Here’s an example mini site created by Minisites.com.
I was excited last week to read that DN Media Corporation teamed up with Nat Cohen of Telepathy, Inc. for a new mini site service called Minisites.com. I’ve been impressed with both of these companies. DN Media has launched successful products including PushtoAuction.com, and also sold DNW.com to me.
I’m rather particular when it comes to mini sites, since I’ve been creating them for over five years. So I decided to put Minisites.com to the test on the domain name KansasCity.us (see picture).
Minitsites.com delivered. It created a good theme relevant to Kansas City, including a stylized skyline of the city using the colors Kansas City is known for. The theme is clean and easy-to-navigate. Minisites.com wrote five quality articles covering the basics of the city. The site also includes a sitemap submitted to Google and a Google Adsense-compliant privacy policy (including the latest guidelines about interest-based advertising). Meta keyword and description tags are well written, too.
Keep in mind that creating a mini site is just the foundation for making money. Minisites.com creates a good foundation; you need to do the work to promote the site. Some simple steps include writing articles and distributing them to online article sites as well as building other back links. Minisites.com does basic link building with each site and its “Big Mini” package includes more link building. But keep in mind it’s an ongoing process. Minisites.com also provides you with a login to add more content to your site in the future.
There are two types of domains I’d recommend building mini sites for. The first are domains with solid keywords but low traffic. For these you’ll need to work hard to get links to them. The second are expired domains you picked up that already have backlinks. You’ll want to get a mini site up on these before parking them to keep them from being de-indexed. You might also use a mini site to show “intent to use” your domain name.
The field of mini site creation companies is getting crowded, but MiniSites.com should be on your short list. It also earns bonus points for using such a good domain name for its service.
Dot Us says
Nicely done,
Really like the skyline, gives a nice touch,
I’d also maybee add a section for a map of kansas city, maybee google maps or something,
everyone want to know where to go.
a nice name,
Good luck.
Been trying to get a nice city .us myself for a while now.
Mark Fulton says
It looks great and the layout is very clean and friendly and I like the advertising positioning. I read some of the content and they wrote very well also.
I guess this is the $225 package, with the 4 additional pages of content.
I’m having a hard time seeing how a domain can earn that investment back even over the course of several years of PPC revenue.
Unless, of course the domain gets massive traffic and/or ranks on page 1 for it’s keyword in search engines.
Though this may increase the value of a domain if you decide to sell it at a later date.
EM @ KING.NET says
I’m experimenting using blogger as my minisites back-end.
I developed http://www.Michigan.TV (still updating contents) cost is ZERO Dollar.
I will share the process in details in my blog to help out domain owner to develop their premium domains.
Cheers for now,
EM @ KING.NET
http://www.king.net
EM @ KING.NET says
Post not accepting?
EM @ KING.NET says
I am experiment to use blogger.com as my back-end for minisites.
I’ve used this for http://www.Michigan.TV (content still in progress), cost is ZERO Dollar.
I will share the process, it a simple task to complete. I will blog this soon.
Regards,
EM @ KING.NET
Rob Sequin says
Andrew,
What did you pay for that site? Looks like the mini for $225?
http://minisites.com/packages/
David J Castello says
I don’t quite agree here, Andrew. This is nothing more than a short cookie-cutter site with a nice masthead and Google Adsense sprinkled on every page. Furthermore, this site is tackling Kansas City – which means you have some heavy competition out there. The bottom line is that no one is going to return to this site for information about Kansas City. And your percentage of return traffic dictates the level of success of your development.
mini blogs says
Interesting to see an example. Is this the $225 package?
Since this is a Wordpress blog it would be helpful to use a few sidebar widgets and maybe instead of one long vertical column of Adsense you replace one 120×600 slot with a something like a weather plugin, possibly a countdown plugin for some major KC event etc.
Then, incorporate some Adsense inside the article in a tasteful yet targetted way (another plugin).
You’re right though, it does take further effort to get the visitors and keep them coming back. A few plugins could be just the trick 😉
Dot Us says
I hate to say it david but i dont think youre sites are much better placed to get visitors to return, cant see much content being updated, links to your other sites, and affiliate links or i assume they are.
you have the advantage of type in traffic, but not the content.
i’ll regret saying this , but your sites look like they were done in 1996.
i’m no developer or seo expert either, but having close to 100 links interlinking your network, cannot be doing much good.
I may have viewd 8 sites of yours so maybee there not all like that ?
