Have You Had an Epik Experience Yet ?

[DnEbook]

I am starting to hear more and more about epik/com , has anyone here jumped in and had a 'epik experience' ? and if so ....your thoughts please

:talk:

 

[NameClerk]

Since you have experience with them can you share what quality/traffic/profit assurance do you get when you sign up and what exit options are in play if you decide that you or someone else can do it better, want to sell the domain etc.

Thanks

There are no guarantees your site will make money but Epik does have a money back guarantee if the site doesn't gross $250 (I think) after 12 months.

Read through their blog. Tons of details there.

Epik Blog

 

[shtaps]

That works for me, I'll verify that and a few other details with them and probably give it a go. I've read some posts on their blog before posting here and understand it's ongoing project, hopefully they'll get to work on their own website sometime soon and make this information more visible for everyone. Thanks for your insight and I hope we'll read some other experiences soon. I'll be back when some of my sites go live with them.

 

[recluse99]

Here is more info on the Epik conference..
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The Epik.com Developer Conference introduces domain investors to other forms of monetization by building online businesses related to products, directories, wikis, reference, polls, Q&A, and more.
“However, developing websites one-by-one is slow and cost-prohibitive. This conference shows Internet investors and entrepreneurs how to acquire and develop domain names and turn them into revenue-generating financial assets by using Epik’s cost-effective, scalable and easy-to-manage platform,” says Monster.
----
devwebpro.com/epik-to-host-domain-dev-conference : - News - Epik To Host Domain Dev Conference | DevWebPro
----
Mid September is almost here...

 

[DnEbook]

i wonder if they went bust what would happen to the sites ?

 

[Domainace]

i wonder if they went bust what would happen to the sites ?

That's always a concern. But I see it as being alleviated by two things. For one, Epik is much more heavily financed than the average domain service. Rob is very rich, I gather, and likely to become more so.

But Bernie Madoff was rich, too. So I'll go with the second thing first, which is character. At some point in business, you just have to look at the guy across the table and ask yourself "Do I trust him to do the right thing?" So, I think Rob is a straight shooter. That's my opinion - you'll have to form your own there.

There is a third thing, also an opinion. I think that Epik is generally a good idea. So, while it may falter at some point, I think there's enough value in the whole concept that it can be bought out and continued in some form.

Worst case, if they sink completely, you still have your domains, and whatever traffic and rankings you have built up. I don't see the worst case happening, but it's a crazy world out there

 

[DnEbook]

well i finally got one up and running , White Dress | White Spaghetti Dress | White Halter Dress | White-Dress.com it will interesting to keep an eye on how it goes , no chances = no changes !

 

[NameClerk]

I've got 4 sites with them and planning to do more. Those domains earned nothing parked, now they're generating about $30 a month (my share).

I paid $1,000 to have those sites developed. $30/month equals a $360 return per year on that $1,000 investment (36%). That's better than my 401k has been doing lately, how about yours? Better yet, I have very little time invested in the process.

I realize that $360 a year is not a life changing amount of money but what if you have $5k, $10k, or even $50k sitting on the sidelines or in a flat line mutual fund? What's that money doing for you right now?

The link building is a big plus but don't discount the liquidity that Epik is bringing to the marketplace. There are a growing number of domainers using the Epik system and Epik is building a platform for these sites to be bought and traded. If they are successful in doing so than the $250 entrance fee per site becomes much less of an obstacle due to the liquidity and ability to cash out.

Could I have built my own sites and achieved similar or better results? Probably. Do I have time to do that? Hell no.

Update: The past few weeks my revenues have almost doubled. If the sites stay at these levels we're talking about a 70% return on investment per year. That's also based on 3 of my 4 sites. One of them has been completely ignored by Google and hasn't gained traction yet.

I've ordered an additional 14 sites that are in production.

---------- Post added at 10:00 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:53 AM ----------

well i finally got one up and running , White Dress | White Spaghetti Dress | White Halter Dress | White-Dress.com it will interesting to keep an eye on how it goes , no chances = no changes !

My advice is to start building links to that site. Outsource them if you have to and invest a little more money. You're going to need them for a term as broad and common as "white dress." The plus side is there's a ton of search volume if you get to the top. I don't think the Epik back links will get you there by themselves though.

 

[kotan]

well i finally got one up and running , White Dress | White Spaghetti Dress | White Halter Dress | White-Dress.com it will interesting to keep an eye on how it goes , no chances = no changes !

