TiaWood.com

Domainers: get your head out of the early 2000's. Your old and tired ways of monetizing domains will decrease in the coming years. PPC is no longer a trustworthy monetization model on a newly registered name. Nor are mini sites. You also have to be careful with premium names. While you may earn a few bucks through PPC or mini sites on a premium name, you are missing out on its true potential.

Some are in the domain business to flip quickly. That's fine. This doesn't apply to you. This advice is geared for those who invest in domains for the long haul. There obviously are some who earn a good living by making smart choices with their purchases. This isn't for you either. I'm talking to those who spend hundreds of dollars registering domains simply because they are available and sound good then proceed to dump hundreds or thousands of dollars on the hope that a domain will monetize. Hope is not a good word in the domain industry. Neither is potential.

Domaining newbies aren't the only ones who make this mistake. I have seen a good handful of high profile domainers make this mistake publicly on blogs and forums. It makes my heart sink because I am a web developer who is paid to develop a domainer's ideas and dreams for a domain no matter if I feel the idea will work or not. Sometimes I have advice to lend on a better way to do a certain method. But in the end, I have to do what I'm directed to do.

The industry is becoming so saturated with competition from all ends: domainers, individuals, companies, the government and the world. If you do not work with a business plan, the majority of you will fail. You need to know why you are buying domains, what you are going to do with them and how you will monetize them before you purchase anything. If a domain is available for purchase that doesn't fit your business plan, simply don't waste your time. There are many, many ways to monetize a domain (in addition to parking, developing mini sites and flipping) and I encourage you all to explore it.

Alternative Domain Monetization Methods:

Branding - Creating a somewhat unique service under a particular brand. example: Myspace.com

Trend Branding - Creating a unique service to cater to a new trend example: MyspaceLayouts.com

Keyword Marketing  - Purchasing keyword domains to promote an existing venture. example: CheapInstaller.com

Direct Affiliate - Skip the middle man and partner directly with a company who has a product that matches your domain.

B/M to Web - Brick and Mortar to Web. I have a client in a specialized industry. We were concerned with how well we could use the internet to help bring in new customers. We learned that users will also search for a particular product using model numbers or product names through search engines in addition to keywords.

Information Service - When content is your product or service. example: About.com, YouTube.com

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