I and my designer came up with this.
http://www.new.us/visit/steve2/
maybee 70% done design wise,
no content yet 🙂
Dont take this the wrong way (my opinion doesnt count for much compoared to you big boys) but i’d seriously consider getting a new designer to redo all those old looking sites.
robb says
It’s a decent minisite, better than a parking page. It has some relevant info on Kansas, and I’d rather land on that site than on a parking page. I doubt there is much potential for return traffic, but you can actually get some search engine traffic from a site like this, unlike a parked page. So a step up from parking but not engaging enough to entice return traffic. For that you would need updated news, and some form of interaction. How about a guest book?
Alan says
David,
Exactly my thoughts.
D says
Do you guys realize that with these scrap sites you are trying too fool search engines and more such sites will be out there, harder search engines will work on algorythm to eliminate them right ?
Domain Name Media says
Guys, you have to keep in mind that this is a mini site, not full scale web development.
We set up the sites on WordPress so you can add in whatever you see fit easily without knowing any code, be it more content, widgets, etc. If Andrew wanted, he could easily go in and in a few seconds have a weather widget, Google maps, more articles… whatever he saw fit. But what he has now, a nice looking site with five pages of unique content, is much better than a parked page.
Some domains require more work than others. The better the keywords, the more competition you’re going to have and the more work you’ll have to do. That’s fairly obvious though. Nobody is implying he’s going to rank #1 in Google for “Kansas City” in a few weeks, or ever. But it is worlds better than a parked page.
I don’t think any of us mini site developers are arguing that mini sites are perfect for every domain. Imagine a mini site on Sex.com, that would be ridiculous. That doesn’t mean all mini sites are pointless though. They have their place, both in their own right and in acting as a jumping off point for a more complete site.
If you have the resources or the skills to do full-scale development on every one of your domains… good for you! Mini sites are a happy medium between that and terrible parked pages.
@D – I think you’re missing the point. These aren’t made up of scraped content in an effort to “trick” search engines. This is original, relevant content, which is exactly what search engines are looking for. There is plenty of content for G to not see them as “thin”, and users can add their own content down the road. This is legitimate small-scale development… not black hat scraping like other services.
Andrew Allemann says
To answer the questions…yes this is the $225 option.
David, you’re right. This isn’t a site that will get much return traffic. No one is going to bookmark it. I don’t expect to create a site with return traffic in a few hours and $225. This is the different between a full scale developed site and a mini site.
What a site like this can do is get search traffic. If you look at nutritionist.info, you’ll see a basic site with not much on it. Not a great site and received 0 type in visitors. After creating the mini site myself I earned over $1,000 in the first year thanks to search traffic.
For KansasCity.us, I don’t expect to get much search traffic until I add articles on longer tail terms. This site will never be number one for “Kansas City”, but could be for “Kansas City ___________”.
Johnny says
I like PalmSprings.com. I think it is very useful and I could see returning to it if there was a need. I like how it is organized, with very little clutter.
Minsites? For the most part, I dislike them more than parking pages, but there are exceptions.
I guess it comes down what makes money since parking is dying on the vine.
David J Castello says
Andrew:
I think these mini-sites may have a future for long-tails (KansasCityDoctors.com) because the level of expectation is not that high, but KansasCity.us is another story. While not the dotCom, dotUs is accepted as the ccTLD for the US in other countries and many foreigners will be expecting to see a major site about the city.
I didn’t take into consideration how much content you intend to pile onto KansasCity.us. Certainly, that will will make a huge difference. However, my feeling is that many domain owners will simply stay with whatever is handed to them because they are looking to use these mini-sites across their portfolios.
Domain Name Media says
“Minsites? For the most part, I dislike them more than parking pages, but there are exceptions.”
So you’d rather go to a page full of links whose best feature, if you’re lucky, is an irrelevant generic image instead of a site that has five pages of of unique and useful information on the subject? To each his own I guess…
This all-or-nothing attitude in regards to development is why 30% of domains are useless parked pages. There is a viable middle ground.
Alan says
I have to agree with Johnny that mini-sites are on par with parking pages purely because of what David pointed out – most domainers will never further develop any of these.
Even small time investors who own 500 names the cost of building out mini sites at $225 or $100 a pop is not worth it. Its better to spend the money on a custom wordpress template which represents your own brand and learn the code itself. Even for the computer challenged people out there building a wordpress site takes less effort than ordering a big mac at McDonalds.
So if you are trying to build out one site – start with a mini site and learn the WP code, add modules – do whatever it takes to learn how to build a site – don’t just be an idiot and wait for the site to be indexed and the bag of money to show up by Fedex in 60 days.
