and bring it online. This leaves parking pretty much as the only option.
I have yet to figure out how to make more than $10/day through parking. Heck, i'd throw a party if i could ever get $300 out of my domains in a month.

Leaves to question, who's at fault? The parking company? The feed provider? My (obviously) miserable portfolio?
Frankly, since the Parking Companies merely provide a service, much like a taxi company, there's only 2 potential problems left: Feed providers and quality of portfolio.

While Google is continuing their path to virtual world domination, very much to my dislike, there's not really much that any single person can do about it. Which, by a method of elimination, leaves only to point back to one's portfolio

IB

 

[goodkarmaco]

Varon,

those are excellant points you make. Parking is all about what you say, tweaking everything. The person coming to the site should feel totally confidant about finding what they are looking for.

The more the sight appeals to them the better the conversion. If it is about gardening, make the appeal from their standpoint. My success at parking is when I park names that I know something about. That way I can lead my visitor to what they are looking for with the right keywords.

All said though we really are not seeing anywhere near the potential in earnings we should be. We can and should be doing something about it.

 

[netmeg]

If it were easy to make buckets of cash without doing any work, everyone would be doing it.

 

[tpruby]

Parking companies do all the work, we just buy a name. How much money do you want to make for doing nothing? Parking with a parking company is free money (even if it isn't a lot of free money)

In general, anyone who wants to make a lot of money parking domains should park them with themselves. Make a page, put up some ads, cut out the middle man and keep 100% of the click money. Or do nothing except change your nameserver and get whatever percentage an evil parking company chooses to share. It's pretty simple.

Why aren't you ripping the registrars like godaddy who put up ads on your parked domain and don't share a penny?

I've spent a lot of TIME trying to make this elusive free money. So much time that is laughable...so much time that if I had just picked up 5 extra shifts at work, I would be way ahead.

Then there is the whole argument about working harder, vs working smarter. In any event, my point is that there is nothing free about parking, you pay in the most valuable commodity of all....your time.

So I spend hours and hours to make $4 a day....and I'm excited about it...:lol: That's the reality for most people....not all....most newbies anyway.

That is of course not the case if you own some awesome name that everyone types in....which in most cases, most people don't own those names.

 

[CoolMark]

What nobody's mentioned yet is that they're not just taking our time and money, they're even stealing our stat's. That's our education they're taking away from us.

They learn exactly what is happenning with the traffic to our domains, and they keep it from us so that we can't learn.

Presumably, the people who run these companies are making a fortune with their ever increasing knowledge, by buying domains and optimising them to make money, and they're holding us back by keeping our stat's hidden from us.

Where's the logic in that? If we could optimise our domains properly, it would increase their incomes too, but they know they can make more money by keeping our stats to themselves, not caring how badly our domains do, and registering all the good domains for themselves using the knowledge that they have kept from us.

 

[Shaggy]

I love the those conspiracy theories :p

 

[mrizos]

I'm not saying that I'm not making any money...I'm making my house payment from parking just 1 domain, but people seem like they are all receiving lower CPC's everyday now...so, I wonder how low they will go.

 

[netmeg]

Yea well, lots of people with developed sites say that about AdSense these days too. But personally, my AdSense EPCs are through the roof these days, so I don't really see it as some kind of systematic downfall of the system. I'm up over 350% over last year on my developed sites.

 

[mrizos]

Yea well, lots of people with developed sites say that about AdSense these days too. But personally, my AdSense EPCs are through the roof these days, so I don't really see it as some kind of systematic downfall of the system. I'm up over 350% over last year on my developed sites.

True, some of my adsense epc's are near $1.00 and others are at .02.

 

[johnny6]

I've spent a lot of TIME trying to make this elusive free money. So much time that is laughable...so much time that if I had just picked up 5 extra shifts at work, I would be way ahead.

Then there is the whole argument about working harder, vs working smarter. In any event, my point is that there is nothing free about parking, you pay in the most valuable commodity of all....your time.

So I spend hours and hours to make $4 a day....and I'm excited about it...:lol: That's the reality for most people....not all....most newbies anyway.

That is of course not the case if you own some awesome name that everyone types in....which in most cases, most people don't own those names.

Finally some honesty. Appreciated. These posts by people who have been domaining for three months and are making "$25k a month" are hilarious.

But anyways, good luck parking, etc.

 

[Shaggy]

Well anyone can just start and make some decent money, if those anyones are doing it the crooked way.

