1. Keyword research: Has the domain lander been appropriately optimized for likely related search phrases? If the domain is BlueWidgets.tld is the lander, if it's a 2 click lander, populated with links such as "buy blue widgets", "cheap blue widgets", "blue widget reviews", etc.
I have witnessed domains being sold at auction or privately that I could tell were not cranking out their revenue potential. Some systems attempt to automatically optimize landers with relevant keyword links. Such systems are constantly being improved but, as of 2007, many/most of them were only marginally optimizing domains when compared to human optimization.
2. PPC optimization: Not all parking companies use the same feed. Not all parking companies offer the same revenue share. Each parking company negotiates a revenue share with its upstream provider. SO, before you sell test your domain(s) with different parking companies.
3. PPC revenue period for pricing: Before you accept an offer based upon a multiple of your last 3 months revenue ask yourself: Is that 3 month period my slow time of year?
4. If you are getting a 50-60% PPC revenue share from your parking company then the person/company buying from you - who has their own direct feed - isn't paying you 5 years of their anticipated revenue. They are effectively paying you 2 and 1/2 of their anticipated revenue AND, if the domain is poorly optimized they may be paying you 1/5 of the likely optimized revenue. That's just revenue. The domain may also hold aftermarket enduser value.
I suspect portfolio and selective bulk acquisition activity will continue in the aftermarket in 2008. BuyDomains was recently reported to have acquired ~24,000 domains from people who listed/parked their domains with Afternic - their affiliated aftermarket reseller.
Who better to know if they are getting a bargain than the company you are parking your domain names with.
I don't fault any entity for getting the best deal they can. I don't fault any entity for taking the position that it's not their job to encourage the seller to do a better job of selling at a higher price.
But that doesn't stop me from looking out for the little guy and, in many respects, we're all little guys some or most of the time.
Any other advice when it comes to selling parked domains?
Also I would look at whether affiliate revenue is better than PPC.
If you are selling a portfolio are there any domains in there that you could get a better deal for selling to an end user? i.e Have you had any offers for individual domains that are higher than the bulk offer you are getting. (Even if you have turned down the individual offer in the past.)
In terms of what to expect in sale revenue for a domain, we don't aim to get any specific multiple as a revenue. Our most basic measure (and it is very basic) is to work out what forecast annual profit is for that domain after costs have come off. We do optimise as a best we can and will monitor for some time to get a clearer picture.
With high perfoming domains we obviously hold out for more revenue, but for those who aren't making as much, sometimes it's a simple as weighing up what you can get for it against the time consumed in continually optimising it - particularly if it is becoming obvious that the domain really isn't going to earn any more.
This doesn't at all mean we sell for the first price. Of course we hold out for the best price like everyone, but we tend not to go down the "we must get Nx Annual Revenue" because you might end up holding on to a low performing / average domain that uses valuable resource (human optimisation). If it seems worth the sale to reduce the resource and make a healthy profit, then why not just sell.
Each to their own I suppose!