If you own multiple domains – the same thing – NEVER buy more than one mini-site. They are all basically the same and your money and time will be worth a lot more when you can do it yourself.
Is there a need for mini-sites? sure, its a natural progression of web development which should have been here 5 years ago but is it for the person who truly wants to develop and build something big.
No – Its a lesson in code – nothing more.
Dot Us says
If you come down to the level most domainers are at (low budgets for the most part) you will find out that you could have, what you paid $225 for, for $100 or under.
good article writers are here for 0.01/0.02 per word,
they have to to keep up with the cheaper writers who get the most work,
paying more than $30 for a logo is a waste of money.
trust me the best designers are around the forums willing to do logos for 20/30 a time.
they deserve more but thats the going rate,
your design took them 20 minutes tops.(it’s nice but it’s not time consuming for someone who knows there way around)
for every $225 you spend there is a saving of lets say $100 for each time.
finding the right group of people is the hardest part.
and then that $100 is enough to get started promoting the site, to try to recoup some of the investment.
or add lots more content.
but again, you are a league above most domainers so maybee spending that much is easier for you than trying to find the best deal ?
who knows.
But the name is good enough to outrank any other extension.
.us / .com /.net / .org if you have what there looking for those char’s after the (DOT) dont make any difference, to tom dick or harry.
Hopefully i’ll own a very nice city .us name in the coming weeks.
Andrew Allemann says
Sure, you can develop your own mini sites. I’ve done many. But keep in mind the time. If it takes you a few hours to create, write the articles, etc., it may be worth paying someone else.
wannadevelop.com says
As somebody who has developed 10,000’s of these worthless mini sites since 2002 and made $x,xxx,xxx in net profit I’d say there is quiet a bit of demand for them and the market will be booming in the years to come as the “product” or “service” keeps improving.
Think of them as white label sites… I know most domainers don’t think of them this way but many e-commerce operators and other businesses have 100’s of sites, setup as lead captures to capitalize on the “long tail” search engine traffic.
Even a few hundred targeted *FREE* visitors per month per site in a niche such as health or finance which yields in a few conversions more than pays for costs and investment in 100 of these.
Case in point — it’s a numbers game 🙂
Play it lottery style and you will win each and every time.
Expecting miracles from one or two mini sites ain’t going to happen. This is why we do domain mass development exclusively.
Cheers!
To success..
Mike
Dot Us says
Thats true,
i’ve yet to find someone good enough who can do it all themselves,
but if you’ve got 10/20 or more, theres many 100’s if not 1000’s to be saved, or added to another project.
good luck with KansasCity.us
David J Castello says
DotUS:
Gotta disagree big time with this: “Paying more than $30 for a logo is a waste of money.”
It does depend on how much you feel your domain name is worth, but a unique logo for your site is one of the best investments you can make. We use DesignOutpost.com and set our bid at $300. The logos we selected for Nashville.com and Kennel.com were well worth the money. In fact, the US National Food & Energy Council asked to use our Nashville.com “guitar” logo for their Nashville convention and we have already made 3X our money back from selling products with the Nashvile.com logo on CafePress.com.
Domain Name Media says
I can’t say I agree with those prices. There’s no way you’re going to find a professional, native English speaking writer to do content comparable to ours for $3 – $6 per page.
Let’s not even get started on finding a reliable designer who does business on forums. As with everything in life, you get what you pay for.
If you want something written buy a C student in high school, and designed by a kid who just learned Photoshop, you want to hire someone to do link building, deal with the inevitable headaches, pay for and set up hosting, etc. you might be able to get it done cheaper. But will it be as good? Not likely.
You could go to the grocery and buy meat, thousand island dressing, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions, and a sesame seed bun and put together a Big Mac for less than you pay McDonalds. Does that mean nobody should eat out? Sometimes you just don’t have the time or don’t want to deal with the headaches.
Dot Us says
David,
Those logos are excellent no denying that fact,
just saying that if you go to the forums, any of them,
set your bid/payment at $50/%60 to be kind,
i gurantee you would get a better logo.
The designers around there are as good as those on designer outpost.
I’m in a league well below you guys, so my $30 may be like your $300.
have a look around, you will be pleasantly surprised at how good they are, for how much they get paid.
Dot Us says
DNM,
how much do you pay your writers ?
Break down your costs and you’ll see i’m close to what youre charging, $100 based on 10 sites ? same niche.
you have to pay out to your staff,
find people on the forums yourself, and there paying themselves.
