How to Come up With a Good Domain Name

Your website is basically identified by a domain name. Therefore, it is of equal importance to allot a certain amount of attention and time to think crucially about what domain name is to be used for your business. You may opt at replicating a product or a service, or the site design that you want may have slight similarities with some other sites, but domain names must be particularly unique with the rest of the other domain names. Below are some of the useful tips that you can use in making a domain name:

- A domain name is considered a good domain name when it is easily memorized and remembered. A uniquely made domain name that stands out differently from the rest is an easily remembered and recognized domain name. As such, people will keep on re-visiting the site because they have a good recall of the site name.

- A domain name is considered a good domain name when it is a shorter domain name. Shorter domain names keep people from incorrectly typing the name, as it only requires fewer characters. Longer domain names are prone to being incorrectly typed on the address bar compared to shorter ones.

- A domain name is considered a good domain name when it is appropriate to the name of the business. The nature of the company activity must be well spoken by the domain name attached with it. Having a matching domain name with the business activity shows an air of relevance and consistency.

Make Money Flipping Domain Names

Flipping domain names can be a profitable way to make easy money online. The key to flipping domains is to be able to find expiring domain names that buyers would be interested in paying a premium price for.

To start flipping domain names, there are three steps you should take. First set up an account at Godaddy to start registering your domain names. I recommend Godaddy because they are very affordable, offer good customer support, and you can transfer a domain name to a buyer just as soon as you register it.

Next sign up for a seller account at www.ebay.com. Ebay is the best place to start flipping your domains. There is an active audience of domain buyers who will compete for quality domain names.

The next step is to find valuable domains that have expired. There are many paid services available which allow you to register domains as soon as they have dropped, but most of these charge at least $60 to catch a domain for you once it drops. The best free service I have found is justdropped.com. You can search for domains that have dropped with your keywords.

Some keywords to search for are loan, creditcard, mortgage, and real estate. There are hundreds of keywords you can search. I chose these because they are some of the most popular for domain buyers to pay a premium for.

After finding a few domains that have expired and are available, go ahead and register them at godaddy. I like to park the domains for a few weeks to see if they get any traffic before flipping them. I have found the best place to park domains is at parked.com. They offer the best payouts I have found from parking services, and I have tried almost all of them.

If you domain is not getting any or much traffic after parking it for a few weeks, you should then list it on ebay to try to flip it. You can set the price you think the name is worth, or you can start it at a lower price and hope more than one bidder will be interested in the name, and will compete to get it and drive the price up. It is hard to know what a domain will sell for on ebay, so you may want to set a reserve price if you do not want to sell it for less than you paid for it.

Many domain sellers on ebay will start their listings at $0.99 and hope the domain gets bid up to a point where they can make a profit. I have done these, and the only down side is a domain you think is valuable will sell for less than you paid for it. In the long run if you sell enough high quality domain names, you won’t have to worry about the few you take a loss on.

After a while of selling domain names on ebay, you will develop a list of buyers and when you register a new name they may be interested in, you can email them directly and decide on a price without having to list the domain name on ebay. This is where the real money can be made flipping domains. You can register a domain at godaddy for less than $10, and sell it the very same day for $100’s of dollars. That’s not a bad return on investment if you ask me.

These are the basics of flipping domain names. Domain flipping can be a profitable way to make some extra money online, or if done right, you can set it up to be a full time business. Many domain flippers are making thousands of dollars per month reselling domain names online.

Ways To Make Domain Name Investing Pay Off

The practice of domain name investing is becoming a popular choice for those who want to make money on the Internet. This investment practice is fairly easy to get involved with and can pay off very well for a small investment. It is important to understand how it works to be able to open the door for big returns.

Getting into domaining, as it is called, requires nothing more than buying domain names and parking them via parking services. The other option is selling these domains to other investors. The practice does take a little effort to master, but it can be well worth the effort. Financial returns from domaining come in one of two ways - resale value or ad revenue.

Starting out in domaining involves buying website names and having them registered and parked or reselling them to other investors. How much of a return an investor will make will depend on the traffic a particular domain name pulls in or how sought after the name tends to be by others.

There are a few methods to use for figuring out what types of domain names to register and buy. The most common are "type-ins" or "typos." Typos are names that are similar to existing websites or brand name products. Typo sites receive traffic due to accidental "typos" people make in trying to reach other sites. This type of buying can get a little tricky, especially when trademarked names are being used though. Some domainers don't feel the typo route is the best way to go for legality issues. Another route to take is to buy actual "type-ins." These are domain names that are commonly used in web searches. For example, "organicdogfood" or other actual words that might be used in searches. This is considered by many to be more legitimate. Another option is buying formerly used domain names that have traffic or backlinks and simply parking them or reselling them.

The options for buying and selling domain names are many. Some investors choose to get their names in bulk from sites like Moniker.com and then research them at a later time to determine their money-making potential. Other buyers go to domaining forums like DNForum.com or DomainState.com These forums are designed for the buying and selling of domain names. On these sites, domains are traded and sold in much the same manner as real estate is in the "real world." These sites do present some challenges though; it is up to buyers to figure out if a sale is legitimate. Not all deals work out. Some of these forums, however, do offer a ranking system for buyers and sellers to help with checking the integrity of a sale. Some buyers and sellers simply opt to use escrowing services to handle their deals to ensure they go through smoothly.

Arriving at the real value of a domain name can be the hardest part of this venture. The price and value tends to hinge on what a buyer believes a name is worth. Buyers can, however, request revenue and traffic reports in some cases to help them figure a fair price.

