Remember the domain name registrations back in the 90’s. This was a begining of the golden era for the domainers i.e. people who were researching keywords and then grabbing or registering matching domain names so that they could get all that nice direct navigation traffic when people typed them into their browser. This was the also the begining of the domain registration gold rush.
After major Tier-1 search engines came online another form of marketing was born known as “Search engine traffic” or “Organic search traffic”. Companies and individuals came into existence offering search engine optimization services. Back then the search engine algorithms functioned differently so it would become relatively easy for people to game the system. However search engines evolved and became more and more sophisticated. Today we have search engines employing various strategies including personalization of search results and possibly even in not so distant future humans contributing to the overall rankings for everyone.
If you are starting online today, you are probably wondering if you can make money with some sort of online property. The answer is you can, there are still lot of opportunities to explore. Websites with some sort of content that captures the interest of the user are probably your best bet in the long term. Whatever algorithms a search engine like Google implements will not affect your online property as long as the content is something that user is interested in and needs to frequent on a daily basis. Afterall that is why bookmarks and social networks exist.
Should you venture into the domain registration and parking today. Probably not, the market is very saturated and registering a good domain name will cost you a lot of money. So if you do not have deep pockets better not dive into it. Websites with content or developed websites as online properties are much more interesting because of several factors outlined below.
1.) Low cost domain name registration
2.) Low cost associated with the content creation
3.) Once the content has been indexed you will get some traffic ( especially true for the long tail keywords )
4.) Better rankings in search engine and more traffic can be achieved with affordable offsite and onsite optimization
5.) Related content is what user is seeking, this means you will get referral traffic from social communities and other websites
6.) Visitors will come again and again, if you have content that is interesting to them, instead of seeing a lander full of ads
Monetization is also the key here as you can monetize your online property in many ways outlined below.
1.) Pay per click ads
2.) Affiliate CPA offers
3.) Direct Banner Image or Text Ad Advertising
4.) Text Link Sales ( This can get you de-indexed from the search engines, so watchout )
5.) Listing sales ( If your website is a directory type of a website )
But you can see that there are much more ways and possibilities to monetize your website then with the domain that does not have any content on it. When they say “Content is the king”, it’s not just about SEO, it’s about your online property as a whole. Nobody can predict the future outcomes, but domains with content that drive visitors, have low bounce rates and create those daily website addicts have the best chances of surviving the online wars that yet have to come.
So do your keyword and trend research accordingly, write content or hire another third party to create it for you by using your guidance and then focus your efforts on marketing the website including search engines, social communities, people. It will pay off and you will have something that can last you for a long time, an intangible asset that can be added to your portofolio and monetized in a number of ways. Remember, online content properties are your best bet for a future to come.