Curious if anyone here regularly buys expiring/dropping domains for links, or sites?
Curious if anyone here regularly buys expiring/dropping domains for links, or sites?
I do, when the right one comes up. Check out the Private Blog Networks thread cash ninja started
I got out of bed today staring at a ghost. Who forgot to float away, didnt have all that much to say. Wouldn't even tell me his own name.
Non ducor, duco
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succor (August 11th, 2012)
we buy dropping domains in auctions on occasion - but not for links or to re-build old sites (maybe we should). we usually do it with the view to develop the domain at some point or just to add to our domain portfolio.
My list for expiring domains is kind of time consuming if you don't have a bot doing the work for you. Of course this is in "THEORY" I would never condone copying someones copyright. If it doesn't have the following I don't worry about them unless it is a great domain just to keep as Golles already mentioned.
The domain needs to be fairly old
It needs at least 1 great link from an authority domain
PR used to be good now I still prefer it to have some
Type in Traffic is preferable
I can get a copy of the old site somehow (either off archive or via original hosting)
Original owners domain info (I have kept clear of the private proxies ones not sure if it would work with them)
Preferably have the old hosting still available (only way to check that is by editing your hosts file to use the old dns settings)
To resurrect the domain I try and place all the original data back in the registrar info (except the email addresses) and if the original hosting is still active I will point back to that for a couple of weeks (or until it dies) and then point it to my new host. I leave the sites static until I can see that most of the original link juice, traffic has been restored, it can take anywhere from 4 days to 6 weeks I have found, depending on what registrar, Godaddy domains seem to take the longest.
I got out of bed today staring at a ghost. Who forgot to float away, didnt have all that much to say. Wouldn't even tell me his own name.
Non ducor, duco
I've been looking into it but as you rightly point out grynge, it's time consuming and also (unfortunately) there are lots of other people up to the same thing, so spotting and then successfully grabbing the good ones before someone else does is tricky to say the least.
I spent a bit of time the other day tracking down some aged sites/domains that looked like they had fallen out of use. I emailed some of the owners to see whether they were interested in selling and the rest are in a spreadsheet waiting for me to do something about them. None of them really excite me though, which is probably why I am dragging my heels over it (that and I have so many other things to do at the moment!)
grynge (August 2nd, 2012)
Once upon a time, not very long ago, one could pick out dropping ICANN domains a lot easier than today and catch them a lot easier than today. Since 2009 it has been getting harder and harder. Here's the short version of "why".
The easiest way was to sort through a list of dropping domains and pick out the ones with PR, using a web-based utility. Brute force sorting would result in a list of domains that could be caught and sold for good money, soley on the PR.
To catch domains, you have to beat the professional catchers and register them first. If you're trying to catch more than a couple, you need a registrar that provides a bulk domain checker and allows you to pre-load your account - even if the domain shows as "available", the pro catcher can still beat you in the time it takes to pay the bill. And the availability check needs to be fast. Some checkers are so slow you don't catch anything.
It is not written down explicitly, but most of the US registrars don't allow dropcatching, and they do it by rigging their domain availability checkers. Having been made aware of this by others, I had looked around for somewhere to catch from. In 2009, the bulk domain checker at Namecheap was useful for catching. As time went by, I noted that I couldn't catch anything with it because when I got to the payment stage the order would be cancelled because the domains were "not available".
For a short time after that, it was possible to catch domains from the Namecheap single domain checker - then that went the same way, when I got to the payment stage the order would be cancelled because the domains were "not available". This was not true, as I proved by registering a couple of domains at GoDaddy AFTER Namecheap had said they were not available.
After that, somebody put together a $17 WSO which trawled through the GoDaddy bargain bin looking for domains with PR. As a nuisance, this rated high.
As a "program", it was rubbish, because it relied on automating human actions and running lumps of the list through online utilities until it was "dumped out" for over-using said utilities. If you bought it, it ran for the first 3 days, then those online utilities started imposing limits. You couldn't grab any good domains unless they had been listed within minutes of the run and started with A, because the world and his wife were competing.
The nuisance was that it showed a lot of people where to go and find ways of automating online tasks at no cost - build your own bot with freeware. I had never heard mention of the software used, but a lot of people took the initiative and built their own "bots" because it told them where to look. Competition increased.
Not long after that, Google started killing the PR on most dropping domains, and the Panda took the PR away from parked domains, so you needed another primary assessment parameter. It also took away the primary marker for resale of raw domains without sites. Nobody wants to buy a domain based on an seoMOZ rating - wozzat?
In early 2012 the Schlund organisation took over Snapnames / Moniker, and they have been aggressively catching dropping domains since then. Some people who were seriously in the "catching domains" market have started up as registrars in order to compete, but for obvious reasons they are not offering their facilities to the general public, beyond putting up sites offering to register and host domains without mentioning fee and T&C upfront.
Until Schlund bought Snapnames, it was still possible to catch the occasional domain using the single domain search at a couple of registrars. Since that event it is easier to pre-order a desirable domain from Snapnames than try for yourself. Two years ago I would sell you a genuine PR4 for $45. The pre-order at Snapnames costs $70, then you have to bid against whoever else has bid on the domain. Other places that are still competing in the marketplace AND catching good domains consistently are the GoDaddy "subsidiaries" (inc. WildWest) and Bellnames, among others.
Amateur catching is dead for practical purposes. You can still catch from the single domain search of some registrars, if you pick the right ones, and you make a pre-arrangement to get a positive account balance. You get a chance with the Aussie registrars - but the charges are high compared to US registrars. In the EU, registrars are in violation of the card providers' terms if they do not supply goods or services in the 24h following a card transaction -tricky to get around that and pre-load an account.
The Schlund subsidiaries are so fast, if they want a domain they get it. If GoDaddy wasn't so big already, they would feel threatened. They should feel threatened ...
cash ninja (August 3rd, 2012), Clinton (August 3rd, 2012), David S (August 18th, 2012), DomainMagnate (August 3rd, 2012), golles (August 3rd, 2012), grynge (August 3rd, 2012), Kay (August 4th, 2012), KenW3 (August 2nd, 2012), Makeit (August 21st, 2012), succor (August 11th, 2012)
Oops! There's a bit missing. The trouble is that Snapnames are now being more pro-active at catching almost any dropping domains with backlinks since the takeover. There's so much activity from the pros that the amateur catcher cannot lay hands on the worthwhile drops except by back-ordering.
This doesn't make sense, at a time when making minisites appears to be becoming far less viable and parking is much less lucrative, but a lot of caught domains appear to be going into "stock".
I've considered and done a bit of this, but can't figure a good way to track these down either scripted or manually. I was successful in doing this in certain niches as then it's easier to identify all the sites and contact owners to sell if they'd sell. But doing in general just trying to find some inactive and unmonetized sites with good traffic is problematic.Originally Posted by cash ninja
I've also looked at godaddy marketplace mostly for catching expiring domains, this seems like the most cost effective option.
I m using a different approach that makes me some money but they dont come easy.
I research, run some checks, then target low-profile domains and register them.
Usually I sell one or two per 3 months after 12+ hours of work making revenue of $500-$1K total, I really dunno if its worth it.
Maybe I ll start a WSO myself and make this method public even though I m obviously not the only one following it.
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