Back in April we were approached by DomainSponsor.com to do a test on their parking system. DomainSponsor.com said they had spent a lot of time and money on revamping their parking system, had all new people working for them and wanted to know how their new and improved system would stack up against Frank Schilling’s InternetTraffic.com
I agreed to do a test with about 19,000 domain names I had parked over at InternetTraffic.com (IT) with two conditions; one, they had to guarantee me the earnings of the domains by matching what they were earning at IT for the two month period and second, I would publish the results good or bad.
I was very honest with the DS folk, I thought they would lose their shirt on the guarantee as the last time I was with DS prior to InternetTraffic the portfolio did not perform well to say the least.
The test started May 1st and run until July 1.
Our revenue guarantee deal was $994 commission/day for 61 days.
Over that time, DomainSponsor (DS) earned $1,054 a day winning 67% of all domains that earned revenue during the test.
Of domains where minimal revenue was eliminated, DS won 8,207 domains by 10% or greater and lost 5,879 by 10% or greater.
The average % lift on names won by DS by more than 10% was 363%.
Finding that another parking provider even having the same upstream provider performed better on some domains is not a new concept.
We have a/b tested our domains for many years amongst the providers which performed better overall knowing that the worst return is leaving all domain names parked with one parking company.
We dropped DS from our testing a while ago but now having run the test we are going to be leaving the “winners” with them while moving the “losers” back to the platform they performed better with.
Here are the results:
| Description | Total Domains | Winners | Losers | % won |
| All domains with revenue | 19790 | 13247 | 6543 | 67% |
| Winners/Losers by +-10% (minimal revenue removed) | 14086 | 8207 (+10%) | 5879 (-10%) | 58% |
Sorry Mike, but the ONLY test that really counts is when they DON’T KNOW a test is being run. The test MUST be blind test and they can’t even be told about it until the test is over.
Well you can try that yourself.
personally I liked to have my test guaranteed
Of course we will be watching the winning domains to see if the numbers hold
you move them and in about 6 months when everybody jumps into the wagon the earnings go down the toilet.
Jose
Even if your right I will still make a lot more money for six months, I’ll take that any day.
“personally I liked to have my test guaranteed”
Then you can never truly trust the results.
Also, I would never accept just a guarantee without a defined 20% minimum increase as it costs money when you switch DNS. You can lose traffic and bidders. Domains can go into “Shock” when moved.
Rick
As you often say the numbers don’t lie and the money is in the bank
I have done these type of test guarantees in the past and they have always served me well, sometimes leading to long term guarantees over the last years when most domainers PPC incomes have declined.
I know there is some shock to the system when you move domains and yes you may take a small hit for a few days but if a parking company is willing to step up and believes in their product to the extent they are willing to guarantee current earnings then we think its a fair deal to try them knowing there will be domains that will perform better for a long time to come.
I hope FS responds to this “test” by either chiming in or upping the rev-share for domainers.
Interesting test Michael. Did you use Above to rotate the domains, or another solution? Also, it should be noted that Internet Traffic switched completely to the new Google implementation recently. I believe this happened some time in the middle of the test window. This would’ve affected results.
Dave
We did not switch the traffic using above.com we just switched the DNS to DS on all of the domain and let DS have all the domains for the full two months May and June using the numbers from March and April as the basis for the test.
As traffic usually declines and the summer is generally a little slower I think the results are especially impressive and as I said I was surprised as anyone to see the results
Summer months are typically lower revenue months so you got over on DS if they based the guarantee on non-summer months. I stopped using DS long ago because they estimated stats rather than pay you using exact domain stats provided by Google. Too much robbing Peter to pay Paul going on.
I would say its stupid to call this a test. Of course when they knew you will write review they have to pay you good. This is rom of advertising when you pay someone to park domains to their parking and pay them little extra and call it a day.
Michael doing this you actually lost money by not charging them for this blogpost. So even if they paid you 50 dollars extra per day over DNs, you still lost money for not charging them for a biased review.
Isn’t this conflict of interest when you someone pay you to move domain and you have no option but pay them little extra manually since parking know you will write vs review if they don’t.
Hahaha so simple and stupid move on parking company end and Michael you should actually charge them for blog post for helping them get some domains moved over to them.
