Is Domain Parking and running AdWords on domains being replaced by building out lead generation and content driven services? It looks like a mix of SEO, content and smart monetization is flipping the domaining market upside down. Here are a look at two domains which sold this month for a lot of money and how they are being transformed into niche portals.
So far this month two top level one word domains have sold for over 2 million dollars each, the total of the two coming in at $5 million. The T.R.A.F.F.I.C. domaining conference is coming up next month in Orlando, and these high level sales are a huge precursor.
Brandable single words tend to inherently work well in attracting links and Google rankings. As an example, let’s look at Pizza.com. The site has been a domain parking site for years and then added some Pizza ads and basic content about a year ago, so since its inception, Pizza.com has had no real value; except for in its domain. Yet the site has over 1,000 inbound links as tracked by Yahoo and also ranks in the top 5 search results for pizza on Google.
Not even counting type in traffic, Pizza.com should do quite well and be worth its $2.6 Million purchase price, even if a sound marketing and business plan is not yet implemented. But they do have a Pizza Forum!
On the other side of the pond, Money.co.uk recently sold for $2.4 Million, which given the value of the English pound to the dollar may be a drop in the bucket at 1.2 million pounds, but is still a considerable amount for a .co.uk domain name and according to a post on DomainNews and Digg, is record breaking.
Unlike Pizza.com, Money.co.uk already has a rather high value content portal running and seems to be monetizing with credit cards and insurance leads.
I think these two examples prove the worth of a well put together business plan within a domain. We’re seeing more and more domainers look for alternatives to domain parking, and by developing content driven and link friendly portals and hubs, the domaining business looks to be changing from parked AdWords to real & relevant content; especially with Domain Ads Exclusion from AdWords.
Your thoughts?