I have to agree, it’s very hard to find reliable writers,
just had a bad experience myself 🙂 so kinda go back on my words here, but my point still stands,
get out there, find a set of people, maybee take a week or to, or more. and in the long run you will save money.
Alan says
“If you want something written buy a C student in high school”
LOL…. by …. not buy.
I’m out … way too busy.
Domain Name Media says
Like I said in my last post, you get what you pay for. We’re not going to sacrifice quality to save a few bucks. Asking what our costs are is a pretty forward question, but I’ll tell you we pay our writing staff significantly more than the price you quoted, and it is worth every penny.
@Alan – Do you always nit pick typos when you have nothing to add to a discussion? Not everyone proofreads and spell checks their comments on blog posts. I can assure you I am well aware of the distinction between by and buy.
Dot Us says
Sorry DNM i had you mistake for another company.
My mistake,
I think i may take up building minisites 🙂
how about MiniSites.us 🙂
No chance, cant write, cant design and cant code 🙂
Have a good 1.
Alan says
DNM
Get some coffee – it was a joke to add some humor to what is becoming a simple dog and pony show between the 2 sides of “mini-sites” which will rarely meet.
A better reply would be to laugh at what I said rather than state you clearly understand the english language.
Hell, I have typos all the time – laugh man, get some coffee.
Life is bigger and better than some comments on a blog.
With respect
Alan says
DNM,
Also .. also you said “Do you always nit pick typos when you have nothing to add to a discussion”
I disagree – I have a lot to add – just not what people selling mini-sites want to hear.
Good luck with the project.
Domain Name Media says
I know Alan, I was just giving you a hard time. I’m a fan of your blog, I know you have useful things to say.
In response to your lengthier post though, your analysis relies on the assumption that the main stumbling block which causes people to not develop mini sites is the theme, and that once you have that all your problems are solved. I don’t think that is the case at all.
It is very easy to say “learn to do it yourself”. It is much different to actually get up and do it, especially for the uninitiated. If it were as simple as having a template and learning some code to develop hundreds of domains, as you insinuated above, parking wouldn’t exist.
It is much cheaper to fix your car yourself. Do you go to a mechanic? There will always be a market to serve people who aren’t interested in learning a new skill. Could you imagine what it would be like if the service industry in the US didn’t exist, and everyone did everything themselves?
Just because it is possibly to do a halfway decent job yourself doesn’t always mean you should. It doesn’t take rocket science to mow a lawn, but there are plenty of landscapers in business. Sometimes people have a better, more profitable use of their time.
M. Menius says
The main point is to get started with something new. Development is demanding, so starting simple at least is a first step be it a minisite, etc.
I will reiterate, cause it was said once and bears repeating, that budding developers need to look into Wordpress as an alternative.
Wordpress is very powerful, free, and there are many affordable (cheap) templates available that allow you to have a 3 page site, 10 page site, 100 pages, you name it. There’s automatic Google submission of newly written pages (very search engine friendly). With a little custom editing, you can go a long way.
Alan says
Is there still a service industry in the US ? lol
I understand what you mean and do respect anyone who wants to offer a new service to domain owners.
Here’s my issue with mini sites which maybe your offering does more and you can clarify.
First, mini-sites are gateways to laziness – what I mean by that is that we have experienced many times in 2002-2004 drastic cuts in revenue by simple SEO changes by Google and MSN – overnight you lose half of your traffic only to rebuild and sometimes it happens again. Most domainers are not developers – no one argues that – but how do these mini-sites (not just yours, Latona’s – anyones) provide scalibility to people developing for the first time. I’ve bought a couple minisites just to see what they end up like (and support some providers) but honestly, they are all duds.
You mentioned above something about adding widgets and providing more than just what current mini-sites (such as AEIOU) offer and thats cool but this entire thread has been more about the theory of a mini-site then what “extra” stuff you offer.
A one time minisite is fine for the small investor but for the person who wants to make a go of it and create something that is not solely dependent on adsense revenue (which you have to admit most domainers ultimately use these for) how can any of the minisite companies today provide a way for these owners to build out sites that work together and brand without incurring $200-$300 a pop.
Thats where my issue mostly is. Its not the simple one or two page design – its the scaleability of these minisites for the domain owners most providers clearly go after.
When I say learn yourself – yes, hire someone to cut a minisite for you but even with 50 sites we are now talking about $10,000. Its not a lot of money but to most newbies its a fortune so doing simple math is if you can’t scale out the minisite or make it something that is connected to a larger puzzle than its worth spending the money to learn how to do it yourself.