But u would recommend I fellows to not SEE THIS A TEST but a trap by domain sponsor don’t fall for it!
I try not to go through life as a cynical bastard.
Personally I think the numbers are the numbers
I’m just reporting the results of my test.
I don’t own any stock in Oversee so if you want to move some of your traffic there its fine with me and if you don’t its fine with me
Doesn’t change my life one bit either way.
@Michael
First of all, the comment is not to offend you in anyway, secondly, I would call it paid review, not a Test by any means. As long as you made money Who cares I agree with you. But I would still not see this a tid bit a Fair Test.
I agree with Rick, Numbers don’t lie, only when they are not manipulated! , manipulated numbers may lie 🙂
Take care
I don’t take offense.
You can chose to believe the numbers or not to, again makes no difference to me.
I’m going to assume the numbers are not manipulated until they proven they are
My portfolio is with IT.
I am seeing more of my pure term / intuitive domains show up in top 10 search results lately – albeit my numbers are down – however I attribute most of that to seasonality.
That said – I put a lot of weight on “DON’T KNOW a test is being run.” from Rick.
In the end I like that Yahoo’s stock and business appears to have taken a good turn – that is good for everybody.
In the end it is all about new ways to hurl a dead horse across the finish line. IMO while traffic might be down – it is much more qualified with buyers of products and services – not to mention more qualified buyers of the domains themselves.
I’ve been very happy with Parking Crew, I guess it’s a matter of finding a parking company you
like.
Well of course you are not cynical Mike, you got a deal they would not give 99.9 % of other domainers.
Secondly I agree with Rick they knew they were getting the review.
Thirdly if they bumped you it was still worth it from a paid post/ad standpoint.
Now I do hope someone does let Frank know because I would like to hear his reply.
Now some domainer out there not as famous please do a test and switch your IT portfolio to DS and post the results.
I have done lots of affiliate marketing
for gambling companies and I had to
keep testing my traffic sending it to different affiliates to get good deals.
Sometimes I would get a whale and make good money. But they stole them so the only way to make ok money was to keep moving my traffic and the next day the affiliate manager would ring me up and give me a better revenue share deal to stay.
This is not the type of business I like
and it’s never secure. The domaining parking platforms are the same. I’m moving all my domains away from parking platforms because I don’t trust them. Imagine some of the deals they have got from our traffic!!
I have done lots of affiliate marketing
for gambling companies and I had to
keep testing my traffic sending it to different affiliates to get good deals.
Sometimes I would get a whale and make good money. But they stole them so the only way to make ok money was to keep moving my traffic and the next day the affiliate manager would ring me up and give me a better revenue share deal to stay.
This is not the type of business I like
and it’s never secure. The domaining parking platforms are the same. I’m moving all my domains away from parking platforms because I don’t trust them. Imagine some of the deals they have got from our traffic!!
Happy you were pleased by DomainSponsor.com’s test results because this service is part of the few parking services we recommend at Domaining.com:
http://www.domaining.com/directory/domain-parking/
And kudo for the courage to have sharing your experience when you knew in advance numerous Frank’s fans will disapprove you.
Maybe platforms like DomainHoldings.com or Above.com who are constantly testing each parking service to maximize revenue may participate in this thread, I am sure they also have interesting numbers to share.
Hi Michael, I’m afraid I have to agree with others. If a company knows someone influential in their industry is running a test on them, it would be in their best interest to provide him/her with the best results, at least better than the competition. Given that they knew the results would be published, this was for them a great promotional opportunity.
Given Domainsponsor knew what you were earning with Internettraffic and knew you’d be publishing the results even blind freddy knows what the only outcome can be. Either they are doing better or they’ve just saved face.
For it to be 5% higher the realist would probably say all they’ve done is increase you’re rev share to the point where it earns a bit more than what you told them it made with Frank Schilling. The optimist would argument domainsponsor are doing better.
Why would any parking company suffer the embarrassment of under performing when they know exactly what it takes to “win”? At the end of the day we’ve learnt nothing at all.
I hope people don’t start switching names without doing a very through test of their own as this one is badly flawed.
I have to agree with most of what already has been said, kind like a teacher telling their students:
there is a test the following week giving them the questions and the answers (subliminally)…
They knew:
you are a person of influence in the domain Industry,
you have a huge highly desirable portfolio,
and the “numbers to beat” (I think)…
hardly a test.
