Domaining
Domaining is the business of making money with domain names by either flipping them for a profit or developing them into income producing websites.
Many of my friends and clients ask me how they can become a successful domainer, and want information on getting started in domaining which is why I have started to share my story.
I hope that you can avoid some of the mistakes I have made over the years when I would buy way too many bad domain names, spend way too much money and time on the wrong things, and getting sucked deeper into the internets black hole of information overload!
Still after all of these years online, I still love buying domain names, developing websites, meeting new people, and moving towards the day I am one of the great domainers like Frank Schilling (Yes I dream big!) or Rick Schwartz.
There is one great truth about domaining that keeps me going. Many domainers make a lot of money selling domain names.
Here are a few of the recent sales listed at Sedo:
| pokergame.org | 3,000 USD |
| homecreator.com | 1,400 USD |
| airservice.com | 15,000 USD |
| i9.net | 3,000 USD |
| thegiftfactory.com | 1,000 USD |
| immo-online.de | 3,000 EUR |
| iclothes.com | 1,050 USD |
| moebel.tv | 4,000 EUR |
| voipfone.it | 2,000 EUR |
| intranet.com | 160,000 USD |
I am not one of the domainers that make a lot of money selling domain names! A matter of fact I make no money selling domain names.
Developing Domain Names
My domain portfolio has fluctuated between 1000 and 2500 domain names over the last 7 years, and I have been buying domain names since 2001. In 2001 when I started buying domain names (had less then 10) I never even thought I would ever own more then those few; but as most domainers know, this turns into an addiction!
The domain names I buy I hold. My intention is to develope these domain names into money making websites. Before the Panda/Penguin update by Google I was making some decent money with adsense (enough to cover the registration fees and then some), but adsense has not made me the millions others have claimed it earned them.
It used to be easy to throw together one page websites that ranked really well, and were loaded with Google ad’s that made you money, but now it takes more time and effort to get the same results. So now I spend more time and effort to get these results! (Ugh)
I have domain names that I have developed into actual websites that earn me over $1000 a month, and sometimes generate leads that make thousands a month, and then some months these same websites only generate a few hundred dollars. But to me this is awesome. I mean where else can I make an $8 dollar or so investment and make thousands of dollars from that investment legally! This is why I am hooked; actually I am a domain name addict (will get into that in another post).
I actually got really good at monetizing domains that I now have started to manage other people’s domain name portfolio’s! I am also working on creating a website to list the domains I manage and let people contact us to buy or lease them. I am also helping others develope many of their domain names so that they can cover the cost of owning them, and begin to actual start making a profit!
I still remember that one of my very first stated goals when I started (pre panda) was to own 1000 domain names, have 1000 websites online, and to earn $1 dollar a day off of each website. Now that many of my one page websites have been wiped off the face of the planet I have been focusing more on buying up domain names that relate to the websites I do really well with, and then build them out to increase my inbound leads.
For me, my whole life as a domainer has been on domain name development, but this might change really soon as I want to try my hand at selling domain names!
So to circle back to the title of this post, ‘Should you buy and flip domain names or develope them?’, my only advice is to learn as much as you can from all of the great domainers out there! You have to love this and be ready to invest lots of time (and most likely money). You also have to have a can do attitude and know that there is still tons of great opportunity to become very successful doing this. My success has been in developing domain names, but many other great domainers flip them.
There is no better time to get started then now!
If you are a domainer, a developer or someone looking to get started feel free to contact me or leave a comment below!