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Title: Making Money from Parked Domains

Let me tell you a true story. A friend of my who likes to collect domain

names was describing a few that he had acquired. While he has a wide range

of domains in various categories, these particular domains were all related

to web hosting.

Some of the domain names were similar to existing web hosting company names

(or derivatives of web hosting company names). Others simply had 'hosting',

'host', or a related term in the domain itself.

So my friend and I were talking and he said something like, "Yeah, it's a

shame - if only I had the time to develop some content for some of these

domains then I might make some money form them". It turns out that he had

no content on any of the domains - just parked pages, or no content at all.

When I investigated the domains, it turned out that there was a small but

steady traffic stream that visited these domains. Some simply typed in the

domain, others apparently found the domain through a search engine that had

categorized the parked page.

So I suggested the following to him - why not use a service that will take

the domain as is - with no content whatsoever - and suggest search options

that generate revenue for each click? He took my advice, grudgingly I might

add, and guess what? He made $50 the first month from just a few of his

domains.

He was so excited that he asked what he might do to further increase his

revenues from his domain names. I suggested that he use his parking pages

(these can be customized with some hosts) to test banners from affiliate

programs with the highest paying hosting companies. He placed only three

banners at the top of his pages - with a brief description of the company's

product offerings taken straight from their web sites. This also proved to

be a great success - and his revenue stream increased.

My friend has since invested some time and energy in monetizing his other

domains. He has either pointed the domains to a pay per click search

engine, or listed affiliate links on almost every domain. This has turned a

lackluster domain speculation business into a profit generating pay per

click and affiliate business that requires almost no effort to maintain.

Needless to say, my friend has taken my out to lunch a couple of times

since then.

If you have parked domains and what to try getting paid for search results

on those pages, check out this service offered by Sedo (there are others

out there as well):

Good luck in transforming your parked domains into cold, hard cash!

About the Author

Derek Vaughan has been actively marketing on the Internet since 1995. Mr.

Vaughan has marketed products at the Walt Disney Company as the online

marketing manager of ecommerce for ESPN.com. Mr. Vaughan is also the

)- a web hosting review site. Mr. Vaughan holds degrees from both the

Indiana University and Purdue University. He has also received a Master of

Business Administration degree from the Owen School at Vanderbilt

University. Cheap Hosting Directory is a part of TechPad Agency's network

of web hosting portals.