What to do with an expired domain name? 301 or Private Blog Network

You’ve finally bought that amazing high value expired domain at an unbeatable price through DomCop. Now, you have three different options of what you can do with it.

Use as your main money site

When to use:

  1. If the domain name is brandable
  2. If the links to the site are authentic links from high quality sites
  3. If the domains is old and has a lot of pages indexed by Google
  4. If the website has existing traffic (check SEMrush traffic stats)

 Pros:

  1. You start your money site with an already branded domain
  2. The domain has high trust and authority
  3. The existing traffic can be directly monetized

Cons: Possible legal issues with trademark and copyright

301 to your root domain or to a page on your site

When to use:

  1. High Link Equity
  2. Low number of pages linked (If the domain has many linked pages, you will need to create pages on money site for each separate url redirect)
  3. Previous site should be of the same category. If your money site is about mobile phones, then this site must also be about mobile phones.
  4. Links from extremely contextual sites. If your money site is about mobile phones, then all the links to this domains should be links regarding mobile phones, communication and technology

Pros:

  1. The redirect is very easy to setup
  2. No server or website setup required
  3. A 301 redirect passes a large amount of link equity

Cons:

  1. Easy for Search Engines to figure out if you have 301 redirected too many sites to your money site
  2. If the expired domain was affected by Panda, Penguin or the next destructive animal, your money site will be directly affected
  3. Redirects should be done page to page resulting in need to create lot of pages on money site
  4. No control on Anchor texts – limited to whatever is already used by linking sites, Setup GWT to migrate website each domain

Tips: Before you do a redirect, setup both websites in GWT and use the change of address tool

 

Create your own Private Blog Network

This is the choice we prefer at DomCop.

When to use:

  1. Site is a generic blog or website i.e it is not linked to any category.
  2. The links to site are generic links as well

Pros:

  1. Cheaper generic domains can be used
  2. Very scalable – new domains can be continuously added
  3. Full control on the anchor text. Can create contextual articles and link as needed

Cons: Need to spend on hosting and setting up website and content writing.

Tips: Have a process in place that is easily scale-able.  Having a thousand domain network is a lot of work compared to a ten domain one if you do not have processes in place.

Nothing beats a Private Blog Network. You have complete control on the content and the links to your money site. This is the only truly scalable strategy and you can gain thousands of links over time by adding new domains to your network.

Check out our next post on how to set up private blog networks