Mike…think about it.
Well there are lots of parking companies and plenty of domain blogs, so if its such a good idea to overpay a blogger/domainer for a short period of time its amazing that no one else though of such a move
The larger the Parking company the larger their share (% they get from the feeder)…
DS is/used to be the largest parking company in the planet
They are not overpaying you, they are giving you a larger % share of the profit
(probably a reverse Robin Hood per se , they took it away from smaller domainers :)….)
For what I understand the spread/margins in the domain Industry are huge
Either you are a humble guy or don’t realize the power behind your publication (or both).
Now ask IT if they can beat DS payout :)…
“so if its such a good idea to overpay a blogger/domainer for a short period of time its amazing that no one else though of such a move.”
Actually, they have been doing that for many years.
It was pretty easy for me to spot the ones that faked signups because I had data from each before and after the test. Most were cool. But 2 or 3 were not and it was very obvious when I checked the stats.
Here is a test I ran in 1999. Still online and detailed link on bottom to see each test.
http://webmastering.com/excelresults.htm
So it worked out well for me personally but I know what I know and I know who did what to take advantage of my tests.
The BIGGEST test I ever did was when I moved my adult portfolio from Fabulous in 2005 to Skenzo and realized a 6X increase overnight and that increase held for close to 3 years at the height of payouts. Don’t think I ever made that public before.
To be honest, I never pay attention to the first 10% +/-
Rick
So if you “Don’t think I ever made that public before. ” then its really not the same situation we have here.
How did Skenzo inflating your earnings 6X more than the previous parking company help them if you never chatted about it.
I have had huge increases to from one parking company to another but it typically due to one of the companies sucking.
Not sure how you are gauging the performance, but what I understand the best way is the group your domains by “Theme” and then look at the RPM rather as the portfolio as a whole.
there is to many variants inc seasonality…
“How did Skenzo inflating your earnings 6X more than the previous parking company help them if you never chatted about it.”
Exactly my point. They did not inflate my earnings. There was no motive to do that.
Rick
So let me ask it a different way.
Back in 2005 you didn’t have a blog, but if you did and had you switched from Fab to Skenzo and saw a 6X increase would you let your readers know or would you keep it to yourself.
Domo
I would never advise any domain to move a substantial portion of their domains to any parking company without doing some testing of their own first.
That is domaining 1.0
Raymond, most parking services will give the same sort of guarantee. So that is not true. We at Above have run a number of guaranteed + tests on behalf of our clients (Large and Small). The offer given is the same to all clients regardless of size.
Parking companies find it extremely useful to be able to try to re-test the results of optimization changes that they are implementing.
From what we have found, many domains will now perform better on that parking services when before it did not before. Of course, some do worse, which I am sure that was the case as well for Michael. Hence why he did not move all of the domains away from IT.
No matter how you put it, and guaranteed test aside, if your portfolios is with just one parking company, it is underperforming.
No one parking company has been able to outperform every other parking service, on every single type of domain, for every type of traffic. So doing these sort of tests are always worth it, especially for Domainers.
Cheers
David
“Back in 2005 you didn’t have a blog, but if you did and had you switched from Fab to Skenzo and saw a 6X increase would you let your readers know or would you keep it to yourself.”
I did have an outlet to write about it back in 2005 but chose not to for several reasons. I have eluded to it a couple times over the years but nothing specific. Just for the record now that we are a long way from that era…..$2k a day with that set of names to $12,000 a day. That is why I TEST and always TEST and have TESTS running right now.
I find domainsponsor’s categorisation engine to be next to useless, except for very obvious domains. It knows what to do with sex, cars, ships etc but rapidly fades when challenged. I’ve been making screenshots over the last few months to illustrate just how far divorced from reality a lot of my domains categorisation is.
I’ve had up to 400 or so domains parked at domainsponsor, off and on over the last – say – 6/7 years.
Here’s an example for nursingbrassieres.com. It’s designed for nursing mothers who choose to shop online for relevant bras.