The development on that one looked pretty good Seems like it's got lots of potential. I guess linkbuilding it would result to better stats just like Name Clerk said.

Rep added to u and NameClerk. I like the contributions and insights. Makes me want to consider Epik, actually )

---------- Post added at 01:14 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:23 AM ----------

@evirtual1
btw, i assume that's a product portal order? which cost u, how much? $249?

 

[mosilager]

I'd like to hear from others who have sites at Epik what their expenses were?. I got a quote for a product site from them for $249 + $500 for SEO/Advertising, total $749.

With 50:50 revenue share, my site would have to gross in excess of $1,500 just for me to break even, doesn't make sense to me....anyone's insight would be helpful.

@evirtual1
btw, i assume that's a product portal order? which cost u, how much? $249?

 

[NameClerk]

I'd like to hear from others who have sites at Epik what their expenses were?. I got a quote for a product site from them for $249 + $500 for SEO/Advertising, total $749.

With 50:50 revenue share, my site would have to gross in excess of $1,500 just for me to break even, doesn't make sense to me....anyone's insight would be helpful.

The product portals are $249. Do the SEO yourself. Use an exact match domain and your ahead of the game.

 

[mosilager]

Granted, this would work in the perfect world, but then I wouldn't need Epik if I could do all these tasks myself!.

I do have a exact match domain that gets over 90,000 exact searches a month, it's the SEO experience that I don't have!.

The product portals are $249. Do the SEO yourself. Use an exact match domain and your ahead of the game.

 

[NameClerk]

Granted, this would work in the perfect world, but then I wouldn't need Epik if I could do all these tasks myself!.

I do have a exact match domain that gets over 90,000 exact searches a month, it's the SEO experience that I don't have!.

Outsource the SEO (link building). That's what Epik is going to do.

 

[dbelfort]

it seems like you might make more money with adsense. Maybe Throw up a Wp blog or something, Throw some random content on it every day, and get it to start generating.

--------

 

[DnEbook]

The development on that one looked pretty good Seems like it's got lots of potential. I guess linkbuilding it would result to better stats just like Name Clerk said.

Rep added to u and NameClerk. I like the contributions and insights. Makes me want to consider Epik, actually )

---------- Post added at 01:14 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:23 AM ----------

@evirtual1
btw, i assume that's a product portal order? which cost u, how much? $249?

Yes it was a product portal order , also have black-dress.com to be a site in about a week

thanks nameclerk i will start to try build some links

i have a few blogs that do not earn via blogging that's why i decided to have a 'shop' rather that just a name or blog

 

[dmyre]

Update: The past few weeks my revenues have almost doubled. If the sites stay at these levels we're talking about a 70% return on investment per year. That's also based on 3 of my 4 sites. One of them has been completely ignored by Google and hasn't gained traction yet.

I've ordered an additional 14 sites that are in production.

Would you mind sharing your domains?

 

[bluesinjid]

No offense to anyone here, but while I love the epik portals, I think they are overpriced. For $250, you only get 50% of the revenue ( moving up to 80%). Also you have to invest it into each domain. I rather make my own inhouse sites.

 

[RevolutionaryDomains]

epik question for the pro's

Are most of you here on NP webmasters to some degree? If so, are you able to create your own portals essentially for free rather than spending $250 on epik? I'm just curious. How is it different than having a template based site with some registrar such as GoDaddy for $5 a month?

Though I've been in and out of the industry since the late 90s, I'm a noob with this side of domaining so pardon the silly Q's. I'm just trying to figure out if this is a possible direction for a couple of my names or just a waste of money. I have a couple of names I would like to develop but am not a webmaster and wouldn't know where to begin, so epik sounds like a potentially good alternative.

Incidentally, epik(.)com appears to be up for sale at sedo. Does that have any impact?

Thanks in advance for your time.

-Regards

 

[infosec3]

No offense to anyone here, but while I love the epik portals, I think they are overpriced. For $250, you only get 50% of the revenue ( moving up to 80%). Also you have to invest it into each domain. I rather make my own inhouse sites.

It was my initial thought when I saw their prices, but I am still thinking about it...

 

[DnEbook]

for me i am not a webmaster of any note and it just seems time to get out of parking, amazon only offer 4% to 6% abouts and there are companies that offer free templates for an amazon shop but i did like the way the epik sites interconnected with a network of other sites which i assume increases the chave for income earning

interesting to know epik/com is up for sale ? strange if this the brand they are building ????

