subject: What Should Small Business Owners Know About Domain Investing? [print this page] There is a huge gap between small business owners and professional domain investors. Having been a small business owner myself, I understand that small businesses are consumed by and focused on what they do best. A domain adviser and Internet consultant can shed light on how small business owners can benefit from acquiring a domain name portfolio to reduce advertising costs and increase revenue.
Domain investing appeals to the following business owners:
Brick and mortar business
A net-repreneur that is looking to actually acquire under valued domain assets, monetize and flip for a profit.
SEO professionals who want to give their clients a competitive advantage to help their businesses achieve high rankings in search results for competitive keywords. Best kept secret about backlink campaigns is that they start and finish with a domain name. If you understand what makes a domain name valuable then you know how how to acquire valuable backlinks. Its all about the secondary markets.
To gain direct monetization through the domain itself, I would guide the user in the following ways:
I would ask: What is your specialty, focus, or passion?
Educate the client on keyword research tools to utilize, walk through the keyword research process and define what CPC, Ad Competition, Exact Match Search Volume, etc means. I would then advise the client on how to strategically acquire an undervalued domain asset which is also referred to as a premium domain. Followed by drawing out a blue print for their domain development via CMS, site architecture, link hierarchy, content strategy, etc.
For brick and mortar businesses, it is a common practice to buy domains with keywords related to that industry and rank those sites organically to drive leads; this tactic lowers their advertising costs in the long run by reducing the average cost per lead. Owning a keyword rich domain can also gives their website a significant boost in organic ranking if optimized properly.
SEO and a domain name:
Is SEO necessary? Absolutely. If you own a business, whether its non-profit, for profit, or if your goal is to build brand equity, the idea is to reach the masses in a cost-effective way. Honestly, there is no other form of marketing that can compete with Search Engine Optimization. Forrester Research provided data on a study to determine the reach of different online marketing venues; Search provided 90% reach vs. Social Medias 7%.
If youre considering taking your business online, SEO is mandatory. A sound SEO strategy for marketing your business online requires investing time and resources for long term results. The sooner you start the quicker you will see favorable results. Remember, rankings in Googles SERPS can take 3-6 months depending on the competition of given keyword term.
Nima.co is a site that is a resource for small business owners. We share over 10 years of professional online marketing experience to small business owners in an ad free and open source way. The site consists of tutorials, walk through and domain tools that small business owners can use for their domain portfolio.
A key feature on the site is the domain resource stab. Over the past few years I accumulated my favorite bookmarks on the web and placed them on the domain resources page to share with others. Whether youre looking for a good domain investing blog, SEO resources, how to incorporate, trade mark attorneys, etc. its all there. You can use the search function to quickly find relevant resources. Try typing in domain tools and watch how many valuable resources pop up. Its the best of the web.
Consulting for Small Business Owners and their domains:
In my profession, sometimes Ill meet someone who spent a considerable amount of money on domains that are not valuable. Im quick to let them know that they need to Trim the fat and start with a clean slate. You have to build your business on a strong foundation;domains are no different. There is a lot competition on the web. Thats why its crucial to have everything lined up with a clear strategy before you start investing and thats what I strive to do for my clients. Its better to have 10 premium domains rather than 1000 domains that will never give you the return that youre looking to achieve. I help clients acquire valuable assets that support their short and long term goals.
Actionable Items:
Some immediate action items that I can help small business owners with include:
Keyword research.
Optimize SEO on page which includes creating keyword rich landing pages, optimize title tags, meta description, keywords meta tags, specify a canonical page, insert headings tags, optimize images, etc
Researching competition
Registering their domain, setting up a hosting account and installing wordpress for them
Site architecture and a Content strategy to optimize their website for SEO.
Walk through each phase of the SEO process.
The second part of the conversation takes place after the above action items are accomplished and would involve manual backlink acquisitions.
Timeline
A timeline for a successful SEO campaign is determined by how long the business owner plans on being in business. One of the biggest mistakes a business owner can make is looking at marketing as a cost rather than a revenue generator. Would you open a business just to shut it down next year? Probably not, and thats the same mentality for your online marketing campaign.
For short term or long tail results you can bank on seeing results within three to six months.
A professional SEO specialist will run a PPC campaign to start bringing in traffic immediately. They can target long tail keywords that are easier to rank for in the short term and shoot for more aggressive keywords over time.
Ive been running a case study on Nima.Co for a little over a year and its been pretty impressive. Ive seen a 58 percent growth rate month over month, 4.5 minutes for the average time on site and over 4000 unique page views a month. I was able to accomplish this part time, with a non descriptive domain, with a .Co which is a brand new gTLD. I can produce results twice as fast if Im working for a client full time with a descriptive .Com!
