How to make easy money by selling domains on Afternic

What is the easiest way to convert ideas into money? Sure there is no short-cut way and you still have to put in a lot of effort but making money on Afternic is reasonably easy and straightforward. If you have a creative flair and have some money that you can safely spare then Afternic is for you. For those of you who have not heard of Afternic, it is the online system where you can sell your domain names for the highest bidder.

Afternic.com provides an interesting and very useful service for domain name speculators. If you can think up a good domain name that is not yet registered you can buy the domain name and offer it for sale on Afternic. Although this might lead to what is sometimes known as domain squatting, it is a pretty interesting way to make money for those who have a creative tinge.

You can make use of the cheap domain registration rates at Zyxware Domains to buy domains in bulk and offer the domains for sale on Afternic. Afternic charges you 20$ as annual fees for listing your domains. So you will have to have a reasonable number of domains to be able to make efficient use of the overhead.

There are three issues that you have to keep in mind when you register domains. The first is about the definition of what is a good domain name that you can sell and get a good profit. The answer to this question is not simple. Some of the key aspects of good domain names are - short, easy to remember, rhyming, combination of short words etc. The best way to get an idea is to go browse through the list of domains that have been sold on Afternic and then figure it out yourself. Browsing through names also will give you new ideas about new domain names that you could possibly register.

The second issue that you have to keep in mind is related to the legal and ethical aspects of buying a domain name. Buying a domain name that is a registered trademark of another company with a malicious intent to sell it to the trademark owner is called cyber-squatting or domain-squatting. This is illegal and you can be legally forced to either not be able to do anything with the domain name or give up the domain name to the rightful owner. Even if it was legal we feel that this borders on the definition of unethical business behaviors.

The third issue is with the risks associated with such a venture. As with any speculative business there is a definite risk in domain name business also. Given below this article are some of the recent domains that were sold on Afternic. Given that an average domain name costs only around 10 Dollars you can see the percentage of profit that you can make through domain sales. But don't be deceived just by these amounts. You will probably have to invest in a few domain names before you can start selling and even then not all your domain names would be sell-worthy or not all would fetch you similar prices. Doing a little homework can mitigate a lot of risks. Additionally afternic provides you some premium services like affiliate marketing and expanded promotion schemes that can help you highlight your domain name to potential buyers. Yes, these services come at their prices.

As a company we condemn cyber-squatting and will not recommend it as a fair way of making money. However you can make money legally and ethically on Afternic by investing in domain names that do not infringe on Trademarks. You can coin your own words, or use word combinations, or use letter combinations to create domain names that could possibly sell for hundreds, thousands or even millions of dollars.

Tips to create a good domain name

Selling domains is a mature business and there are already around 2 million domain names available for sale on Afternic. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domain_name has some tips on how to coin good domain names. Listed below you can find some of our recommendations on how to create a good domain name.

Most of the words in the dictionary has already been registered. However you could try your hand in registering english-ised words from your local language to register domains that you can sell to your own countrymen. For example the corresponding word for greetings in Malayalam is 'Namaskaram'. The .com domain has already been registered but this should give you an idea.

You don't have to restrict yourselves to just the .com, .net or .org TLDs (Top Level Domain names). It is true that these are the domain names that sell like hotcakes but you can also go after third level domain names like .co.in, .co.org etc or after country code extensions like .us, .cc etc. There are also some expensive domain name extensions like .tv and .cc which would have more options available specifically because of their expensive nature.

You can also try to create domain names that makes sense only when added to the extension. When you are trying to do this you also have an option of using something other than the typical www as the third level name. One of the more popular examples is del.icio.us. Here the domain name is icio.us and they have added a subdomain del to make a meaningful word delicious.

Some of the recent sales on Afternic

Given below are some of the recent sales on Afternic at the time of writing this article. You can find more at
the list of recent sales at Afternic.com. The prices, both here as well as on Afternic, are given in US Dollars.

julk.com                      1099
islamicbanking.net            1088
zult.com                      1000
millionairesclub.org          700
greenlightsolutions.com       1450
compease.com                  1300
DimmerShop.com                1250
kexu.com                      1100
apparelsaver.com              688
funcalendar.com               688
Empleamos.com                 600
HotAndCold.com                988
trivid.com                    988
snackwizards.com              880
freshcatch.net                788
baconbits.com                 3200
lafo.com                      2000
frischknecht.com              1500
GoFar.com                     13000
USHEALTHCARE.com              3500
gotcredit.com                 4800
rolk.com                      1500
windpark.com                  5000
infinitereturns.com           1300
mddx.com                      850
iWidgets.com                  25000
DNFM.com                      700
eggsoftware.com               5000
actualpolitics.com            500
5Gig.com                      500
jetting.com                   16500
educationalerts.com           2000
ARTCREATIONS.com              1000
spanish-estates.com           500
SMSBUSTER.com                 1000
VO1.com                       699
TuitionSolution.com           1250
ChartLyrics.com               900
PhiladelphiaGym.com           2400
sungem.com                    950
TopForeclosures.com           765
samsun.net                    1000
truthfactory.com              500
sawomenshealth.com            505
soulvault.com                 700
DRIRWIN.com                   795
isf.info                      1260
clonescripts.com              660
CYBER-MONDAY.us               505
COOKABLE.com                  1300
DEBTFEES.com                  1000
iStore.biz                    500
Diif.com                      500
BestOfOklahomaCity.com        500
CAVIAREXPRESS.com             1500
nomorecandy.com               500
THEPET.net                    750
DRMCCOY.com                   795
bldz.com                      800
nationalapparel.com           999
CAMPINGCOMPANY.com            560
forex.nr                      2000
AFNA.com                      750
Newsmaster.net                700
PAPERDIVA.COM                 1350