Domain Sponsor, however, adamantly declines to give them any Assistance. It has decided that the domain name is really about nurses – although even at that, the first hit on the parked page is:
Top Canada Mortgage Rates
Get Canada’s Top Mortgage Rates From Banks, Credit Unions & BrokersRateSupermarket.ca/BestRates
then there are a few links for RN exams and online education. There’s also a plug for graphic design school. I suppose with 3D printing, one might learn to print out a nursing brassiere because it’s the only way they’re going to get one here.
I wish I could list even more ludicrous examples, such as adult names on which the leading link is for HELP DESK SOFTWARE – what a disappointment for those seeking sexual satisfaction.
it’s a nightmare and the low returns reflect that.
I figure my job is to get the visitors but once they’ve arrived it’s domainsponsor’s job to get them to click – and they’re not doing it often enough, probably for the reason discussed.
Carl
Parking companies are taking the piss out of domainers!! FACT
Domainers need to grow some balls and find other options.
The problem domainers with large portfolios have now is they have to put their hands in their pockets more often and they don’t like it. So the parking companies keep taking the piss because they know they are stuck. Frank come out the woodwork and tell us your point of view? Never going to happen!!
I don’t understand why domainers let parking companies take so much commission when they are using them. WAKE UP!! Time for a change
Look at the money Rick made from domain deals in the last 3 years compared to the profits from his parking companies. I bet it’s a totally different league. Change direction to the correct path.
Rick
I agree
As I said I test all the time as well.
The difference is maybe that I report the findings.
Maybe I should keep my mouth close and just collect my check
David
“”No matter how you put it, and guaranteed test aside, if your portfolios is with just one parking company, it is underperforming.””
That is what I have been saying
Domaining 1.0
Mike,
In my position it is hard to go public and say out loud the parking companies that people have to be out of their minds to use. I just think “findings” can be faked and manipulated when the sponsor knows you are running a test. They can give the domains special love etc.. So I think we all have to agree that given the circumstances, it can’t really be labled as a test or findings. 😉
But I am glad you made more money! 🙂
Let me help you make even more.
Now the proper way to work the market, is to now offer your traffic at 15%-20% above DS with a 90 day minimum to the first parking company that believes they can outperform them.
🙂
Rick
Ok parking companies bring it on
I will will let you know if I hear from anyone to take you up on your offer on my traffic including Frank
So far its pretty quiet
“So far its pretty quiet”
Hey, nobody else knew you were fishing for an increase until one comment ago. 😉
Well that is their bad
I’m always fishing for an increase
What are you fishing for?
A reduction
And what will it all mean when you lose you last payment because DS goes under or bankrupt before the payout?
Hi all,
Here are a few interesting facts that we’ve seen at ParkLogic.
No parking company wins more than 28% of traffic. This means that by placing all of your traffic with a single company (eg. DS, Internet Traffic etc) you are actually losing 72% of the time.
Rotating traffic is bad – I proved it mathematically in a session at the last TRAFFIC conference. The traffic needs to be intelligently switched……yes, there’s a BIG difference.
Looking only at the revenue number is a stupid way of measuring success. What needs to be done is a review of the total traffic (NOT filtered views) to a domain combined with the revenue. To be quite honest with you I’m getting really tired of telling people this……..an analysis of the traffic volume and normalised RPM will begin to show WHY the domains earned more/less.
Domain owners are constantly lashing out to try and get a higher payout and not considering the many variables……the smart thing that Mike did was underpin his earnings with a guarantee (all power to you) BUT it DOES NOT prove that DS is better than IT. It does prove that at that point in time DS performed better for some domains than IT.
I’m sorry if I appear a little frustrated but I feel like I’m a broken record……I’ve never seen so much money lost by domain owners doing “a/b tests” behaving in an emotional rather than analytical fashion.
the real important question:
do you big time domainers actually put on pants when you wake up?
personally feel boxers are much more professional… i cant take a domainer in briefs seriously.
Rick that jump in revenue was because Skenzo had the Ask feed back then.
@ ontheinterweb
do you big time domainers actually put on pants when you wake up?
personally feel boxers are much more professional… i cant take a domainer in briefs seriously.
==================
BTW my neighbor’s dog is a Boxer and he’s swell …. but I think Briefs provide more support & security for the ole’ jewels…plain n’ simple … but working boxers into the ensemble now n’ then ain’t bad
==
But Not sure which attracts more Traffic….. maybe an impartial test will tell all
@Michael Gilmour:
“It does prove that at that point in time DS performed better for some domains than IT.”
