In this series of articles, we are looking at how to optimise your domain portfolio across the different business models of sales (big and small), traffic and development. The first model I have been unpacking is development, not the technical aspects but the business aspects of domain development.

We’ve explored why people return to websites and how to earn money from advertisers. In this article I will be discussing how to build an online business selling services and products.

The first thing we need to separate out is the different between building a business and conducting a transaction. Building a business is all about repeatable revenue that ideally grows over time while transactions are the big deal you hope to get one day.

My wife has a great saying, “Like clockwork.” What she means by this is that she would much rather have twenty dollars each month coming in from a customer than the big deal that may happen one day.

After attending a domain conference and hearing all about the great big things people are doing (most are not true btw) it’s easy to lose sight of what is really driving your business in the quest for the big deal. This is particularly appropriate for selling services and products. Don’t get me wrong, I love the big deals but they just take up so much time and have about a one percent chance of coming off.

So why am I a big fan of my wife’s saying? It proves a number of things about your new online business:

1. You have traffic.
2. The traffic is the correct type because it’s purchasing your service/products.
3. Each month the revenue has the potential to grow with more subscribers.

Once you have these items in place all you need to do is repeat as many times as possible and ensure that the backdoor is closed. If two things happen, your business will then have no choice but to grow:

1. You get more of the same type of people to your website.
2. Your existing customers continue to keep their subscription/buying habits in place. This is the ultimate endorsement of your product/service.

Of course, I’m working under the assumption that you have your pricing right and that your customer acquisition costs don’t put you into a loss making situation.

People will subscribe to services/products for a variety of reason but generally speaking it’s because they can’t get the service/product from elsewhere. Associated with this is whether the new customers trust you enough to part with their cash. One of the problems that many news websites are experiencing is there is always another website where the same content is for free.

Let’s imagine that I decided to charge for access to my articles here on my blog. My guess is a few people would subscribe while the vast majority would write horrible things about me in the forums. My advertisers would abandon me and whizzbangsblog would become a shadow of its former self…..so I’m not too excited about this idea.

This raises an important issue that newspapers from around the world are wrestling with. When you’ve given something online away for free it’s really hard to then start charging for it. So going free is great as long as it’s in line with your overall business strategy.

In my case, I’m happy to write articles and share my experience with people because I believe in giving back to my industry and my sponsors like it. Although, if you have quality unique content that isn’t just a regurgitation of everyone else’s then you may get away with a paywall.....but it had better be really good content!

So let’s imagine I’m wanting to increase my revenue through some sort of subscription basis. What I may do is have premium content that is behind a paywall and leave the blog articles as they are. This strategy is used a lot in the software industry where you can have the free version of some software which has a few features or pay an annual subscription for the full version.

Another thing I could do is provide something completely different from my blog posts. For example, for twenty dollars a quarter I’ll automatically send you an awesome T-shirt with a really funny domain related statement on it or a domaining mini e-book/newsletter to help provoke your thinking about your business.

Better yet, why don’t I put together an online training course that takes a person from a novice domainer right through to a masterclass level. The course will include videos, notes and assessment so that it has some standing in the domaining community. There’s many different ideas you can adopt for your online business but my advice is you should test the market prior to investing a huge amount of money.

Two really interesting areas of subscription earnings that are only recently being exploited are subscriptions to highly targeted educational courses and products. For example, if I shaved with a blade I know that would love the concept of receiving new blades each month via a subscription service.

A couple of years ago I was listening to a radio show about guys and clothing. I couldn’t resist calling up the show and explaining to the presenter that I would love to subscribe to clothes. I hate going out to buy clothes and most of the time I just want to buy the same pair of jeans…..why not have a subscription for jeans?

I hope that you get the sense that all of these ideas are examples of subscription services. Just for the record, I have no desire to do anything with whizzbangsblog in that area…..I have enough on my plate!

Obviously there are a great multitude of business models that you can apply to your development project. Remember that we are looking at developing one of our domains into a business as part of our portfolio optimisation. The first business model that we will examine is advertising.