Now, if you have the budget – of course, higher someone and focus on doing something else but the value is still connected to how well these minisites can be expanded and scaled to connect, add new features etc.
In a world of widgets, plugins and addons it should be (in theory) pretty easy to offer a template(s) that far surpass all the other minisites at the same or near price of current ones.
I think there is a great oppurtunity in the mini-site marketplace – just needs to evolve a lot quicker.
With this said, again – I respect what your doing. Hell, it takes time and money so for those of you are thinking about a mini site – BUY ONE – but just get a plan before popping your children’s education fund on 30 sites that look cool.
David J Castello says
I think the bottom line to all of this will to be see what Andrew adds to the foundation on KansasCity.us. I do agree that if these mini-sites provide the impetus for domainers to start developing (adding content) it will be a very good thing. After that, all they need to do is learn to steer clear of Adsense and start making some real money.
RKB says
I can make that site in $25. All you need is a free word press theme and 5 articles written from someone. It will be free if I write 5 articles myself. $200 is just not justified. Imagine spending 200 on all your traffic less domains and it will make you a huge loser.
Btw, you can also spend $100 – $200 on UBD themes or revolutiontheme.com package and use all there themes on unlimited domains forever and those themes are just awesome.
RKB says
All I see these days is mini-sites are over-hyped by their sellers and promoters. I am yet to see someone giving a money back guarantee on their minisites if they fail to produce better results. I mean, not even 1 seller/developer want to guarantee anything and just want you to believe their huge rosy promises of getting rich using minisites.
I can order 100s if you anyone guarantee their results, otherwise as of now it is just HYPE.
RKB says
I can foresee google banning minisites in near future as more people develop them and content gets half duplicated if not 100%.
Steven says
Time is money…everyone has to evaluate what their time is worth.
If it was so easy, everyone would be doing it. Just because you can do it does not mean someone else can or wants too.
You can find cheaper people on the forums to do logos? I have seen YOU post numerous looking for people and based on no response repost and repost. The sample you showed looks like a $25 BS template. Please do not come with that BS. You pay for what you get…PERIOD!
I made X,XXX,XXX but i continually spam message boards and hype myself up. Except my sites look like crap and I annoy everyone I talk too.
Damn…this conversation should be about ways to improve the development of kansascity.us.
Thanks for the good laughs.
Dot Us says
If that was for me, yes my template was $25, and better than most charge $100 for 🙂
Every time i post for a logo i get exactly what i ask for, nothing more , nothing less.
time is money 🙂 gotta go.
David J Castello says
Dot US:
Our sites may look basic, but looks can be deceiving. Those simplistic looking sites generate massive revenue for our advertisers – and our advertisers are our #1 priority. Furthermore, sites like PalmSprings.com have constantly updated content with editors for its Calendar of Events, Classifieds, Forum, etc.
My suggestion is this. Build a site, do all the things you believe are important and then sign advertisers to contracts. In other words, put your reputation and talent on the line. If you don’t drive serious business to these people you will be run out of town. If you survive the first year, I promise you will have entered a new world that most domainers haven’t a clue about and you will have learned to play by a whole new set of rules. And when something works, you will be exceeding hesitant to mess with the formula (ever wonder why Google still hasn’t changed their front page?).
Our sites have been criticized by webmasters and designers alike for years. And I’ll tell you the same thing I tell them – every day my brother and I cry all the way to the bank.
John says
@RKB: DEAL! I pay you $25 / website including 5 original articles. When do we start?
And also please explain how Google would see any difference on a normal website compared to a “minisite”.
RF says
Looks great!
I have launched several mini sites over the past few months
Here are my examples – I used noomle to do it myself and have had alot of success so far.
CheapRims.us
CheapSneakers.us
CheapFood.us
CheapCarpet.us
ElectricRazors.us
ClothesDryer.us
It doesnt take alot of work to get sites active and going.
The best thing is it gets your sites ranked and helps grow traffic.
I think minisites are good for non traffic domains but good generic dot coms need full development or parked.
Well these are my thoughts.
Regards,
Robbie
ojohn says
I just made my first mini site http://www.SuperLuxuryHomes.com at Noomle.com (it’s all free) , by the way I just registered this domain last month, I can’t wait for it to show up on the search engines.
