Edwin

I hope nobody minds, but I decided to kick off a version of the contest that was suggested and debated on the thread below. I am not in any way claiming this to be "my" idea, I'm just conscious that sometimes it's better to get started rather than waiting and seeing what happens:
http://www.acorndomains.co.uk/compet...ed-domain.html

To make things a little more fun, I will put up 2x £50 Amazon.co.uk tokens as prizes. These will be awarded as follows:-
1. To the most "commercially successful" site

2. To the most thorough and informative/educational writeup of the development, promotion and monetisation process

In other words, you can win one of the prizes if you're willing to share decent progress reports along the way, even if your site does not end up setting the world on fire as much as others did.

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THE RULES
1. The domain name must be registered on/before September 4, 2011 and can be of any "age".

2. The domain name must not have had a previous site on it (or at least no site newer than 2000 as per Archive.org). A parking page or domain for sale page, or similar "coming soon" placeholder, doesn't count as a "previous site" but a mini-site does.

3. You can do any kind of development you like, but if you have to pay for anything that has to be counted against the total commercial viability of the project (i.e. if you spend £1,000 on a database driven site, it's at -£1,000 for the purposes of the contest)

4. You can do any kind of promotion you like, but if you have to pay for anything that has to be counted against the total commercial viability of the project

5. Hosting costs do NOT count. ALL other costs do.

6. You can monetise the domain in any way you like except for selling ad space/sponsorships to other companies you control or have a significant interest in

7. You must start a thread in this forum to track your progress before September 10th at midnight (the domain has to be registered before September 4th). That thread should be titled "DEV CONTEST 2011: blahblahblah" where blahblahblah is the domain name (plus a brief description if you like). There is no obligation to specify the full domain name in the post if you don't want it spidered yet, i.e. you can split the "keyphrase" and the "extension", so long as it is crystal clear what domain name is being referred to. The intention is that you can then use your thread to post progress reports in.

8. This contest will run until December 31st, 2011 at midnight for the purposes of calculating traffic and earnings. Writeups will be accepted until January 15, 2012.

These rules may be tweaked if problems are pointed out with them, but the intent is to make this fun, friendly, interesting and educational, rather than a bloodthirsty battle. Any revisions must be in this spirit and should not materially affect the challenge. Likewise, attempts to find "loopholes" in the above should, hopefully, be seen for what they are.

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Please note: All sale prices over a week old are automatically invalid. No exceptions. Thanks!

Ashton

In, will find a suitable domain.

Whibs

Count me in

Blossom

I'm in too, thanks for kick starting this Edwin.

I don't want to be nit picky, but are reg/buying costs counted as hosting costs?

boxfish

Nice one Edwin for getting something started.

I'm in, here is my entry

newpbc

I'm in just need to check a few of my to develop pile for previous sites

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Edwin

I'm in two minds about this, and I'd welcome more input.

Here's why:-

On the one hand, clearly a great domain name (that might have cost thousands) is a potentially much stronger foundation for a site than a free to reg.

On the other hand, at least part of the competition is intended to showcase what can be done with a domain name AND development. As such, if somebody takes a strong generic and builds a strong site on it (and documents everything) that's a clear, incontrovertible statement that 2+2>4 for the right domain.

My instinct is towards allowing complete freedom as to the process by which the domain was acquired, but perhaps with a note in the relevant thread if a significant cost was involved. But as I said, I'm very open to alternatives.

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Memorable Domains Ltd - Over 7,000 descriptive, generic .co.uk domains for sale
Please note: All sale prices over a week old are automatically invalid. No exceptions. Thanks!

Alien

I'm in on this hopefully - can the domain be shamelessly promoted from existing sites owned or managed? I guess this is the case, but wanted to be sure.

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Edwin

Yes, as long as you explain what you do. You don't have to detail every single link from every single page, of course, but I think it's only fair if you're going to lift yourself by your own bootstraps if you mention it when analysing the efficiency of your promotional efforts (e.g. "I added links to 3 pages of the new site on a couple of busy blogs I manage" or something like that).

__________________
Memorable Domains Ltd - Over 7,000 descriptive, generic .co.uk domains for sale
Please note: All sale prices over a week old are automatically invalid. No exceptions. Thanks!

Alien

OK dokey - sounds fair enough.