In this business model you are trying to ramp your traffic so that it becomes worthwhile for advertisers to spend their money to reach your audience. A couple of things about audience, you can either provide mass numbers or the right people to advertisers. For instance, Whizzbangsblog doesn’t have millions of people visiting it every day but it does have the right people in the domain industry. This is valuable for sponsors.

With your new development you need to choose your approach and go mass volume of advertisers or a select few. If you have a mass of advertisers on your pages, then readers may revolt and advertisers won’t pay the big dollars. Less advertisers will potentially allow you to charge a higher rate and keep the readers onside. It’s a balancing act and it really depends upon your market vertical.

Remember that one person’s advertising can also be another person’s content. This is often the case in hobby publications where the advertising is just as valuable as the articles to the readers.

Unless you have huge volumes of traffic then I would recommend staying clear of selling on a cost per view basis. Likewise, any other performance based advertising (eg. Pay per click) may not be suitable for a business you’re launching out of the gate. A reasonable charge per month is often palatable for advertisers as well as provide some necessary initial cashflow for your venture.

As you write your content what you really want to do is provide value to your sponsors/advertisers. For instance, I use both Escrow.com and Epik and I wouldn’t have a problem recommending them to readers. You need to be careful that you’re not writing advertorial pieces but sharing your own experiences of using their products and services.

You can add a lot of value beyond a banner on a webpage. For instance, earlier this year I conducted a video interview with Jackson Elsegood from Escrow.com about some of the developments that he’s introducing at Escrow.com. Likewise, I will be interviewing Rob Monster from Epik about what he is working on at Epik. If you are looking at adopting this strategy, then the number one issue that you should be focused on is whether this is providing value to readers. There’s no point in conducting an interview that’s merely a sales pitch.

On the flipside of the coin, the ultimate mass volume model is a directory. Once again the biggest challenge for anyone building a directory isn’t the actual building (there’s lots of directory software available) but getting the high volume of traffic to the directory so that advertisers get a return on their investment. As an aside, as a directory grows they can often morph into market vertical or hyper-local search engines…..hence why Google is very interested in this market.

So there are a lot of decisions that need to be made with the advertising business model but they all tend to boil down to providing value in the form of highly qualified traffic. The only way you will keep your traffic is if you are providing reasons (see the previous article) for people to return to your new business. So be really careful in looking after your audience....they have a lot of demands on their time and for them to spend some of it with your new venture is a privilege and should be respected.

In the next article we will look at products, services and how building one of these businesses isn’t actually as hard as you may think.

In this article I will be further expanding on how to develop a domain into a business. This is the first business model that can be applied to domains, the other three are monetising traffic, treating domains as stock-items and the last selling domains at high values.

The first issue for me with any developmental project is working out how the domain is going to make money. This seems like an obvious question but many people approach developing a domain from an aesthetic perspective (ie. pretty website) rather than being focused on the business outcomes.

Generally speaking, all business models hinge on getting not just new traffic to your website but repeat visitors. A repeat visitor is gold as they perceived a value in your site enough that they returned for a second look. It shows that there is something about your business offering that they want.

So here are some reasons why people will return to your website.

Information
Users want to get access to information that you provide. This could be anything from technical documentation right through to an online training course or even an online newspaper.

Opinion
You and your business has developed a significant enough reputation that people are interested in what you have to say on issues, products and services. Before I buy anything I like to do my research by reading reviews on the product I’m interested in.

For example, when I write an article on the domain industry I try and not just report the news but understand what is happening and provide an opinion.

Useful
Google is the ultimate useful tool that allows us to effectively find things on the Internet but there are many, many other tools. How about domain tools, whatsmyipaddress.com or geoipview.com. These are all tools that I personally regularly use.

With the introduction of cloud computing there has been a blurring of the line between a site being useful and one that provides a service….which is our next item.

Services
Users will return to a website because that website provides a great service that they are willing to pay for. A website that is useful is one that often gives their service away for free because they earn money in other ways (eg. Advertising). Salesforce.com is an example of a massive company that provides CRM solutions to businesses all around the world. Businesses can subscribe to their base offering and pay more for additional features. Will your new venture offer a billable service?

Products
Put simply, I’m Amazon and I want to ship you as many physical or digital products as I possibly can. Gaming platform Steam saw the transition to pure downloads and built a whole ecosystem around selling software to gamers. If you have an exclusive product that people want, then they will return to your website to get it.

