RSSFlipping Expired Domain Names: Cash in the Bank!
Do you remember when the big thing to do was to flip real estate? All sorts of people got into that and lots made a fortune. The large amounts of money attracted lawyers and others who consequently made the business of flipping real estate risky and much more time consuming that it needed to be. It doesn’t make much sense to make an internet business out of flipping real estate. But flipping expired domains does.
What are expired domains and how do you make money from flipping them? Good question. Let’s start with the basics of what a domain name is and how it expires. A domain name is the address by which most people recognize the name of a site. If you have ever typed www.ebay.com, www.google.com, or www.amazon.com into your web browser to get to these sites, then you have used a domain name! A domain name has come to be an extremely important part of a business’ identity. I’d be willing to bet that if you took the first three or four business names and searched for them with a .com at the end you’d go straight to their website.
You’ll probably come across a few sites that aren’t owned by the company that you were thinking of. Why? In a lot of cases the company probably decided to build a website after the domain name was already taken by another company. You’ll see the bigger companies, those with enough money and time, will have simple, specific, and intuitive. If they weren’t the first to register the domain name, they probably spent the time and the money to buy the domain name from whomever had it originally.
Demand for a domain name isn’t just limited to big companies. A domain name composed of some highly searched keywords can get a lot of search traffic that they don’t need to pay for. The more people that come to someone’s site the more money they stand to make, whether their site is a blog, news and information site, or actually selling something.
Anyone can purchase use a domain name and they will have access to it until it expires. The length of registration depends on the registrar through whom the domain was registered. Once the allotted time period has passed the domain can be reregistered by the owner, or if the owner decides not to, then the domain has expired and any one can purchase it.
So, how do you flip an expired domain name? Frist you have to find the names that are expired. The best way to do that is to do some keyword searches on google and find what domain names are selling on ebay. Create a list of both domain names that are selling well on eBay and popular search terms on Google. When you search on eBay use the “completed auctions” function so you can see what keywords and concepts are hot. You’ll want to search for the popular terms on google as well and add those to your list.
Before you go on to select domain names to purchase you’ll want to remember a few tips. First, don’t get a domain name that starts with or contains numbers. Secondly, avoid domain names with hyphens. Third, you’ll want one that isn’t longer than 24 characters. Finally, only get domain names that end in .com.
There are several free and paid sites that you can use to find expired domain names. The one that I like to use the most is Networksolutions.com. I like this site because it is free and it is considered the granddaddy of them all. When you go there take your list of search terms and you’ll be able to see what domain names correspond to your list.
- Go to the Network Solutions expired domain search form
- Enter your list into the keyword box
- Make sure that you set the search terms to not include domains with numbers and hyphens
- Set the search terms to include only .com extensions
- Remember that you only want to have domains that are 24 characters in length
Once you get the results, download them in .csv format and open and save the list. You’ll notice that there are several thousand names that are available in this list. Not all of them will be useful and the first way to find out which ones are useful is to see which ones are available. Godaddy.com has a bulk domain registration form that you should use. Enter in up to a maximum of 500 domains, process them, and then examine the results. You’ll see the results divided into those that have warning and those that are in the bulk register box. Copy and paste the ones without the warning into a separate excel spreadsheet and save it. Repeat this until you’ve gone through the whole list.
Once you’ve collected all the available names and saved them in your list you’re ready to sort through them to find the ones that are likely to be valuable. Look for names that are memorable, easy to understand or spell, don’t abbreviate, fit a niche, and aren’t more than four words long. Your potential buyers want domains that are clear, concise, and specific because they will be using the domains for business or personal use. These buyers will offer you the best prices for the domains as opposed to the other buyers in the market who are there to speculate and domain squat. They will generally try to offer you the lowest possible price. You can avoid them by having clear concise domain names.
The next step is to buy the domain names. Go back to the Godaddy.com bulk domain registration form and start buying your names. Make sure that you don’t talk yourself into buying lousy names or names that don’t fit the criteria that I’ve already mentioned, you’ll not be able to sell it. You may only be buying as few as 10 to 20 names at a time, but they’ll be more worth it than the names which don’t fit the criteria.
Godaddy.com has pretty good prices, just remember that you don’t need the services that they are advertising as you go through the purchase process. Your wallet will stay a little thicker for ignoring the ads and just buying the domains.
Once you’ve purchased the domains you’ll want to park them. That way they will be hosted for a cheap price and you’ll be able to show that the site is for sale. In addition to showing off the site, you can also put ads on the site that are related to the domain’s name’s industry. If any visitors click on the links you’ll also make some additional money. Trafficz.com and Sedo.com are two site I would recommend to use to park your domains.
Once you’ve done that it is time to sell your domains! And the perfect place to sell the domains is eBay! You may have seen in the Make Money Online Section and (other area). This is another lucrative way to make money online using eBay. You’ll want to write a compelling article and title for your domain that you are selling on eBay. You won’t be able to post any pictures of your domain, so make sure you are thorough in your description. Include a link and maybe discuss the industry that the domain is about.
When you start the auction, start it low with no reserve, with a specific ending time, and give detailed transfer information. If you start with a $0.99 cent bid you’ll be sure to attract a lot of eyes on eBay and you’ll be that much closer to getting a great auction. Don’t forget to have a compelling headline to go along with the description and screen shot. For instance if you are selling the domain icecreamsammies.com, make your headline look something like this: IceCreamSammiches.com Premium Domain Name – NR. That way the industry will be clear and people will know that there is no reserve to start bidding.
Then all you have to do is to get the domain to the buyer. eBay will send an invoice, the buyer pays through PayPal and you transfer the name. I recommend using godaddy.com to transfer the name. All you have to do is click on the account change button. Once there, fill in the email address, the name, address, and phone number of the buyer. Click done and Godaddy.com will take care of the rest!
Let’s make some money online flipping domains!
Filed Under: E-Commerce
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