After domains have been secured, there are ways to really make them pay off financially with little effort involves. Parking service sites are the most common way to make this happen. Services like these let owners "park" their pages with little content on them. This means the pages will appear in web searches, but they won't contain a lot of content. Although content doesn't go with this deal, these pages can have text ads on them. This means the owner of the domain name will reap the advertising revenue if the sites are viewed and used. The other common option for making money is to sell the domains to those who want to develop or park them.

Parking services like Sedo and Parked.com have their own rules domainers must follow. Although these services do allow text ads on parked pages, they tend to frown on backlink generation. They expect that traffic that comes in will be of natural, organic means. Simply put, they want accidental hits, normal Internet searches or existing backlinks to drive traffic. If site owners do too much to generate traffic, their pages can be taken down.

Getting into domaining can be one of the easiest ways to make money via the Internet. It requires very little effort. Using this practice to its full potential will take a little time. Although some forms are not considered as legitimate as other, the overall business is one that works quite well for many people.

Internet Real Estate Mogul

Ever wondered who owns the most internet real estate aka: web addresses or domain names? Well the Internet Real Estate Mogul is a fellow by the name of Kevin Ham. For years, Ham has been snatching up available domain names with value, and adding them to his portfolio of money makers. Kevin makes a very good living buying domain names. Since 2000, Ham has acquired over 300,000 domains, which when added to his other business ventures generates over $70 million dollars a year for this internet real estate king. And John Chow thinks he's a dot com mogul.

It’s one thing to own a handful of a big money making sites, but when you own over 300,000 of them, you have quite a bit of control on the internet playing field. Being he’s a devout Christian, Ham has purchased several religion based domains such as God.com, Religion.com and Satan.com. During Ham’s journey to the top, he occasionally left his home in Vancouver to do missionary work in China, Mexico and the Philippines.

By the year 2002, Ham was making approx. $1 million a year and was just warming up. With help from his high school friend and now partner, he made the next few years his most aggressive. This is when he tried out a trick of his called “tasting.” Domain purchasers were given a 5-day trial period on the domains that they purchased. This was intended to let them test the waters with the traffic on the domain for a few days and toss it if they were not satisfied. Mr. Ham used this provision to purchase thousands of domain names and discard all but maybe 100 or so that showed potential. Ham no longer practicing tasting due to the overwhelming number of unreliable domains he was ending up with.

Domain auctions are a big part of Ham’s purchasing strategies. Domainars, venture capitalist and investment bankers all take part in the bidding of various domain names. At these auctions, upwards of $150, 000 or more. Ham has paid $171,250 for HotelDeals.com.

Since the tasting days, Ham has moved on to bigger and better methods. He current searches for typo-squatter domains. Have you ever tried to enter the URL of one of your favorite sites and mistakenly left out the “O” in the .com? Well, you may have ended up with www.google.cm. It just so happens that .cm belongs to the Republic of Cameroon. Ham began purchasing the popular names with the .cm and had the traffic forward to another one of his sites. This page contained PPC links that when clicked, would generate cash for guess who? That’s right, Kevin Ham! Ham and his crew are not stopping at .cm. He also has his eyes on (.om) which belongs to Oman and (.co) which belongs to Columbia.

Domain Name Renewal Woes

Domain name renewal might sound simple, but with so many scams going on, it's definitely a subject worth mentioning. If you fail to renew your domain name properly or within a certain amount of time, you could lose it to someone else and never get it back – no matter how hard you’ve worked on your website. Here are some helpful tips to ensure that your domain name stays right where it needs to be - in your domain name account!

Early Domain Name Renewal Recommended
It is recommended that you renew your domain name as early as possible - before its expiration date. The registrar (or domain name registration company) should send you a reminder of when it is due for renewal. But emails can get lost or stuck in spam folders easily. So it's wise to do your own scheduling for domain name renewal.

If you own multiple domain names, keep a list of all your domain names, their individual expiration dates (if each was registered at a different time), and your personal account information for your domain name registrar. You will likely need to log-in securely to an account to renew your domain name and pay the renewal registration fee.

Secure Your Domain Name for Longer Periods
If you own a domain name that you plan on keeping for many years to come, you can save money now and time in the future by signing on for a longer duration of domain name registration. For example, some domain name registrars are offering up to 10-year registration at a tremendous discount per year. You will pay a little more up front, but save dollars in the long run. Also, this frees you from the yearly domain name renewal for 10 years!

Use Renewal Time to Re-evaluate
When your domain name renewal time comes around, use that time to re-evaluate your website situation. Perhaps you've changed to a new hosting company since registering your domain name. You might consider moving your domain name to that company to make things easier in the future. During the renewal period, this is a good time to make the switch without wasting part of your yearly fee.

You might also use this time to register another domain name or two that will complement your business. You can package your registrations together to save money on each domain name.

Automate to Avoid Domain Name Mishaps
Many domain name registrars allow you to automate your domain name renewals so you won't have to be reminded each time. This is an automatic credit card charge billed to you during renewal time. Be on alert still with this system. No system is flawless, so you should still be mindful of when your renewal time is to ensure that your domain name gets renewed on time.

Start with the Initial Registration
If you're brand new to this whole domain name registration process, keep the following tips in mind. Register your domain name at a trustworthy company. Cheaper is not always better. Keep your domain name account information in a safe place on your hard drive as well as in your office, written or printed as a hard copy in case you lose your computer information.

When renewal time comes, you will need your account login and password to access your domain name information for renewal. Registrar companies are usually very strict when it comes to domain name security, so you might have to give an arm and a leg to get your password back if you lose it!