Funny
In many respects a website that is funny is a subset of the information category but it’s so big a segment then it’s worthwhile commenting on it. Websites that are genuinely funny provide content that you find irresistible to pass onto your friends. The good ones often have massive traffic and drive large amounts of cash from being paid pennies per visitor by advertisers. The challenge here is to ensure your website remains funny and not just become old-hat.

Social
A social website is centred on a community where the individual members can share their knowledge and expertise with the wider group. The first social communities were built using forums and Internet Relay Chat. This has quickly expanded to fully functional Facebook like applications that you can instantly install on any Joomla/Wordpress website. Beware, since Facebook is the eight-hundred-pound gorilla in this space, this segment is often a difficult one to crack but if you can then there can be some really big dividends.

There are a lot of other different methods to encourage users to return to your new venture but the above list should kickstart your thinking prior to you spending a whole lot of money. As I’ve mentioned before, I’m a bit of a SEO cynic and believe that if you give people what they want then Google will love you for it as well. So really think about why a person should return to your new venture.

I should mention that when I build an online business, I’ll often do combinations of the above. For example, I may have a social website backed up with regular blogging on topics that people find informative….so don’t think that each of the above items are completely separate from one another.

Whatever you do, pay attention to your statistics and interpret what they are telling you. It’s rare that growth is the answer you want. What most new businesses need is the right type of growth. If at all possible, do whatever you can to engage with real readers/customers as soon as you can as they will tell you so much about your business that you never even thought of.

I recently had the privilege of conducting a session at Domaining Europe on the topic of monetisation. Many domain investors have fallen into the trap that monetisation is dead and let me share with you that nothing is further from the truth. Domain monetisation is alive, well and thriving.

What has happened, is like any industry there has been an evolution in technology. Those that have kept up with the technological curve remain successful while those that don’t struggle to remain in business.

This is not dissimilar to the days of the buggy whip manufacturer. During the days of horse drawn carts they made an absolute killing. Then a strange contraption initially known as a mechanical horse came onto the market. This technological innovation was really expensive so the buggy whip makers all laughed at the early version of the motor car and continued to make their whips. The rest is history and other than the handful of craftsman buggy whip makers are no more.

It’s the same thing in the domain industry. On one of my recent trips around the world I was talking to a domain owner that had been in the industry for years and he was decrying that monetisation was dead. I asked him one question, “What are you doing now that you weren’t doing five years ago?”

He replied, “I’m doing the same thing.”

I then said, “So you are expecting a different result by doing the same thing? You do know that’s the definition of insanity, don’t you?”

Of course, he wasn’t insane but how many domain investors behave in exactly the same manner? Five years ago they placed all of their domains with a single company, watch their revenue line fall and then claim that it has nothing to do with their own behaviour but the industry. The problem with these domainers is that they are still trying to make buggy whips rather than innovate.

So in this series of articles I’m going to share with you what I do with my own domain portfolio and more importantly why I do it. Since I’m a numbers guy, as much as possible I’m going to track everything back to facts rather than fiction and gut reaction.

When I think about optimising my domain portfolio I place each asset into one of four main buckets.

1.      Development
2.      Traffic
3.      Stock-items
4.      High value

In terms of development, I have whizzbangsblog.com and after a hiatus of about five years I’m in the process of rebuilding my aviation website downwind.com. Why these two domains? I’m passionate about both sites and I really enjoy engaging with readers. For example, those of you that have left comments here at whizzbangsblog quickly discover that I really enjoy replying to questions and helping other domain investors out in any way I can.

Developing a website that you’re passionate about is really important as it will spur you on to write or work on the site into the years ahead. I was speaking to a domain investor about developing a website into a business and I shared that it was actually really easy to do. In my case, all I had to do was write an average of three articles a week for nine years. Voila! Success :-)

I’m actually really proud of the articles here on whizzbangsblog and I often find myself trawling back through the archives to review how my thinking on a topic has developed over the years. I also find that I do much of my thinking about the domain industry and all of the opportunities within it while writing articles. It may sound strange but it’s my way of relaxing.

