Domain development part 3	3.0/5.0 (5 votes total) Rate: Select 1 - Terrible 2 - Poor 3 - Average 4 - Good 5 - Outstanding
Barry Goggin May 02, 2008

Many domainers have particular topics that they are interested in and comfortable with and so they tend to buy related domains. This is a smart strategy since you will pick the best domains in areas where you have the most knowledge of the topic.

In effect though, many domainers have domain names clustered around themes and I want to talk about a development strategy built around those themes.

Theme development strategy

Advantages

• You most likely have some knowledge of this area
• You most likely know what visitors are looking for
• You have some feel for the traffic from parked domains

Disadvantages

• Market may be very competitive and crowded

Skills

• Your knowledge of a particular topic
• Your insight into visitors to such websites

Funnel method

I have talked briefly in the past about this method. It works very well for themes. You pick one domain to develop and point all related themed domains to that website. Usually a 301 redirect works best.

Lets use the international calling example again. If you develop CallingIreland.com, you can then point PhoningIreland.com, CallsToIreland.com, CheapCallsToIreland.com and so on to that website. You are funneling your traffic to one site and selling to the visitor there.

The advantage of the funnel method is that you only have to develop one website per theme. Note that you can have different landing pages for different domains. Lets say PhoningIreland.com traffic is mostly coming from England, then you could have that domain point to CallingIreland.com/England which specifically presents information and advertising or even products towards calling to Ireland from England.

The disadvantage is that the other domains that are not developed are just bringing in type-in traffic and will not get indexed by the search engines. Resale value for those will be lower though you can try selling the domains and website as a themed set.

Indirect funneling

Another way to funnel is to set up your main website and then place one page sites on each of the other themed domains. Each of those one page sites link to your main website.

The advantage is that you can pre-sell focusing on the visitor attracted by that particular domain and that site will have a greater chance of being indexed though it probably will not rank highly.

Another advantage is that you now have links from each domain pointing to your main website. You have control over the text used to link which can contain keywords you wish your main website to rank for.

The disadvantage is that you are now relying on the visitor to the themed domain to click on a link to go to the main website. Good sales copy and a strong call to action is needed. These are particular skills. A call to action is a strong message that motivates the visitor to take an action that you want them to take.

Monitoring funneling methods

It is very important to monitor your visitors to each domain and their actions while on your themed network. Understanding what is working and what is not will be critical to tweaking your network. Optimising the sales copy and the calls to action are also critical to success.

Much has been written about this and you should read extensively about marketing if you decide to follow this method. Actually reading extensively about marketing will help you almost no matter what strategy you take.

Independent themed development

Finally there is the most labor intensive method which is to develop fully a set of websites around a theme. This can work well if each website now caters to similar but minimally overlapping sets of visitors. For instance I have a website catering to newly divorced and one catering to remarriage. I can easily advertise the remarriage site on my newly divorced site thus maximizing the time spent on my websites.

You also have the ability to link judiciously between those sites as they are on related topics and you gain a clear insight into these visitors interests and behavior to help you meet their needs and market to them.

Themed content

Hopefully with your knowledge of this theme, you can create your own original content or at least identify people whom you can hire to create it. It is best not to reuse the same content on other sites in your themed network as original content works well. It is OK though to link to content elsewhere on your themed network where you think it would benefit your visitor and also introduce them to another site on your network.

Identity

You have a choice as to whether you wish each site to maintain its own identity or if you want the themed network to have one identity.

If you keep each site’s individual identity e.g. own logo, colors, layouts the visitors will feel they are visiting independently owned sites and may gravitate towards the site that they feel most comfortable with.

If you share a common logo, layout and colors across your themed network, then you give a sense of continuity to the visitor. It tends to elicit a stronger sense of trust and authority if done well. Also it allows you to market a strong identity to the benefit of all the sites within the network. You can also sell to both visitors and advertisers across your network.

Summary

Themed networks are common on the web and whether you choose to use a funnelling method or build a strong website network depends on how much time, effort and money you wish to sink into such a project. You can certainly start with a funneled network and develop it into a fully developed themed network over time as you identify the opportunities.

More development ideas next time

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