A Lesson in Effective Interaction with Domain Parking

What you need to know to maximize your ROI

[Webwork]

I admit it: I park domains. Lots of them. Most reserved for development. Most undeveloped, as it was always my plan to devote more time to development after my children both went off to college.

I've read all the whining and whining threads and post about parked domains. I got it, but I don't think many of you "get it".

This thread isn't meant to defend anything that might, in fact, be going wrong in the domain parking or the MFA world. I trust Google et al to ferret out the bad stuff and keep the good stuff, and price according to demand and effectiveness.

This thread is about how to take on the challenge of direct navigation traffic - and learn directly, via your own experience - what may actually be the best way to integrate direct navigation traffic into your marketing plans. Don't trust Google to get it right? Well, don't just sit their waiting. ;)

As best I can tell - as someone who "parks domains" - most of you really need to do a bit of direct navigation, or domain parking research and testing.

I'd suggest, if and when it becomes available, that you consider specifically - and only - targeting domains that relate "by their domain intention and meaning" to your business's product or market.

I suspect it can be lucrative, especially if you are paying less for "content network traffic", but I won't suggest that this is an across the board reality. Unfortunately, if you are going to "do parking right" you are going to have to do some homework. No free lunch. No easy money. However, done right, I'll bet the ROI will be worth it.

IF I was giving advice about domain targeting cough . . cough I might suggest a strategy like this:

• Determine your highest and most productive keywords.
  
• Check to see whether the domain version of those keywords is registered.
  
• If not . . DOH! Register and redirect them to your website. Now! Especially if the related PPC is high.
  
• What is there are several words in the domain? Not to worry. Is the domain-phrase the commonly used search or generic product phrase? Get it. Some work even better as the longer domains (direct navigation) express a clearer intent - BuyBlueWidgets.com, etc.
  
• Okay, so you have your keyword list, you checked for registrations, grabbed what you can. Next, you look back at your notes about the WhoIs record of domains AND about what type of feed was on the parked domains. You did make a note of this? Why?
  
• Well, if you recorded the feed you know where to buy ads IF you can target. (I think this is coming and hope it does.)
  
• Why check the WhoIs? You check for signs of reliability: Private WhoIs? Hmmm. Older dot come? Likely a player who doesn't mess around with click fraud, etc. You get the idea.
  
• You use the WhoIs "reliability test" to help guide you in your decision of which domains to test . . but . . don't stop there.
  
• You mean there's more? Yes.
  
• I suggest you check to see if the domainer or parking company is smart enough to populate their domain landers with domain relevant, preferably 'exact match' and 'related' keyword phrases. Unfortunately, this late in the game, there are still many very nice domains that call up domain landers litter with "off domain topic crap". Forget them. Even the best domain won't convert unless the feed or secondary links "target the traffic".
  
• Lastly, if you really want to outgun your competition you can contact the domain owner, ask if you can buy the domain, and, if not, you ask the domainer to manually optimize their domain with the keywords you are prepared to target. While you are at it you might also ask about the domains traffic stats to get an idea of what traffic you will be getting. There are still domainers willing to sell domains based upon traffic, so being asked for traffic info is not considered offensive.
  

Seems like a lot of work? Yes, maybe.

However, you want the biggest bang for your buck, right? You want to beat the competition, right? You realize that it will be an incresingly competitive market, right?

Then don't just sit there complaining about "the contextual network is blah . . blah . . bad . . ".

Ask the feed providers to allow for domain targeting and use it to your advantage if they offer it. Do so whilst others are committed to the idea that "It's all a fraud". IF the feed provider IS thinking of offering granular control over targeting specific keyword domain "in the future" then start to do your homework now, as outline above.

Test everything. Don't just take what some pundits - especially what the click fraud pundits (product/service sellers) are saying. The water's fine. Step in. I suspect you will be happily surprised if you take control and do your homework. And learn where the nettles and biting fish hang around. (See above)

Why do I think this? Because I've hold domains were the traffic keeps growing and the advertising keeps growing and the CTR is pretty high. I have no control over CTR, except that I manually optimize many of my domains with relevant keyword phrases.

The fact that I optimize landers with keyword phrases relevant to the intent of any direct navigator seems to make everyone happy.

I know this 'cause I'm not the one doing the clicking nor paying for the ads that keep coming back.

Well, I hope this helps. I know it's written by someone with a presumptive bias, but that said, what I've written is the most the most intelligent overview of this facet of the industry that I've seen to date.

If I do say so ever so humbly. ;0)

[edited by: Webwork at 4:09 pm (utc) on Aug. 16, 2007]

[Bennie]

Then you develop the successful domains into mini sites feeding new links into your existing site(s). Or just diversify and keep both seperate and build them up independantly.

Excellent post Webwork.