Every domain investor should have a couple of projects that they are developing into real businesses. In the case of whizzbangsblog I have the privilege of Escrow.com and Epik sponsoring my blog and this helps fund my time for writing.

I'm really careful about the number of sponsors and who sponsors my blog as I'm tying my own reputation to the services being offered by the sponsors. If their services aren't any good then it reflects badly on me.

With the relaunch of downwind I will be seeking aviation industry advertising as the traffic grows.

What’s really important is that when you develop a domain, develop it into a business. Don’t try and make something pretty because you like pretty websites. Focus on the end goal of how you will make money from the site so that what you develop is sustainable over time.

For the record, it doesn’t take much to get a good website up and running. There’s many different platforms available for managing the content. I personally use Joomla but wordpress is just as good.

If you spend over $1,000 getting an initial launch of a website put together then you’re probably spending too much. Make sure you get your first dollar of revenue in as fast as possible and whatever happens, learn from customer feedback!

In the next articles I’m going to dive really deep into my thinking around the four business models and how they help me optimise my domain portfolio for greater profitability. In the process I also plan on revisiting the series on pricing domains.

I’ve founded a lot of different businesses over the years and there is one thing for sure, running a start-up is very different to running an established business. So what’s a few key things that I’ve learned?

The biggest mistake that many entrepreneurs make is they believe their cashflows and assume that success is only moments away. A cashflow is the result of modelling the business in Excel and often bears little resemblance to reality. There are a lot of assumptions that you are able to identify that are built into any cashflow and then there are a lot of other assumptions that never make it to your analysis because you never thought of them.

For example, today I was looking at a cashflow for a new business unit I’m working on and one of the major assumptions is the price of the new offering. When I put the cashflow projection together I really thought about the pricing and made sure that it at least looked sensible. Despite this, now that we are market testing the service I’m going to be looking at what real customers tell me more than my guestimates.

Many entrepreneurs also make the mistake of trying to make the perfect product/service prior to taking it to market. Don’t do this! You could end up spending a huge amount of time and money on something that no one will actually pay for.

My advice is to get something together as quickly as possible and get it in front of real potential buyers. Then, do a lot of listening. You’ll soon learn what they value and what they don’t. Don’t be surprised that this may be a LOT different from what you initially thought they’d want.

So here’s a good saying that we constantly say at ParkLogic, “Build the rusty mini-bike before the shiny Harley Davison.” In other words, cobble your product/service together before you automate everything and make it all perfect.

Where is your first dollar of revenue going to come from? This is the number one question that entrepreneurs should really be able to answer. It encompasses what you are selling, what value you bring and more importantly, who’s going to pay for it.

Really understanding the value you bring to your market is critical to the success of any new venture. Are you solving a complex problem? Making a task easier?  Or saving your potential clients money? Once you understand the value proposition then you can work on ways to build barriers to potential competitors.

One of the things that I really like doing is solving really complex problems. A lot of people shy away from tough problem solving but I must admit that I really enjoy it. I know that if I can crack the tough nuts then I’ll have loyal clients and large barrier to entry for any potential competitors. By their very nature, tough problems are also often the ones that get paid to be solved.

The next thing I look for is how to productise solutions that I developed for one client and run it across many. This will provide the scalability and impetus to really accelerate the growth of the business.

For example, when I’m looking at buying or selling domains I like establishing standardised relationships. I may lose a few percentage points by adopting this strategy but it allows me to scale my business by selling many domains very quickly. A lot of the hidden costs in buy and selling is setting up the relationships with either party. If you can give away a little bit of margin for a large volume of transactions then it’s a no brainer.

So there’s a few things that I look for in start-ups...most of them hinge around speed of execution, scaling and really understanding your customer. Let me know your own thoughts on what you like me discuss in future business related articles.

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Michael Gilmour has been in business for over 32 years and has both a BSC in Electronics and Computer Science and an MBA. He was the former vice-chairman of the Internet Industry Association in Australia and is in demand as a speaker at Internet conferences the world over. He has also recently published his first science fiction book, Battleframe.

Michael is passionate about working with online entrepreneurs to help them navigate their new ventures around the many pitfalls that all businesses face. Due to demands on his time, Michael may be contacted by clicking here for limited consulting assignments.