I don’t think it proves that since there was a guarantee…unless I am not understanding what you propose.
The day we know the actual % “our cut” of the revenue generated by domain portfolios a lot of this guessing will go away, sooner or later someone will sue Google over the lack of transparency and their “trust us” type of one sided contracts …
Good to see you commenting.
Robert Fernandez.
Above.com has had a “domain parking management/monetization” platform for a while now…it essentially tests/compares & contrasts how domains perform on multiple different domain parking venues many-many parking co’s have signed up as Parking-provider members (both old & newer),,, but IT would not join up for a long time so “parkers” could Not compare/test them vs others on the platform…….. Has IT since enrolled in the Above.com platform ??
Would be good to see !
Totally agree with you MGilmore, rotation/testing needs to be done correctly and not based on end Revenues, many other factors need to be considered. We introduced the nRPM algo when we 1st released Above many years ago and have constantly made learning adjustments over time.
JNet, no IT is not looking at joining Above, I am sure that they are fully aware that they can not beat all the other parking cos on every single domain.
Maybe they have not considered the other potential upside of winning on those domains that are on Above and they dont have access to currently. If they are better than the rest, then the upside would be greater for them. Something to consider Frank?
Cheers, David
@ Domo Sapiens
“I don’t think it proves that since there was a guarantee…unless I am not understanding what you propose.”
I’m working on the assumption that it was a genuine test and not some scam by DS.
The biggest issue that we’ve wrestled with is being completely transparent. Making sure that the domain owners actually know our take and their earnings…..it just makes business sense to be transparent.
@JNet
ParkLogic has been around a lot longer than Above….in fact, we actually worked with the founders on their portfolio before Above existed…..we’re pretty confident that our traffic routing and optimisation is much more effective than Above’s.
@JNet
I should add that the reason why I believe that ParkLogic is better than Above is that they are different solutions. Above does a great job as a sell managed solution where the domain owner does much of the work. ParkLogic is pitched typically as a complete solution where outsourcing the management and optimisation of a domain portfolio is best.
@mgilmore
I did not know that this was a thread to boast about your platform, put our service down and give a biased assumption? Actually, I expected better from someone like you. Yes we ran a test with you, and we have tested and continue to test everything we can, as all good domainers should be doing.
As for who is better, we both have our strengths, we just dont have the same weakness, as we do not take a cut of all domain parking revenues like you do.
Don’t get me wrong, I’ve always respected what you do MG, and its a valuable service for some. I just dont like giving out a share of my parking revenues, when Above based on my very biased opinion, is the best on the market 😉
Robert
Do you know how many lawsuits have been filed against Google arising out of its advertising product?
More importantly do you know how many Google has lost
ZERO
That’s the answer.
1. you don’t have to use Google if you don’t like the lack of transparency they give don’t use them.
2. The issue of lack of transparency, which is one I have raise on many occasions at the end of the day means nothing if the numbers flush out. Which is to say if you spent millions of dollar filing and pursuing this lawsuit and at the end of the day you might just find out Google paid you all the money they were suppose to using their algorithms which they are never going to have to disclose as it is one of the highestly guarded trade secrets right up there with the formula for Coke.
So why not spend your time and energy on making the most you can make with the domain you have
Michael
I think a lot has been lost in translation
So lets revisit
At the end of the day DS did better than the guarantee, on the portiion of domain names I had at IT
Therefore the guarantee which I needed in place to try DS because i had little confidence that they would do as well as IT, became irrelevant after the first few days as the actual earnings were high overall and now having moved back the losing domains to IT I’m well ahead of where I was on the IT portfolio when it was all parked at IT.
However I think since most people know I own substantially more than 20K domain names people would also know I didn’t have all my domains parked at IT.
We just used IT to test with since they had the same upstream provider.
Owen MANY years ago I was in the 900 business and a Company Called Telesphere came on the scene back then you were 90 out on payments not 15, 30 or 45 like today.
So for the same reason you just expressed I always felt like Telesphere would be belly up and I would get stuck with not getting paid for three months of revenue.
