Managing a Domain Portfolio – Lessons Learned
Domainers approach management of their portfolios from different perspectives. The size of one’s portfolio, monetization methods selected, and development goals can all affect how one might choose to manage their domain collection.
An initial benefit is to consolidate all of your domains with one registrar. I have found this very helpful since monitoring domains across many different host registrars is cumbersome and a big time waster. You wind up with too many passwords and must learn several different user interfaces when using multiple registrars.
You are also likely to lose track of a domain name when utilizing many registrars simultaneously. I have consolidated the bulk of my portfolio at GoDaddy. Some like Moniker while others use Enom. Each of these registrars have positive and negative qualities so it boils down to personal choice depending on which features are most important to you.
Another commonly accepted norm is to keep your domains on auto renew so that you don’t accidentally lose a domain. Some registrars do not send renewal reminder notices and you do not want to depend on that as your only means of monitoring a needed domain name renewal.
Many domainers are happy with one PPC provider. It’s fairly convenient to load your portfolio into one parking company, like Parked.com for example, but often another parking provider will provide a higher rate of return for certain domains. So diversifying your portfolio across different parking companies may be a technique that you want to try if you are really focused on maximizing PPC income.
Aim for volume discount in your registration fees as your portfolio grows. A registrar knows that your portfolio will be a repeat and steady source of income for them. Never pay retail registration fees. As a portfolio owner, you will likely also be buying other services from the same registrar, and you may direct new business to them if you are satisfied with their services. The larger your portfolio, the better the price consideration you will receive.
In regard to website development, a whole other article is actually merited. Website development of multiple domain names is a complex issue … particularly when you are embarking on a creative endeavor with some level of complexity involved.
I have had numerous websites with different hosting providers and none of them have gone without a hitch. Suffice it to say that the consolidation concept makes much sense and offers huge advantages to you as a developer. When it comes to development, I am a “jack of all trades”, but an expert at none. When you have limited time, learning different development platforms and software becomes a huge time and energy drain. Simplicity rules, and especially simplicity with reliability.
In 2008-2009, I discovered the beauty of WordPress. That has become a popular development platform for good reason. It is not without occasional headaches, but is certainly preferred by some who would rather not learn html or other code writing skills.
In 2009, I learned about DevHub. After testing their platform, I commited fully to DevHub for developing various domains in my portfolio. I started simple and have continued to refine my sites over months as time allowed. The advantage is that I can edit my sites from any PC and have easy, quick access to multiple sites all contained within one development platform. Also, a module developed for one site can be replicated on another site fairly easily since you are working within one common platform.
Now for the downside. If an online platform goes down or experiences a major hiccup, your entire portfolio of develop sites goes down. Scary as hell when you have invested hundreds of hours in website development. For example, DevHub recently upgraded their entire online system and moved their hosting to a new provider. The repercussions were initially catastrophic. Thankfully, DevHub are commited to building a loyal customer base and went to work for several weeks sorting through & correcting a myriad of unexpected problems that their upgrade introduced.
The lesson here is to make sure you are hooked up with some high integrity, well-funded professionals who really value what they are doing. Anything less than that and you should run in the opposite direction. I am sticking with DevHub at this time because their upgraded system really is the cream of the crop. I am sure that they will more thoroughly test run their next upgrade.
Lastly, a portfolio owner needs to consider the sales venues they might utilize for listing domain names for sale. And, also how one might assemble their portfolio online to display to potential buyers and business partners. I have an html-coded windows hosted site (PremiumDomains.biz), a linux hosted site built on Noah’s Classifieds (PremiumDomains.US), and a page dedicated on this blog (Domain Names For Sale) profiling some premium domains from the Menius Enterprises domain name portfolio.
Murphy’s Law is a constant. Might as well accept this. Advanced planning and preparation are the portfolio owner’s best defense. Organizational skills and back-up of one’s work can also not be overstated.