 

[goodkarmaco]

parking is a magic show

Coolmark,

I have to agree with what you are saying. Until the day a parking provider is completly transparent we will get the screw. If a parking provider showed the actual stats from Google, ask, yahoo to the domain owner and treated us like a true partner we would all be making tons more money.

Companies that are raking in money from our parked names are simply giving us bread crumbs and we have no knowledge of what is really being earned. They go to domain conventions, spending tons of money talking about how great their parking program is. We read how they are making millions from parking names.

Is it so great if we have no clue what is really earned by them for every click received?

If a person places money in a bank saving account they are told what the interest rate earnings are. That way a choice can be made, which bank is the best. The bank then has to pay the posted fee. If we knew exactly what the parking service is paid for our clicks, we are going to get more of a share because we will go with the company who is giving more of it to us.

Is parking going toward transparency or is it getting more and more like the diamond industry, controlled, huge profits for a common mineral. Diamonds are not rare. It is the hocus pocus marketing they do that makes a diamond high priced. They are not competive as they band together to set the prices for consumers.

Here is my take, if a certain keyword pays say $1.00, then if the advertising pool dwindles and we are paid .02 cents for the clicks, we have no way of knowing if it is true that the advertisers dropped off or if the parking company is giving us the screw.

That is why now is the right time for a parking company to offer such a transparent partnership with its customers, us the domain owner.

If we knew exactly what the pay per click was then we would all gravitate to the company that is paying us the closest amount to what it is paid. The way it is now is we are shown what a keyword pays, lets say for example real estate pays average $3.50 a click. Then when we import names for real estate the pay per click is .02 cents!

So far it is Fabulous that pays the most, but they don't show the actual ppc fee paid, they only show what they are giving us, but like I say they are paying more than anyone.

Here is the real oppourtunity for a new parking company. Take all parking companies on by showing a true payout when the payment is made by showing the actual monies paid at that moment when the click was made.

The parking company that is paying close to the actual ppc will get all the domainers parking their names with them and would virtually wipe out its competition.

Can anyone tell me why this transparency is not shown today, besides the fact they want us in the dark as this helps their bottom line?.

Parking companies can now hide behind this thin wall of secrecy. Its a magic show and we are getting more than sawed in half.

 

[tpruby]

Perhaps the begining of a Domainers Union is not far off. If everyone withheld their names from the parking companies, things would change overnight.

Likely impossible, as there would be too many scabs....but an interesting idea all the same.

 

[goodkarmaco]

Interesting a domainers union.

We would have a union as everyone would be parking with the ONLY company that paid the closest to what each ppc shown when the click was made.

This was my hope with Bodis when they started, but they are not doing it either. No company is doing this that I know of.

Anyone out there see the huge oppourtunity of starting a parking company that is transparent?

 

[netmeg]

I don't see how you can have a parking company that is completely transparent, when you don't have any ad providers that are completely transparent (nor should they be)

 

[whitebark]

Parking has its uses - I park until I can develop. What they earn till then is an extra bonus. Problem is I buy more than I can develop, but since they make money - who cares!

 

[Badger]

2 points:

1. by rights you should receive a higher net EPC using a parking company than ou would opening a google adsense account and making some eyesore. The advantage of opening your own adsense account and doing the minisite thing is that your smartpriced traffic is unaffected by others.
2. Tis nigh on impossible to show your % revenue share because as soon as you do it gets discussed. As im sure most would realise, not every domainer receives the same % profit share

 

[verbster]

not every domainer receives the same % profit share

Can you explain this a bit...is it the domainers who receive different %, or is it domains that do (or both)? I'd like to understand a little better how it all works.

 

[Shaggy]

Can you explain this a bit...is it the domainers who receive different %, or is it domains that do (or both)? I'd like to understand a little better how it all works.

What he means by that is there are domain owners that have special percentages because of the amount of money, traffic, and/or domains in their portifolio that would(or does) bring to that PPC company. So if that one person(domain owner) brings in $1000's of dollars each day, the PPC company gives them a higher % so that they can keep his/her business.

 

[netmeg]

Not all traffic is created equally. Nor should all traffic be paid for equally. As an advertiser with AdWords to the tune of around $70k per month, if I lose confidence in the ad network I'm spending money in, I'll either go elsewhere or spend my money on something else. The advertisers are what fund all this, and most of what we care about are conversions and ROI, not traffic and not impressions and not clicks.

 

[evilopinions]

maybe a 10-12 of us can get together and combine all our domains and negociate with google ....That way we will have thousands domains and more trasperancy..Or maybe just stop brooding over what is happening and just enjoy Bodis and Parked......

Domains that pay the rent....