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:

 

[Erdy]

Hi,

I was browsing the epik website and somehow I went into a section that has a different top menu than the home page. It looks like there is more content available here. I don't know why they don't have the same menu on the home page.

You can see it here:
http://store.epik.com/

By the way, I think their $249 development price and 50/50 revenue share model is rubbish. I would expect to pay about $40 and get 90% revenue. Something like this would be acceptable.

They are doing many things correct but their prices are annoying. It makes them look like people who try to screw the newbie domainer.

For instance Godaddy screws naive people by charging them to park their domains. There is an another domainer forum that sells an overpriced ebook promising to explain secrets on how to turn a $9 reg fee into a $900 domain sale and how this is better than a 9 to 5 job.

I put Epik in the same category with these. I really don't like this kind of business practice that is trying to profit from selling dreams. I have a moral problem with this. This is wrong and it is also unsustainable.

It is a shame because the Epik team seems to do many things right. They have the technical knowledge. However their business practice is too short sighted.

 

[mwzd]

Epik product sites have been dropped from the search results by goog, people will have you think it doesn't matter, but think again.

http://domainnamewire.com/2010/10/28/epik-will-be-ok-and-current-customers-will-win-big-tomorrow/

What's even more interesting is that people assume throwing money at the problem will make it go away, if only it was that simple.

 

[Domo Sapiens]

Not a suprise at all.
Mini-crappie-cookiecutter-sites are the Antithesis of what Google is "suppose" to be all about, quality relevant content.
There is strong pressure from Bing, it seems to me this is a well concerted move by almighty Google in an efort to go back to fundamentals , I even think the new Sedo parking Stats system move might be correlated.
Give it a few days before the whinning starts...

So far I heard of 2 different Minisite providers taken down...

I WPonder who is Next?

 

[robmonster]

Here is some perspective on what we are doing on the Epik side:

First, what happened? A percentage of the sites were de-indexed. Although the traffic hit was 25% versus the day before, we were still on par with where we were 30 days ago. Sure, this was a setback, but not the end of the world. We are in contact with Google to discuss this action and request a policy-level review in the context of Epik's plans for product sites. In parallel, we are taking a number of specific actions on the operating side:

- Content: The single largest action we are taking is to upgrade Product Portals to full eCommerce. A product portal normally costs $249. Full eCommerce normally costs $2500. The difference is night and day in terms of (1) ability to monetize traffic, (2) ratio of in-links to out-links, and (3) feature set for running an entire online business. While it was always our plan to roll out cost-effective eCommerce, we expected to do this in 2011. The move by Google has caused us to accelerate that existing plan.

- SEO: Some of our Developers have used paid links. We will be asking Developers to cease use of paid links for the foreseeable future. While we cannot complete stop individual Developers from taking their own initiative with SEO, this action by Google overwhelmingly targeted sites that had used one particular SEO provider, SubmitEdge.com. We are also working with SubmitEdge to have links removed and they have agreed to comply.

A few take-aways:

- Epik is building real businesses. We start with a simple site, and then upgrades. We had some high profile sites that were already on the way to full eCommerce but did not switch over soon enough. While we have been transparent about our plans, it is clear that we have reached a size that we need to proactively manage the dialog with Google.

- Google is important. There is no debate here. However, the most successful eCommerce companies do not rely on Google to execute their plans. At $0.18 per click, it is impossible to invest heavily in brand development or to buy media. With full eCommmerce, those options become viable. The Product Portals are what allow us to learn what the market wants before investing in supply chain development.

- Epik is a well-run company with talented people. We have sufficient resources to help owners to be successful with their Epik-powered sites. While Domain Development is not easy, I still put Epik's prospects at getting this right as good as anyone else.

And finally, Epik's pace of innovation will not be slowing down. During Q4, we will be rolling out the fastest pace of innovation in the history of the company, including Video Portals, Job Portals, Recipe Portals in addition to continuing to grow Epik Stores and Epik Directory.

Onwards!

 

[enlytend]

Doesn't surprise me either - the product sites I saw were about as "thin affiliate" as it gets. And all the links were from other sites in the network - Google calls that a "link farm."

 

[Miguelcp]

ParkingMinisite
Epik
.....
WhyPark Wins "Best New Monetizing Solution" at T.R.A.F.F.I.C. Miami :
T.R.A.F.F.I.C. Miami was a great conference on its own, but we enjoyed it even more after receiving the "Best New Monetizing Solution" award. We're honored and thankful that our peers voted for us and thanks to Rick and Howard for putting on a great show. It's always nice to meet new customers in person and spend time with existing customers.
:O

 

[TheBaldOne]

I am in shut-down mode at the moment, not posting on any forum/etc., this is self-imposed whilst I am developing a project. This news though about Google actions against Epik developed sites and the reactions by some to it means I have to pass comment.

