UK (mostly geo) Domainer and Geo portal developer

[lwoody]

Hi

I've come across this forum more than once over the years but never hung around long enough to appreciate what it offers. I came across one of your expired lists a few weeks ago and was pretty shocked at the quality that was being posted (i will confess to picking up a few off it and will donate!).

I invested in my first domain about 5 or 6 years ago...Mumbles.co.uk for £750, my mates thought i was mad but it's paid off. As a result of that domain i've developed Citys.info which is a tourism platform that can be run on any geo domain. Each site varies on revenue but it's the same old: the more you put in the more you get out. The adsense CTR is 1.5%+ (i managed to double it by improving the integration) and i average about £3.30-£4.00 eCPM

Im in the middle of developing Whitelabelhotels.co.uk which is a white label hotel solution for existing brands or new websites. I should have a styled version online by the weekend. If any of you have geo's and think might work on this or likewise citys.info let me know. All the white label hotel sites are fully functional they are just not styled yet. An example at www.o2hotels.co.uk.

I've got about 100 ish domains in the portfolio 70 were freely available to register and 30 which i have acquired from either sedo or directly from the registrant. I have quite a bit of experience at buying and selling (more buying) for myself and the company i work for.

Some of my best:

Mumbles.co.uk (£750 5 or 6 years ago)
top10iphoneapps.co.uk
bestiphoneapps.co.uk (sold it for £150...too cheap i think but i had it on fixed price on sedo and the exact match shot up some time last year and i didn't increase the value accordingly, oh well you win some you loose some it only cost £6 in the first place so not a bad investment).
pspforsale.co.uk (33k exact match...what u estimate value at?...its very commercial IMO)
Swansea.info (bought for £400, one of my favourites and starting to rank ok although not on the exact match)
Aberdeen.info
l-e-e.co.uk
footballnews.mobi
domainreviews.co.uk (£150)
hotelandgolf.co.uk (£6 from 123-reg)
internalsearch.co.uk (my favourite online marketing term)
hayonwye.co.uk (one of my best catches ever!)

Im sure these have potential:
mefc.co.uk
londons.co.uk

Some of my worst:
sexinspace.co.uk (i'd dreamt up a good viral video for that one using parabolic flight)
zaam.co.uk

I use 123-reg as my registrar as they are very quick at .co.uk registration IMO for someone that's not got a tag and in work use Melbourne IT for our portfolio management.

look forward to doing business with some of you

Lee Woodman
Lee Woodman - Natural Search & e-Business Consultant

 

[Admin]

Hi Lee,

Nice post.

I'm always happy to see members benefitting (and profiting) from AD.

Admin

 

[orchardapple]

Hi Lee, welcome to the forums, nice opening intro

 

[newguy]

Welcome!

Btw, I get an error on the non www version of O2 Hotels in London .

 

[lwoody]

Thanks for the post newguy, im undecided on how best to deal with the non www version of the domain name as i use it for the identifier to get the site information. Usually a simple .htaccess tweak but as multiple domains running as aliases a bit more tricky IMO unless somebody might know another way instead of creating multiple entries for each profile in the .htacess file). I had forgotten to uncomment a 301 redirect (which come to think of it should be a 302) which will redirect users to whitelabelhotels.co.uk temporarily if the www. is not in place.

What do you think of the site skin on O2Hotels.co.uk? still not quite finished...but coming along.

Lee

 

[woopwoop]

Hi Lee

Interesting stuff you have going on.

How long have you been working with the geos? Any tips?

I started a project London Plots for a bunch of London geos... so far only a couple of the individual sites have been built eg Acton Town (but doing it for the rest isn't too difficult, just time consuming)...

ps. you have an error in your footer at Aberdeen.info - Tourist information Aberdeen

 

[lwoody]

geos

HI woopwoop

Ive bought my first in 2003-2004ish Mumbles.co.uk. I

Be the first with local information is my top tip i think. If there's a new restaurant get it on the site even if you only have the name of it. A new restaurant has just opened in Swansea called The Penthouse. As i now live in London it's a bit difficult to keep on top of the latest infromation so i get my folks to keep an eye out ;-). That and related terms pulled in about 7k visits last month alone just from search 90% Google. It does have a lot going for it being the tallest residential building in Wales with the restaurant on the roof so lots of press but still. Saying that two examples where i've done similar both brought in significant traffic just by getting the information online ASAP. If you're the only source of the information the engines have no alternative but to give you the top spot.

Yes i find them very time consuming, although once set up they can run themselves to a degree. keeping up with the latest restaurants and hotels i find the biggest issue.

Are you running all your's from a single database and file system. I build citys.info each with their own filesystem and db...that's caused a few headaches but learnt plenty in the process!

Lee

Ps. Thanks for the error mention (permission issue with the cache folder)

 

[WigWam]

Hello and welcome to acorn domains nice domains you have there

 

[woopwoop]

Really interesting and good advice - I'm the other way around (moving out of London) so like you say it's difficult to be first with the news...

All of the community sites have their own database for wordpress (Acton Town News), forums (Acton Town Forum) and local business directory (Acton Town Businesses). I think that the footer on each site can be changed remotely from a single source.

Would really like to monetise things a little more from these projects and I'm just not sure whether spending the few days needed to convert all 40 London communities to how ActonTown.com is, is really worth it, or focusing on the other things I have on.

I think a big thing that is needed to give the profile of the sites a boost is for more local businesses to submit their details to the directory. I've tried to seo them so that the age titles/descriptions come from the submitted content and I just have to manually approve the listing.

I know it'd be a lot of wor to get it to the point where each London Plot makes £25/week, but in total (40 plots) thats 52k/year !

If you're interested in teaming up let me know.

 

[lwoody]

What's the average donation people put in if they snap up a domain from one of the droplists?

Lee

 

[davedevelopment]

What's the average donation people put in if they snap up a domain from one of the droplists?

Lee

No idea pal, but I think anything is appreciated. If you sell the domain for £xx,xxx down the line, come back and give them a bit more!

 

[WigWam]

What's the average donation people put in if they snap up a domain from one of the droplists?

Lee

depends how much it is worth to you. Maybe £1 for a ok domain and £10 for a great domain. - all depends on your budget.

 

[WigWam]

No idea pal, but I think anything is appreciated. If you sell the domain for £xx,xxx down the line, come back and give them a bit more!

+1 to that, always keep them in mind

It will make a good present for them