 

[NLP]

The thing that's keeping me away from Epik sites at this point is that most of the stats pages I see have measly earnings. You can see the stats of any of their sites by adding /stats/ to the URL.

The sites they advertise on their blog and mention all the time have decent earnings, but many of the others seem to be making pennies to a few dollars every week.

I also don't know how they get away with trademark infringement, as I've run across several sites with "Adidas" in the URL, selling Adidas gear.

The problem is, too many domainers don't know squat about developing. I outsource a lot and I'm all for making things easier with WP and other platforms, but Epik sites are not really development. You don't really have that much control, and they're all cookie-cutter. I think it's the perfect platform if you have popular items that you KNOW you'll sell a lot of, but honestly, I buy most of my stuff at large online retailers. I wouldn't see much of a point to going to a site that just sells white t-shirts, or coffee grinders, etc. I'd just go to Amazon.

I'm not saying I won't test out Epik someday, as they do seem to be the "latest craze," but the thought of investing that much up front for very little guaranteed return is scary. Don't you guys see how much of a racket this could be for them? Imagine how much they're making off those thousands of customers. It's wild.

 

[dmyre]

I just rediscovered WhyPark.com, and noticed that they added domain apps. By doing so, you can have a directory, you tube videos, local business directory, band bios, embedded on your site. Although I just discovered it again, I have been playing around with it tonight, and am very impressed.

I don't see any need to pay someone hundreds of dollars to receive "half" of the revenue.

 

[liquidcherry]

Have You Had an Epik Experience Yet ?

This morning i woke up with a wonderful ** from my wife, now that was EPIC!! LOL

Look, I have maybe 400 domain names, dozens of which I maintain on my own, updating, optimizing, etc. My issue is time. There are several people saying, heck just develop this or develop that, you don't need them, but it comes back to time. Right now I have 4 product domains with them as a test, and one portal, about a $2K investment. Six months from now, I will have an idea as to whether or not the services they provide are worth it. Frankly, though, the product domains they are developing for me have been sitting in my portfolio for years, unused, undeveloped other than a parking page that brought in squat. So 50 percent of something looks better than 100 percent of nothing, imo.

Rogue, have you looked into noomle?

It takes some time to learn the system(but there is a ton of help in the support forums) but once you get the hang of it it is pretty easy and fast to get a domain up and running.

Cheers

Liquid

 

[mwzd]

I haven't used Epik's platform, but I'm skeptical about anyone asking for a setup fee + content charges (monthly recurring) and a 50% revenue share.

And you have to spend on off site seo after that?

Consider someone with 100 domains - that's $600 x 100 = $60k + renewal fees + promotion fees and then you only get 50% of the revenue? Now consider someone with 1k domains.

What exactly is the advantage here?

You can build a website for less than what they want for single point solutions for sure. Or outsource the construction, if that's your thing.

Plus you have 100s of 'website builder' services you could do this at, for considerably less too.

I'm sure Epik will make a ton of cash with this, but will the domain owners?

 

[harkster]

I haven't used Epik's platform, but I'm skeptical about anyone asking for a setup fee + content charges (monthly recurring) and a 50% revenue share.

And you have to spend on off site seo after that?

Consider someone with 100 domains - that's $600 x 100 = $60k + renewal fees + promotion fees and then you only get 50% of the revenue? Now consider someone with 1k domains.

What exactly is the advantage here?

You can build a website for less than what they want for single point solutions for sure. Or outsource the construction, if that's your thing.

Plus you have 100s of 'website builder' services you could do this at, for considerably less too.

I'm sure Epik will make a ton of cash with this, but will the domain owners?

Very well put. I have read this whole thread today. After spending quite a while looking at the site I have the impression that this service is not much more than the latest incarnation of the 'give us some $$$ and we will fill your pockets with cash' mini-site builders.

Now their Amazon store and local directory design is nice but unless you have that 'niche buster' name (in which case you likely don't need them) it is a crap shoot.

My $0.02

 

[liquidcherry]

Now their Amazon store and local directory design is nice but unless you have that 'niche buster' name (in which case you likely don't need them) it is a crap shoot.

My $0.02

And yet again i have to advertise Noomle, these features you have there and more(you can include a free forum as well), try it and you will be amazed...

Cheers

Liquid