I have talked to Rob prior to this Google delisting episode, and Epik is now working on well over 500 sites for me, a number that I foresee only growing in the near future. Undoubtedly, this action by Google will no doubt be blown out of proportion by some, but I for one have confidence in the future with Epik and Rob.

My advice would be to calm down and await reports from Rob and his team, Epik have been absolutely as transparent as possible in the past and I see no reason to suspect they will be anything but so in the future.

One last word. For those that think they are only paying for a site development with Epik please re-read what you actually get, the most important thing is contining work on your site to make it ever more attractive. Remember if your site does not make money then neither does Epik!

 

[silentg]

How come this isn't posted on your own blog?

Here is some perspective on what we are doing on the Epik side:

First, what happened? A percentage of the sites were de-indexed. Although the traffic hit was 25% versus the day before, we were still on par with where we were 30 days ago. Sure, this was a setback, but not the end of the world. We are in contact with Google to discuss this action and request a policy-level review in the context of Epik's plans for product sites. In parallel, we are taking a number of specific actions on the operating side:

- Content: The single largest action we are taking is to upgrade Product Portals to full eCommerce. A product portal normally costs $249. Full eCommerce normally costs $2500. The difference is night and day in terms of (1) ability to monetize traffic, (2) ratio of in-links to out-links, and (3) feature set for running an entire online business. While it was always our plan to roll out cost-effective eCommerce, we expected to do this in 2011. The move by Google has caused us to accelerate that existing plan.

- SEO: Some of our Developers have used paid links. We will be asking Developers to cease use of paid links for the foreseeable future. While we cannot complete stop individual Developers from taking their own initiative with SEO, this action by Google overwhelmingly targeted sites that had used one particular SEO provider, SubmitEdge.com. We are also working with SubmitEdge to have links removed and they have agreed to comply.

A few take-aways:

- Epik is building real businesses. We start with a simple site, and then upgrades. We had some high profile sites that were already on the way to full eCommerce but did not switch over soon enough. While we have been transparent about our plans, it is clear that we have reached a size that we need to proactively manage the dialog with Google.

- Google is important. There is no debate here. However, the most successful eCommerce companies do not rely on Google to execute their plans. At $0.18 per click, it is impossible to invest heavily in brand development or to buy media. With full eCommmerce, those options become viable. The Product Portals are what allow us to learn what the market wants before investing in supply chain development.

- Epik is a well-run company with talented people. We have sufficient resources to help owners to be successful with their Epik-powered sites. While Domain Development is not easy, I still put Epik's prospects at getting this right as good as anyone else.

And finally, Epik's pace of innovation will not be slowing down. During Q4, we will be rolling out the fastest pace of innovation in the history of the company, including Video Portals, Job Portals, Recipe Portals in addition to continuing to grow Epik Stores and Epik Directory.

Onwards!

 

[snoop]

Remember if your site does not make money then neither does Epik!

That isn't true, they charge an upfront $249.

---------- Post added at 03:23 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:16 PM ----------

Personally I think Google is going to be on their tail for a long time to come, just look at Epik's products pages,

eg, the $199/month package called "content support"

Base Package plus
5 articles/news items/blog posts a month (per site)
50 forum posts a month per site
10 videos a month per site
2 free banner ad placements per month within the Epik Network
5 reviews a month per site

Google doesn't want bogus forum posts, fake reviews and blog posts written only for SEO in their index. They aren't going to "work with Epik".

 

[TheBaldOne]

Snoop, but then they carry on working on the site, so as to get it indexed higher! Now a hiccup has occured and Rob and his team will be working to resolve it. The work carried out after the site is live means that unless the site is making money they will not earn any revenue.

As I said above, let us keep calm and see what the next few days brings. In my opinion I would rather have a cool head and make decissions when facts are known rather than make a knee jerk reaction when the situation does not require one, though obviously some may disagree with this.

 

[snoop]

In my opinion I would rather have a cool head and make decissions when facts are known rather than make a knee jerk reaction when the situation does not require one, though obviously some may disagree with this.

Not sure what you mean, what knee jerk decisions are people making?

Some people are simply saying the system is flawed, that has been getting more obvious over the last few weeks with the stats release showing most sites aren't really making any ROI and now this de-indexation of many sites.

 

[has2hands]

Content: The single largest action we are taking is to upgrade Product Portals to full eCommerce. A product portal normally costs $249. Full eCommerce normally costs $2500.

You have to love this statement...I only have a few sites but that is exciting!

 

[DnEbook]

Content: The single largest action we are taking is to upgrade Product Portals to full eCommerce. A product portal normally costs $249. Full eCommerce normally costs $2500.

You have to love this statement...I only have a few sites but that is exciting!

