Remember the good old days when you could post up a mini site, load it full of Adsense ads and promote it in the search engines, then sit back and watch the money come in?

That used to be a half-decent business model, along with parking some better quality names,  just like parking did.

Not so anymore, at least not for the majority of us.

The cash has stopped flowing in our direction as the likes of Google squeeze publishers (that’s us) and keep as much money on the table, whilst letting us settle for crumbs.

I didn’t buy into it that much anyway, but the sites I did make in that way are far from productive these days. Probably a few hundred pounds per month, which for no work I suppose isn’t anything to grumble about.

Instead of following the ppc market, I have continued to use my domains to promote real business.

I’m delighted to say that this approach is working better than ever and the beauty is that I control the lead source entirely.

To give you some real examples from the last working week, this is what I’ve been dealing with:

• A UK landlord needing several thousand surveys conducting . £250,000 total value.
• A large UK based PLC company in need of maintenance for their 1000 sq metre asbestos roof – contract value – £20,000 and the deal closed in 24 hours. I gave the enquiry to a company who decided to cut me out – oh dear. It happens, but only once! What they fail to realise is the next day, this happened…
• A manufacturing company called wanting to replace an asbestos roof. The contract value is £65,000.
• A very large development company wants a specialist survey on properties adjoining the site of their huge construction project – it looks like £10-£12,000 and the deal will be signed on Monday.
• Two separate property surveys for landlords of commercial property – each of them at around £1000.

If those same visitors had clicked an Adsense link on one of my sites, I’d have probably got 20 pence each click.

Instead, I built out my domains promoting somebody else’s business, but I took the enquiries. That makes the client mine (except in the case where someone decided to cheat), so any more business comes through that source, I get a cut of that too.

I traced the clicks. The two roofing ones came from a £6 domain I recently redeveloped using WordPress. It is number one in Google for the search terms used by the visitors.

The big surveying lead and the two £1000 leads came from a name I bought on Sedo a few weeks ago for £550 – it is currently a one-page site, a sort of holding page with a note about the services I can offer. I must get round to doing something better with it and I must remember that sometimes, those low value domains on Sedo are worth the investment.

Apart from the roof maintenance deal, the rest have been closed by me.

Looking at these, you’ll see that they all have one thing in common, in that deal with a niche that I am comfortable with. I’ve spent the past few years learning enough to be able to write credibly about them and also speak with confidence.

It might start with a name (or a search engine listing usually if I’m honest), but then it’s a matter of getting the click.

When the visitor clicks they have to see something that sells them on calling or emailing – you won’t get that for $10 per article on Elance!

Then the job has to be sold. In these and other cases, it wasn’t too difficult, since my response time to receiving an enquiry is almost instant.

I believe in giving the customer what they want very early – the price.

For that reason, I quote prices over the phone. My competitors don’t. They lose 8 times out of 10, or they would do if they had the lead in the first place, but it will be years before they catch on, if ever.

This all adds up to work as you can see, so it’s not an approach that most established domainers would advocate as there are more working parts in what I do compared to pay per click.

The PPC model though, relies on a lot more clicks to make the kind of money I’ve made this week (and consistently for a few years now).

My total clicks this week that brought in these leads and deals was less than 200 across just a few sites.

I’ve still only worked one full day and am still walking about feeling like I’m unemployed, so have had to force myself back the the computer in order to further develop what I already have.

It’s all about cash flow. I keep developing and the cash keeps flowing.

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