I recently wrote an article about the different factors that impact domain parking click through rates. Today, I want to take that one step further and discuss some factors that might influence your decision on when to test them.
Changes in Statistics – Changes in traffic, revenue and clicks may be tricky. Sometimes a domain will slowly drop in revenue and unless you look back through several months of statistics, you might not even notice a difference because it happens at such a small rate. Other times a domain will have a drastic drop that will immediately raise some flags. Is it just seasonal? Is it normal for that domain? Or, is it a flag that maybe the parking company is just no longer monetizing the domain? It’s usually a good idea to check in with the health of your portfolio. Just because a domain was doing well doesn’t mean it will continue to do so. Sudden increases are something to look at as well, and could be a prime time for testing a domain to maximize the influx of new traffic.
Click Through Rate – For me personally, click through rate is a big flag. If your click through percentage is low then your traffic is not converting, and if it’s not converting then you’re not maximizing your revenue. I know it’s obvious, but I’m also often surprised at the number of people I speak with who have their domains parked with just one company and have CTR numbers in the single digits. Several different things can impact your CTR and sometimes you have to dig for the answers while other times simply changing domain parking companies fixes the issue. So many factors can influence your click through rate, I could write a completely separate post discussing them.
Earnings Per Click – When using EPC (earnings per click) or RPM (revenue per thousand) as a factor, you will want to be cautious. Some keywords are just low earners and always will be no matter what changes you make to them. Others will have an abnormally low payout and you will find that you can earn more at a new company. Some domain investors prefer to focus on RPM rather than EPC. Personally, I like to exam both and see how they vary over a certain period of time. I don’t have an all-inclusive rule for either that will cause any flags to rise. For me, most of it will depend on the domain itself, its potential keywords, any kind of seasonality, and other stats as well. Whenever you have a domain with both low CTR and low EPC then the risk to test elsewhere is much lower than the rewards.
For most people parking revenue is a passive endeavor, but it doesn’t have to be. The best thing about testing your domains on different parking platforms is that you have the ability to be hands on and analyze your domains to make decisions manually, most platforms will have all the tools you’ll need to do so. At the same time, if you want to be more passive and let the system manage your portfolio for you, that’s always an option as well. The bottom line is, if you’re parking all your domains with just one company then you are most likely leaving some money on the table. Contact a few potential parking companies and see what kinds of recommendations they might make to help increase profits. Remember, it never hurts to ask for a little assistance every once in a while!