As already mentioned by others here, mini sites are good alternative for some domains, but if you have a tier one premium domain then it might be best to invest a little more time and money and make a fully developed website for it. (unless you are a starving domainer 🙂 )
ojohn says
Follow up,
It took me only a couple of hours to put this site up (including writing my own article).
Stephen Douglas says
I’m a big supporter of building out non-performing domains at PPC services. That’s why I joined WhyPark. So let’s talk “PRICE” and “MARKET REACH” regarding ccTLD’s and gTLD’s for getting them out of the deathgrip of “parking” and getting no possible SE indexing on them.
Getting your domain indexed on an SE if it gets no typeins is more important than anything else AT THE START of getting value on your domain.
To do that, will you spend $225 to get a “startup” site with nice graphics and a few relevant articles, or does $.99 per domain sound better? Will you spend five minutes on each of these sites to add 50-100 words of original content (either you write or hire someone) on each of those sites to get them indexed, as non-duplicates?
Of course you would, if you were smart in managing your money. WhyPark has been at this for 3 years, and just there is a pattern you need to follow in order to put value on your domains that aren’t getting typein traffic from PPC.
I’m trying to inform domainers who seem to have this idea that Whypark only pumps out lame RSS feeds and duplicate content, when that isn’t true. You can click a button, add a page, and type your content, links, graphics, and other monetization paths into each page as you go.
In other words, for $.99 per domain, you are getting a minisite already, you just have to be dedicated to add the relevant content to separate it from the rest. For me, this is only a few minutes a week for each domain.
I did pay a doctor friend of mine $50 to write 1000 words of original content for a domain I have at WhyPark. It spread out into four additional pages of original content, and helped me get that domain indexed, FINALLY.
If you want to really do a test on getting content into a “minisite” without spending a chunk of money, $99 will give 100 of your domains a chance… it’s up to you, on WhyPark or ANY development service , to make the domain bigger than what they can provide without extra expenses.
It’s your choice — one domain for $225 with some nice graphics and a few stories, or $.99 for a startup site for you to build at your leisure.
Domain Name Media says
Stephen,
How do you expect to break the stigma of selling scraper (MFA) sites, when your sales copy says dozens of times (especially in the tour) that you can create a site in minutes? Granted you have the functionality to add your own content, pick from a limited number of themes, etc. but I don’t see you stressing anywhere that to really succeed you MUST have unique content.
WhyPark is a great service for the do-it-yourselfer. However, for those who don’t want to spend countless hours modifying themes and doing graphic design to make them not look terribly generic, writing pages upon pages of unique content, researching keywords and doing SEO, building backlinks, etc. you really leave people wanting more.
Your service and ours are not comparable or competitive. To put it another way, we’re a mechanic and you’re a tool box. If your car is broken you can take it to a mechanic, or buy a tool box and get your hands dirty. Some people don’t know how to, or don’t have time to do it themselves. That’s where we come in.
wannadevelop.com says
Stephen has some good theories…if…and..or…but…maybe…possibly…probably…etc.
In reality, the whole concept in it self simply doesn’t work for numerous reasons.
I’ve yet to see any of the DevHub or WhyPark pages “succeed” at at least one thing.
Stephen Douglas says
@ Domain Name Media — sheesh bro, it took me some time to figure out which of your leaders at “Domain Name Media” I was talking to in order to address you directly like a man. However, even http://www.domainnamemedia.com is a danged ol’ landing page, and apparently not owned by you… so no help with your handle here in allowing me to know who I’m talking to.
Should you use the full phrase of your acronym company name (“Domain Name Media” standing in for “DNmedia.com”) as a handle when you don’t own the full phrase domain name? Why not just post as “DNMEDIA”? You’re sending all that traffic over to them too! As Jon Stewart of the Daily Show would say, “ehhhh, no diss respect”.
Here’s what I had to do to find out even who you are, if you are who I think you may be (Please someone, tell people who want to be looked at as legitimate to use their real names when they post comments, and not be shy, or frightened. Everything upfront is good, yes?)
Okay, back to trying to guess who I am talking to. First, I had to type in the domain name of the handle you are using here: “Domain Name Media”
Result: Landing page, owned by Mediavision of Canada. Ooops! Then I googled the PHRASE “Domain Name Media” and all I came up with was a few other posts by whoever your ghostly self is, on other blogs and forums. hmmmm…. no “person” connected with that handle “Domain Name Media”.
Finally, I just did the whois “minisite.com” thing – argghhh, darn, the singular domain is owned by someone else! Okay, the plural version, finally, I think i came up with a name; Michael Sumner.
