How to Find A Domain Name

Have you ever been curious how domain resellers make profits off a piece of Web estate? Here are some steps to get you in the right direction when searching for domains with high value and resell ability.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• A lot of time
• Research
• A small money investment

1. Go to a website that lists expired or recently available domain names. Good sources include justdropped.com, alldrops.com, and bustaname.com. You can pay to get a variety of expired domain lists, though I would steer clear of them unless you were experienced in what to look for.

2. Though unlikely, you should strive to find one-word, two-word, three-letter, or four-letter .com domain names. The reason for this is that .com domains are the most well known; short, concise addresses are easily recognizable and more importantly, profitable. However, most one-word, three-letter, and four-letter domains at this point are already taken. If you cannot find one of these rare wonders, your best bet is the two-word .com domain.

3. Do your homework. Go to a domain auction website such as Sedo.com or Afternic.com and see what is currently selling. What is garnering the most traffic? What has the most bids? Ignore the auctions with skyhigh asking prices and no bids, those are not the ones to emulate. If moneyfunds.com has 43 bids and is sitting on $1,860.00, well passed the seller's reserve price, then that is a good sign of what may be popular. Even better is if similar domains such as moneytalks.com is also having the same success.

4. Using this information, seek to find a .com address that can emulate the successes of the best auctions on Sedo.com or Afternic.com. Though there is no guarantee of that kind of profit, it is a good indicator and guide as to what is popular and what is desirable. In general, the more broad your address is, the better chances of selling it. For example, a website catering towards finance and investments such as FundCost.com will garner more attention then GuitarPicks.com, because the latter is a niche address that would only cater towards guitarists.

5. More then likely you will not find a one-word, three-letter, or four-letter .com domain. So, if you are searching for a two-word domain name, it is much more profitable to find two words that relate to each other. For example, petsupplies.com, as a whole, is one hundred times more profitable then petcity.com. Don't just register a two-word domain like rugbytalk.com and expect it to sell quickly, or even well.

6. As a general rule, avoid intentional misspelled domains, such as yahooo.com; chances are they will not be as profitable as you think they are. Also, steer clear of adding "e" to the beginning of a word, such as ePet.com or eLove.com. The vast majority of sellers that attempt to sell such words end up disappointed. Ebay.com is not popular because it is called ebay.com, it is popular because of the hundreds of millions of dollars they spent marketing it and their company. You probably cannot afford such luxuries, so don't buy them!

7. Avoid hyphenated words. Hyphenated words make far less then there non-hyphenated counterparts. Just because SportsCars.com paid for your retirement fund does not mean Sports-Cars.com will do the same. In fact, it would probably only pay for a year's worth of groceries as compared to the non-hyphenated domains.

8. Once you find a domain that looks promising, make sure to get it appraised professionally. Check out how often the keywords in the domain are searched for on Google. Also, see how much traffic the website gets currently. Was it registered recently, or has it been around for a long time? These are questions that can spell the difference between a one hundred dollar profit and a one thousand dollar profit.

9. Once you have found a winner, register it with a hosting company. I highly recommend Ipower.com, they can get you a domain for $7.75 a year, which is about as low as they come.

10. Your last option is to try and sell it quickly or wait it out. In general, unless you have a fantastic domain, it is better to wait it out. If you are a web developer or know one, build the website with relevant material and ads to build pay-per-click revenues. If you can build more traffic to your website then there was prior, you are on your way to making much more profit!

Tips & Warnings

• If no .com domain sparks your attention, do not forget about other TLD's (top level domains). Domains such as .info and .net can still make you a good profit. The .mobi domain is very popular at the time of this writing as well.
• Even with all these tips, don't expect huge, quick profits. A lot of success in domain reselling is in the timing. It takes discipline, research, and patience to truly make a buck now since the "dot com" surge ended.

Resources

• Sedo - Domain Name Auctions
• Afternic - Domain Name Auctions
• JustDropped.com Expired Domains
• AllDrops.com Expired Domains

[afsnyder]

on 9/14/2008 You could also try a free one here:

http://www.domainlagoon.com/sign-up