Wanted: Domain Appraisal FlyingLessons.co.uk

[bonusmedia]

I've just bought this one. I'm happy with the price I paid, but I'm interested to find out what other people think.

I'm yet to decide what to do with it:

1) Hold it for a profitable sale or lease
2) Build an adwords focused site (high cpc)
2) Build an affiliate site promoting existing deals
3) Attempt to deal directly with flight schools and sell vouchers for trial lessons

I've had some success with competitive terms in the gaming sector and I'm sure I could get it ranking nicely - the question is how much it will cost to develop etc and whether the return is worth it.

If any of you happen to be private pilot instructors looking for a partnership, let me know...

 

[dashu1]

I'm not trying to be funny or picky, but shouldn't you have worked all of this out before you bought it?

 

[Sound]

Sell it to Frank

 

[bonusmedia]

> I'm not trying to be funny or picky, but shouldn't you have worked all of this out before you bought it?

Have you had a full business plan for every domain you've bought?

I felt the domain was a good investment at the price, so I bought it. This strategy works well for me.

I thought I'd ask for advice as I've seen some intelligent posts here in the past and there might have been someone with relevant knowledge interested in a deal, but I guess I was asking too much.

Thanks anyway.

 

[dashu1]

Hey Bud I'm not trying to p*ss you off.

If I've bought one for reg fee then it might be a speculative buy, but to pay money then it's for a specific purpose.

I'm just surprised you've spent money with no idea what to do with it afterwards.

Unless you got it for £200 or something, then I'd have imagined you'd have planned ahead, that's all.

 

[doodlebug]

Hope you dint pay that much above reseller price?

This domain makes you think of planes but ofcourse it covers helicopters and gliders etc.

The thing with affiliate programmes is people are likely to book there first 1 hour lesson and you would get commission from that, a typical cost of a 1 hour helicopter lesson is £300 but the total cost of aquiring your private helicopter licence is about 16k so you could do with trying to get a chunk of that.

 

[bonusmedia]

Hey Bud I'm not trying to p*ss you off.

If I've bought one for reg fee then it might be a speculative buy, but to pay money then it's for a specific purpose.

I'm just surprised you've spent money with no idea what to do with it afterwards.

Unless you got it for £200 or something, then I'd have imagined you'd have planned ahead, that's all.

Right, sorry.

I'm a developer, not a domainer. I buy premium domains that I think have strong potential for profitable affiliate sites, but I don't need to have all the details worked out ahead of time. I guess it's like a house builder having a land bank.

It's not a sector I know well - but I can see that it's the main search term for a high value product - so I'm looking for advice. It will probably be months before I have a definite plan.

 

[bonusmedia]

Hope you dint pay that much above reseller price?

This domain makes you think of planes but ofcourse it covers helicopters and gliders etc.

The thing with affiliate programmes is people are likely to book there first 1 hour lesson and you would get commission from that, a typical cost of a 1 hour helicopter lesson is £300 but the total cost of aquiring your private helicopter licence is about 16k so you could do with trying to get a chunk of that.

You're right, it would be great to get a commission on a full course, not too sure how it could be done though. I don't think the flight schools do it for any current sites from what I can tell.

 

[alex]

I quite like the domain, but unless you build up personal relationships with flying schools you may struggle to earn commissions from lessons. One other possibility, if you're going down the affiliate route, is to advertise the additional equipment required, the maps, course books etc. Getting a license requires passing exams so there is potential here if you're not interested in building relationships. I am a member of Leicester flying club and my Dad has a private pilot license. People don't suddenly buy lessons, or buy from a single affiliate click, they research local flying schools, decide the types of aircraft they wish to fly etc. Providing more information to inform the decision to become a pilot could be useful here. Coupled with relationships with schools nationwide and you could be on to something.

 

[Ghengis]

It would go well with my flyingexperience.co.uk

 

[bonusmedia]

Sell it to Frank

Who's Frank, and how big is his budget?

 

[Systreg]

Who's Frank

This is Frank:

http://www.acorndomains.co.uk/members/domainseller200.html

how big is his budget?

This is how big his budgie is:

 

[bonusmedia]

Thanks Alex. I like the idea of investing in some quality content, listing all the schools and their rates, equipment, books, and maybe some sort of online 'ground school' membership content. There don't seem to be many instructional videos out there, for example.

If I could get an instructor or two on board to produce quality stuff, that might help with building relationships with the schools.

I quite like the idea of getting my PPL myself, so looking into that would help a fair bit with the research.

The ideal would be to build a community of learner pilots with a forum etc but I imagine that would be pretty difficult to get going.

I quite like the domain, but unless you build up personal relationships with flying schools you may struggle to earn commissions from lessons. One other possibility, if you're going down the affiliate route, is to advertise the additional equipment required, the maps, course books etc. Getting a license requires passing exams so there is potential here if you're not interested in building relationships. I am a member of Leicester flying club and my Dad has a private pilot license. People don't suddenly buy lessons, or buy from a single affiliate click, they research local flying schools, decide the types of aircraft they wish to fly etc. Providing more information to inform the decision to become a pilot could be useful here. Coupled with relationships with schools nationwide and you could be on to something.

 

[bonusmedia]

No refunds, no dead parrots.

This is Frank:

http://www.acorndomains.co.uk/members/domainseller200.html



This is how big his budgie is:

 

[David]

Personally I like the domain although I do have a PPL so would say that.

A preferable option If I owned the domain would be to partner with as many schools as possible and sell an own-branded voucher - whether this is feasible is another matter entirely. From a user perspective the site could be a directory of schools (presented in a fresh, original way) which draws in airfield information, facts, photos, videos from Youtube (there are lots) etc.

I think you'd struggle to command commission for lessons after the initial 'trial lesson' or 'experience' as margins are often quite small on the PPL, particularly at the 'schools' as opposed to clubs. Margins tend to be greater for 'self fly' hire once the licence is earned, and if the student advances to commercial lessons schools tend to make more profit here.

I paid close to £1k for all my accessories & equipment over an 18 month period of learning so there is certainly commission to be had. Clubs do sell some of this stuff themselves however there are quite a few established online flight stores.

You're correct in thinking a forum would be difficult to get going - there are many established forums out there such as PPRuNe, Flyer, & Pilotweb.


Good luck.

 

[addz123]

I like the domain.

I also buy domains I "fancy" such as judaism.co.uk even if I have no plans to develop it or no business strategy. That being said, I do go the extra distance if it's an affiliate-orientated domain to check existing affiliate programs, commission structure and how much I could expect to make.

After doing some keyword research, I think your best strategy is to make a directory site with reviews/info/google map/contact no. and address on flight schools in different cities and locations in the UK. Just use Adsense to begin with and add affiliate links to various schools where possible. After you've got decent traffic and followers you can try a business approach of getting various flight schools to start an affiliate program for you or pay you for traffic and listings.