You will only get that if your sites were deindexed where as my sites have actually been indexed by google. yahoo and bing with about six weeks or less , i have done a few articles and tried to find some good links along the way.

So the recent changes don't seem to have affected me , although being honest i could not see myself paying two and half grand for a ecomerce site ?

My latest domain regs/purchases have been aimed at having more stores so i will be watching on with interest i guess

I am wondering if there is a tool that i can use to keep an eye on my rankings , i dont meant page rank but more to where i stand in google , example if i am 10009 for the my site i would like to see where it moves to? up or down ?

Can anyone help with this ??

 

[mike031]

Epik sucks... BIG TIME

 

[DnEbook]

Epik sucks... BIG TIME

very constructive imput , thanks for your sheep like comments

 

[bluesinjid]

I guess there are 2 good things in this mess for epik customers ( I am not one). Their rankings in bing dont seem to be affected, which is a good thing, and also they will have a chance to get a free ecommerce site.

Seems like a trade off by sacrificing google for getting search from bing, a "$2000" upgrade.

 

[snoop]

Seems like a trade off by sacrificing google for getting search from bing, a "$2000" upgrade.

You just said yourself Bind rankings don't seem to have changed, so how is this latest news a tradeoff between Google and Bing traffic?

Secondly, unless the keyword is massive getting ranked in Bing means very little.

 

[DnEbook]

can anyone confirm they have earned EPC with epik as this part of reporting now seems to be gone from the stats reporting ?

love to know thanks

 

[TheBaldOne]

Just thought I would post this little nugget of info.

IceCreamMaker.com back at No.1 slot on Google

http://domainnamewire.com/2010/11/05/epiks-icecreammaker-com-back-at-top-spot-on-google/

 

[DnEbook]

Decide to add www.sexybikinis.net to my other two epik sites , articles written, keywords added and pictures included in articles should help it plus i will also promote it on www.bikinis.tv

 

[randomo]

Hmmm ... my Epik earnings have really flattened out over the past month or two. One of my New Year resolutions is to add some of my own content to my Epik sites, to see if that helps with rankings; at this moment, it looks like the sites won't get far without that type of boost.

I don't have my Epik stats from last week. For some reason, the weekly reports always arrive in my spam folder (even though I've whitelisted the address they come from) - and the guy who sends them has ignored multiple requests to change my email address. Sigh.

I'm eager to see what further developments Epik will add; but overall, my experience is still in the "promising" stage, not yet at a really successful level.

 

[DnEbook]

i have done at least three articles for each site , on the downside two weeks after my sexybikinis.net site ...........there is still no logo after three requests

Hey i have paid you EPIK for a service WHERE"S MY LOGO ?????

 

[Erdy]

evirtual1, so you paid $249 for sexybikinis.net development. How long ago was that? How much money did you make so far? How about your other sites. Does any of them make money?

On average I'm making about $1500 a month from domain sales. However it is hard work. I spend at least 6 hours a day searching for domains. I would very much prefer having 150 small sites making $10 each a month.

I'm starting thinking that building a big portfolio of thousands of domains is harder than a smaller portfolio of money making websites.

However I have no experiment with money making sites. I find it very difficult. Does anybody here have any suggestions? Does this epik thing work for you? Do you suggest some affiliate sites instead. It looks like there is more competition in the affiliate site market.

Any suggestions are welcome regarding changing your business model from flipping domains to making money through affiliate sites.

Is there a place where I could buy sites that make between $10 to $50 a month? What would be the multiplier to calculate the price of such sites? I have seen people selling them for 24 months profit. Is this the industry standard? Where do I find such sites?

 

[DnEbook]

Well my sites are only few months old and i am still doing the articles and seo when i can , i believe that parking is dying and that i should try to diversify a little , i go with the attitude i have the rest of my life so if not making a fortune in a month not too fussed , income would be better than money term deposit in the bank at this point.

http://stores.epik.com/ is a place you can at least get an idea

Not all my product names are epik sites (only three) white-dress/com black-dress/com and sexybikinis.net

I think you can build on your domain as an asset it is better than idle parking , i think over time i will get a return and then profit , i also like that i can write articles and add to the content of the site, plus write my own meta description and keywords

I am trying to have a few stores for my www.bikinis.tv blog , i do plan to have cheapsunglasses/me as a store for my blogs as well , so the hope is the sites do ok by themselves plus i have them as links on my sites

 

[RevolutionaryDomains]

Quick question for you both. Do you feel domain parking is starting to taper off due to the generic templates and generic looking content perhaps driving people away, or is it for completely different reasons?

Though I am considering it, I have been hesitant to go the route of parking due to how silly and cheap they all tend to look. Surely parking companies do not actually believe the people surfing the net for specific products can't tell the difference between a real site from a parked site, can they? Or am I way off base here?


-Regards