Today's age is all about recycling and nothing seems to have capitalized on this more than expired domain names. These have represented a great potential of earning quick money online. Ever since the dot com downfall people have been thinking of innovative ways to access tools which track expiring websites every single day!
Count yourself lucky
Until recently, only a handful of people could earn a fortune from expired domain names. It's because they had access to automated tools which tracked every website which ceased to exist. However with the plenty of modern tools available today, you can tap into the tremendous potential of expired domain names.
What are expired domain names?
In essence, these domain names belonged to another website owner at some point of time. They may not have paid their renewal fees which could be one reason why such domain names have become available for all in the market. Usually companies wait about 45 days since the expiry date and then the domain name becomes available to the open market. Then there are others who have created a domain name merely on the basis of speculation. They hope to earn a tidy profit in the future from the resale of the domain name. There are other website owners who create a domain name but don't really follow up on the development of the site. This often results in the expiry of the domain name.
New trends
It helps to keep an eye open for upcoming trends in the future. Most speculators have already started creating domain names which reflect future trends or technologies. If you want to get a share of this revenue potential you need to create domain names with these trends in mind. Then at a later date when these trends pick up momentum you can resell these for a high price.
Redirecting the traffic
Another great way to make money off expired domain names is by purchasing the domain name and then redirecting the traffic to your own site. You could get this traffic at just a few pennies for each click. This way you get plenty of traffic volume for a very low price!
Small websites
Another way to capitalize on this phenomenon is by creating several small websites using these expired domain names. That way you can direct loads of traffic to these sites for virtually free! You can even develop these sites and then resell them later as a value added feature, along with the expired domain names. You can be sure to earn loads of money in this way!
Functional sites
If you are lucky you may even find sites which have expired domain names but which are completely functional. Many times they may already have incoming links from other sites, directory listings and even good page ranking on popular search engines.
An extension of affiliate marketing
Another way to make good money off expired domain names is by using them to divert traffic to your affiliate marketing program. Try to find expired domain names which closely associate with the theme and content of your affiliate marketing program. Then use these domain names to divert traffic to your affiliate site. You will receive tonnes of traffic at the fraction of the cost ? without much effort!
The best approach
One great business model which is still fairly nascent is as follows. You can search for expired domain names where the website owners are providing the service at a certain price. Then create a site which uses these domain names. However the catch is, in the initial days you provide these services free of cost. Once you start receiving more and more traffic you can convert this site into a placeholder for others to keep ads. Then with every click through you get to earn substantial income. Thus you can not only improve your page ranking in this manner but also capitalize on the popularity of the site to get advertisers for it.
Why expired domain names are a goldmine
There are plenty of reasons why buying an expired domain name can fetch you loads of money. For starters, it is a great resource to divert tonnes of traffic. It most likely also has plenty of links on it which accounts for its already high page rank on search engines. Imagine the kind of traffic, revenues and popularity you can enjoy by buying an expired domain name for a fraction of the cost.
Domain names are commodities like any other, and so are valuable and tradable. These two examples given are trademarked, and so are valuable for that reason in itself, but there are many generic domain names which still have great value.
An extreme example is diamond.com, which recently sold for $7.5million. Obviously, not all domain names fetch that sort of money, but there are lots of domain names which hold real value.
So, how do you actually make money from domain names? There are 3 different income generating strategies.
1. Parking the domain, and using Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising
Parking is a very simple strategy. It relies on natural traffic from people who just take a chance that there's a site called, for example,'florist.com', or books.com, and type it into their browser.
If there is, and it's yours, you'll get that natural traffic, or 'type-in traffic' coming to your site. About 10 to 20 percent of Internet searches worldwide are done this way, so that's adds up to a lot of traffic every day. All you have to do is park your domain name at a domain parking network, and all this natural traffic will be sent straight to a site full of relevant pay per click ads, all generating cash for you.
2. Affiliate marketing
Affiliate Marketing can be very profitable if you have natural traffic, but here you have a slightly more active role than in PPC Parking.
Rather than having adverts placed for you, you sign up to affiliate programmes. You, as an affiliate, then advertise other peoples' products and for each actual sale, you get paid a percentage of the sales proceeds. Your share will vary a lot from one product to another, but some pay up to 75% commission. A good starting point is clickbank.com.
Of course, you can always sign up to place pay per click ads on your affiliate site as well.
3. Buying and Selling Domain Names
This strategy probably requires the most time and effort, but it can be the most lucrative. Domain names are the 'real estate' of the Internet. Being able to locate a website 'store' on a prime domain name that gets natural traffic is like having the best spot in every high street.
It is difficult to get the very best spot (most of them are gone), but you'll still be able to find a lot of lower value domains, and many of them will be worth something to someone. In the meantime, you can increase the value of the domain using the first 2 strategies.
If you hold on to a domain for some time, you can develop it and make money from affiliate links or PPC parking. The revenue earned shows a potential buyer how desirable it is, putting you in a much stronger bargaining position. Higher traffic volumes to any particular domain will create higher earnings, and therefore make the domain more valuable.
A domain name business can be very profitable, provided you pick the right domain names, and if the above strategies are implemented correctly.
Both Pawel Reszka & Val Wilson are contributors for EditorialToday. The above articles have been edited for relevancy and timeliness. All write-ups, reviews, tips and guides published by EditorialToday.com and its partners or affiliates are for informational purposes only. They should not be used for any legal or any other type of advice. We do not endorse any author, contributor, writer or article posted by our team.
Pawel Reszka has sinced written about articles on various topics from Make Money Online, Internet Marketing and Entrepreneurship. Here is the best course on how to profit from . Check out this. Pawel Reszka's top article generates over 673000 views. to your Favourites.
Val Wilson has sinced written about articles on various topics from Marketing, Finances and Fitness. To find out more about making money fron domain names, and for your free Domain Profits Report, go to