Long story short I was right many years later the company went out of business and people got stuck for money they were owed but on the other hand had I used their service when I could have I would have made millions in the years they were in operation.
So yes I didn’t lose $300K of revenue at the end I would have gotten stuck holding but I lost millions of dollars over the years before by not doing business with them.
Lesson learned
Rick
Buy you had your board and was one of the biggest domainers out there and one of the top 5 most influential, so you sure you didn’t get any special treatment?
“Buy you had your board and was one of the biggest domainers out there and one of the top 5 most influential, so you sure you didn’t get any special treatment?”
Ya think they needed to pay me another $4 Million annually for that?
As another commenter indicated it seems it was because they used ask.com feed. But that was all inside baseball to me and meant nothing. I just move around and test and found out who pays what. I tested DS, Sedo, Fabulous, and others at the time.
I did not announce what I was doing. I just pointed a couple domains and then a couple more and a couple more. The stats were live. I just sat and watched.
“”Ya think they needed to pay me another $4 Million annually for that? “”
Exactly so why do you think DS would over pay me then
@Michael, they are overpaying you , 50 bucks a per day haha, but what Rick trying to come across is that this post should not be called a test. It should be called, “DS, willing to pay little extra to some domainers if they write reviews which ofcourse will be good, since they will be paid little extra.
Unless the numbers are real and they actually do outperform IT on a certain percentage of domains
I believe once all these gTLDs hit the market, parking revenue will be higher than years ago with some premium domains. I don’t like parking domains but I believe this is going to happen.
SmartName is NameMedia’s Domain Parking platform…. How do they stackup/compare to DS and IT …. and/or the other major parking companies
Personally I don’t have any domains over their right now so have no idea
@Mike Berkens:
in regards to your reply …
It seems to me I read a ‘somehow’ different point of view from you back in 2011
http://www.thedomains.com/2011/05/23/hey-elliot-here-is-why-we-should-be-critical-of-parking-companies/
All I am saying is we could use more transparency, and perhaps only litigation one day will open that possibility… never say never.
Very few domainers know the actual % paid to them, % earned/generated by THEIR domains…
The actual/factual % and not some: B.S quote such as :
“Don’t worry…You are at the highest possible Paid bracket”
The Subsidizing of lesser quality portfolios is not a secret.
Since we have a few parking companies reading this thread I ask …
Who among you tell their customers the actual % they are getting paid?
And yes Mike, I am moving to perhaps less productive but safer areas of domaining (including a simple exclusive “For sale landing page” no-ads), away from parking and it’s huge liabilities, I am sick and tired of Google over-riding/ignoring genuine keywords rather relaying on the “visitors” history search/navigation to serve ads in many cases totally irrelevant and worse yet “Potentially TM conflicting “all of this in the name of a few cents while risking nothing…
end of rant.
DrD –
“once all these gTLDs hit the market, parking revenue will be higher than years ago with some premium domains”
Yes PPC for .com portfolios will do better and .com domains sales will move noticeably to higher levels and the new non.com registries – like .shop, will make fortunes – yet virtually all speculators in the new non.com domains will lose their ass.
So David commenting on ParkLogic’s comments on this thread-
“I did not know that this was a thread to boast about your platform,”
I think this thread was exactly about parking companies boasting about their platforms 🙂
MB, did the higher rev come from an increase in ctr or cpc? And how did reported traffic fare please?
@ Domo Sapiens
I can only speak for ParkLogic…..we publish all numbers as gross figures (ie. actual domain earnings). We then tell the domain owner their exact revenue share and then publish our actual earnings right alongside their own in their account area each and every month. It can’t get more transparent than that. All parties know what each other is earning from the traffic.
On the other side…..we deal with the majority of the parking companies on behalf of our clients. We typically don’t discuss revenue share other than saying that they will receive precisely the amount of traffic that they deserve. Our algorithms operate in real-time and have been developed over 7 years……there’s really no point in parking companies trying to game our system.
It beats me why any domain owner would put all of their domains with a single parking company….it just doesn’t make economic sense.
Domo
As always a lot happens over years in this case a lot of cases where companies both advertisers and TM holders have taken Google to court and came away with just a big legal bill.
While I still would love to see transparency don’t think its going to happen
Thanks Mike & Mike.