Like many domain investors, I’ve never developed a complete website. I know I should develop all of my names, but development is difficult and it takes quite a bit of time and money. For the past few weeks, I’ve been working on the development of Lowell.com off line. After careful consideration, I have decided to blog about my ongoing experiences to give other domain investors insight into this development project.
While I hope this will give others the opportunity to witness a successful (or unsuccessful) development undertaking, selfishly, I want to document my progress so I can emulate and/or make improvements on my next project. I hope to be able to provide full details about various aspects of the development process, and I welcome any comments or advice.
So begins the journey into “The Lowell Project.”
***UPDATED BY ELLIOT***
Just as an FYI, the current site looks absolutely nothing like how the final website will look. I am keeping the current site up (which came along with the domain name) in order to avoid delisting in search engines that could possibly occur if I take it down.
This is great news Elliot…since I bought a city.com about the same time as you did…I will follow closely…I am developing too…If you dont mind I’d also like to plug my new “geo” domain forum…I’ll write about your progress there too. GeoOwners.com.
good luck with Lowell. btw there is a Lowell, Indiana 15 miles from me:)
Development is a pain :). I’m in the same situation… the most I’ve developed in terms of a site is probably my blog. Parking is doing fine, much room for increase in revenue, but I’d like to ONE DAY develop a majority of my really good domains. I’m trying to work with someone right now to develop one of my sites!
Elliot,
I too am very excited to see your progress. I would like to develop some geo domains and am interested in your lowell.com and the city.com TimDavids mentioned. Of the 1200 or so domains we own, I have about 10 staged for development use. As an SEM expert we have extensive experience in developing and montizing sites, yet I want 2008 to be the year our comapany shifts back to “yellow page” type fee monetization.
I am eager to learn of your monetization on Lowell.
I think it’s great you’ve decided to share this development. This is a huge project, and will have plenty of experiences we can all learn from. As the developer, it’s important that I try to keep you informed of every step we take. That way your next development is easier, and you actually learn from the experience rather than JUST have a working site. Knowing your developer/client and being able to communicate well is the absolute best way to a successful site. I’ve already learned a lot here, and I thought I knew everything ;).
You have to watch out though. If you bad mouth me, I will see it 😀
Elliot, this is going to be fun reading for sure. Are you going to be open to ideas and comments on your progress from all of us in the peanut gallery?
Good luck!
I’ve been through this path and I find it useful to create / buy a couple of templates. As a first step to developing a domain name, it is possible to use these templates to setup new websites in less than one hour. Sure, you need more time to fully develop, but one hour’s effort plus a few templates will give you something far more developed than a parked domain. As an example, you can have a look at one such domain http://www.mumbailunch.com.