So… is this Michael Sumner speaking as someone wishing they had the domain “DomainNameMedia.com”?
Just kidding ya, bro. If you are Michael Sumner, glad to meet you. You should post your name, so everyone can connect to you personally, without that “veil” of secrecy that is so… umm… bothersome when talking biz.
Anyway, your analogies between Minisites.com and WhyPark.com are completely incorrect, UNLESS you think that a “toolbox” (as you state WhyPark is) can open up, let all its tools out, and those tools dance around like Disney cartoon characters doing all the work for you. If that’s what you mean, then for sure! That’s what our WhyPark standard and premium tools do! (Can’t wait to ask my boss to design little cartoon characters representing each of our services.)
In other words, WhyPark provides domainers with the toolbox, the resources, guidance, and support in order for you to create EXACTLY what Dub-A provided as an example in his example of Kansascity.us. That site is nicely done as a simple foundation. However, Whypark can provide that and more for about a $60 investment. Maybe even less.
Unless you can show me a WhyPark-managed domain that comes up with less content and development you yourself have tested by using all our premium services, then there is no floor for you to dance on.
If someone spent $225 on a Whypark account, they’d get 100 domains filled with relevant content, click-and-add pages for easily adding original content, and they could still pick one domain out of their 100 to further design, build out, AND promote through our tested premium services, and have about $50 left over. And I will bet you $100 that the WhyPark website would eclipse the minisites.com offer in total content, promotion, and ability to get the domain indexed by SE’s.
I think from what I’ve seen DUB-A submit as an example from Minisites.com can’t compete with the same investment using WhyPark premium services. Unless there’s a true comparison test, we can’t argue about it. Plus, I will gladly state here that I encourage all domainers to use your services to see how they perform.
Look, my point really is that WhyPark encourages any domainer to develop their domains, and to try out your services along with all the other great domain development services such as AEIOU.com and DevHub.
My professional opinion, though, stands strongly behind WhyPark. Dollar for dollar, we can do more, and we have the longest history in the domain development sector (3 years), and the largest domain development crop, which is growing rapidly everyday.
As a final bit of marketing advice, my friend:
Visiting your site, although you list a few of some great domain news sites, I noticed that you don’t have some of the most influential and powerful domain news reporting sites under your “Sponsors & Friends” sidebar title, including Dub-A’s “DNW.com” (who bought the domain from you). And what about DomainNameNews.com with Adam Strong and Frank Michlick? Worse still, no DNJournal.com link? Ron Jackson not promoted on your site!!! BLASPHEMY! And even sadder, no mention of Successclick.com. 😉
Other great sites to include:
DNForum.com
NamePros.com
RicksBlog.com
Domaining.com
DNCartoons.com
TheDomains.com
In all seriousness, I wish your company much success. Competition is great for everyone, especially domainers looking to create value from their domains. Let’s all support legit domain companies/individuals for the overall success of the domain industry! I think Minisites.com is off to a good start, and after a few years, may catch up to WhyPark’s abilities at this moment.
++++++
hmmm… I think there was another comment by someone mentioning my name and attempting to ridicule my “theories”, but I don’t “wanna” be the eagle that eats a fly.
DNMEDIA says
Thanks, but I’ll pass on marketing advice from a company who didn’t even think to buy the generic domain for what they do 🙂
You don’t seem to get that providing relevant content doesn’t mean jack if it isn’t unique… and you don’t provide that for your $1 per domain. Having scraped content is only marginally better than parking, it won’t really get you ranked in the search engines long term, but I guess it will be slightly more sticky than a page full of links if you happen to get a lot of type-ins.
For the $225 you spend at WhyPark in your example, you have 100 domains that are almost no better off than parking which is free, and one domain that was built out with one of your standard templates and only three pages of content on the site. I don’t see the advantage…
Again, your service is absolutely great for the people who want to do it all themselves.
I just wish you would be more forthcoming and explain to people that they really need to be adding unique content, not just using scraped content. That would make selling the dream of having a site in minutes for $1 pretty hard though. Because all of a sudden those “minutes” just turned in to hours of research and writing, link building, SEO, etc. to have something that can trump a parked page.
DNMEDIA says
Oh, and sorry, this is Michael Sumner.
Stephen Douglas says
Hi Mike,
Great to meet you officially!
As for your comments, you didn’t read my novel I wrote that you seem to be trying to answer.
