If your domain names are generating revenue from PPC, it’s important to check your keywords and landing pages somewhat frequently to make sure they are optimized, showing relavant advertisements and the images are related to the subject. This might be cumbersome for some portfolio domain owners, but you can’t expect people to click on the links if they are completely unrelated.
While Google doesn’t usually index parked domain names, some do have better luck getting indexed (a few of my small niche names I have parked with Fabulous are indexed well). If the domain is indexed in Google but the keywords aren’t optimized, the page title and meta keywords will be impacted. This could cause a lower SE ranking, less traffic, and less revenue as a consequence.
It’s also important to make sure domain names aren’t showing links that could be infrining on a company’s mark. For example, I have a great nnn.com domain name. I know there are several casinos who use numbers as their brand name, so I make sure the domain isn’t showing casino or gambling related advertising. While it is usually easy for a company to manipulate parked names to show what looks like infringing ads using the search function, domain owners should be able to prove this manipulation.
Although PPC revenue has been generally declining across all sectors, it is wise to check in with your parking company to make sure your domains are optimized as best as they can be optimized. Frequently aut-optimize programs work well, but there are times they miss the mark. Doing this yourself will ensure that you are going to make the most revenue with the least chance of infringing on someone’s trademark.
It might also behoove you to sign up for the new Reinvent Index, a fixed list of 200 domains, divided into 20 verticals, owned and operated by Reinvent. This will allow you to track how Reinvent’s mini portfolios are doing so you can compare them to your own portfolio. If their revenue is jumping in a particular industry but yours is tanking, perhaps your keywords need to be better optimized. The Reinvent Index will allow you to see seasonal trends, industry performance or general market swings, and you can compare this to your portfolio.
Thanks for bringing this up. The PPC industry changes so often that you have to constantly be watching for things like this; look at your sites, look at the keywords that you are using, and most likely you ARE leaving money on the table if you haven’t actually looked at your parked pages at least once a month. For the more trafficked domains I like to look at them manually at least once a week. I usually set up an MS Outlook recurring meeting/appointment to remind me to do it.
So we have to sign up for an account and be accepted before we can see the Reinvent index? I don’t see a link on the site.
Not to nitpick a good post, but meta keywords are virtually worthless and many SEOs don’t waste their time with them anymore. Just thought I would throw that out there.
You can view the Reinvent Index on hitfarm.com’s site: hitfarm.com/tour_06.html