Let me reiterate: Whypark provides ALL the services your company provides, and we do it cheaper. That means, yes, we provide original content providers (writers), and a lot more website promotional services. These are PREMIUM services. However, getting your domains set up with content quickly for only $.99 (unless you come in with more than 300 domains, which makes it cheaper), is a huge first step in obtaining value for your non-performing domains. And domainers WILL get more value at WhyPark for those domains than leaving them at a parking service.
Of course, we allow our users to manage each website on their own terms, but I’ve had several of my own websites, for $.99, finally indexed by Google, (some of my domains I’ve owned since 1999) and some as fast as 2 weeks after using Whypark. Average time is about 60-90 days, and that’s without using “original content”. You can’t get that value just parking your domain, so saying that there is no difference between WhyPark and parking your domain is untrue.
You also continue to label WhyPark as a “scraper”, when in fact we have probably the largest database of original content covering hundreds of categories in the business. And you and I both know that just adding a few original paragraphs to a page will prevent it from being a “duplicate” content site on the SE’s.
The most obvious examples is that the news syndicates (Reuters, AP, UPI) send out thousands of news stories daily to hundreds of thousands of websites, yet those websites don’t get “blacklisted” by Google. Why? Because each website has something a little unique on them to prevent them from being labeled as a “dup” at the SE’s. That same platform is applied at WhyPark, or at any website that features “duplicate” content.
You seem like a nice guy, Mike. I don’t want to continue a “war of relevant content words” here, but I’ll give you the last word. I would enjoy talking to you privately by email if you like.
Best wishes to you and your content development services. What you provide is better than having a non performing domain sitting uselessly at a parking service. (Even the parking services all agree with this).
cheers
DNMEDIA says
I actually did read your entire post, although half of it was a diatribe about my handle on a blog comment system and the side bar on my blog.
I am aware that you offer most of the services we offer, although I didn’t see anything in your “Domain Stimulus Package” about an actual design (you mention WhyPark will select one of their standard templates for you), or what extra pages of content cost, since you only offer three on-site and one that gets submitted to article directories.
Please don’t put words in my mouth. I said your core product (scraped content) is marginally better than parking, not that your entire service is “no better than parking”. If everyone used your full-service option and then paid someone for a better design and an extra page of content they would be pretty well off.
But your core product is selling a pipe dream, that you can have a site in minutes that will do well in search engines. If someone doesn’t add unique content, even if they are lucky enough to get indexed for a few days or weeks, it will inevitably end in an SE ban.
I really enjoyed this comment though: “I think Minisites.com is off to a good start, and after a few years, may catch up to WhyPark’s abilities at this moment.”
For a company that claims to be so advanced… it really took a long time (three years) to figure out one of the most basic SEO principles out there… friendly URLs. Will it take a decade to put ALT tags on your images? (Joking, I don’t know if you do that or not.) Anyway, since you conceded the last word I guess we’ll pick this up in email 🙂
Michael Sumner
EM @ KING.NET says
@ Andrew,
How will I deactivate receiving update for this specific article?
Thank you,
EM
Andrew Allemann says
EM – there is a link below the comment box that says “manage subscriptions”
EM @ KING.NET says
Thank you.
Stephen Douglas says
Great Mike! I look forward to communicating with you. You can get my contact info on my blog http://www.successclick.com/about
Much success to you…
Craig Rowe says
Michael,
I’d be happy to share some stats with you showing traction from “out of the box” WhyPark sites in addition to those that are customized. Drop me an email at [email protected] and I can send you some third-party stats showing traffic and search engine growth.
One thing I want to clarify though is that we don’t scrape. We pay license fees, have direct partnerships and manually review a large amount of user submitted content.
We’re essentially competing for domains being developed, but we’re definitely different models. I think there’s a place for both models personally. I agree, development isn’t easy and I always recommend custom content and link building, which is why we offer each service. It’s not for every domain or portfolio though, so we leave the choice up to our customers.
I can absolutely validate our model with stats and welcome the opportunity to speak with you.
Thanks,
Craig Rowe
President
WhyPark
Stephen Douglas says
Yeah, what my boss said! 😉
Domainers, please note that when Craig Rowe takes the time to post, it’s because falsehoods being spread around, innocently or otherwise, need to be addressed because believing these erroneous comments, you may miss great opportunities for your domains.
WhyPark will definitely open up your eyes to amazing opportunities with your longtails and ccTLDs. We have the track record to prove it. I will gladly help anyone with ccTLD’s or longtails learn how to get value on their domains quickly through WhyPark. You can email me at successclick (at) gmail .com.
Thanks Dub-A, for allowing WhyPark to respond.