What is it exactly?

What is direct navigation in laymens terms? Basically it’s whenever you (or someone) visits a website by typing the URL address directly into a browsers address bar. This happens way more often than you might think. Even more specifically is something called Type-In Traffic which takes this direct navigation method one step further. It’s when someone types in a keyword followed by a TLD (such as .com) in their address bar rather than searching that keyword in a search engine.

What are the Stats?

According to a UCLA study entitled “Analysis of User Web Traffic with a Focus of Web Activities“, 86% of online consumers reach websites through direct navigation. This essentially means that web users access websites in 1 of 3 ways a majority of the time:

1. Through a bookmark
2. By typing in a domain
3. By typing in a keyword with a TLD appended (eg. widgets.com)

Another compelling statistic comes from the a study in 2005 by WebSideStory Inc. The study showed that Internet traffic from direct navigation converted into sales for advertisers at a staggering 4.23% of all total visits compared to 2.3% from search engines. This is crazy! This study showed that conversion rates nearly double when coming from Direct Navigation. And to top it all off, many domain experts are showing increased traffic numbers in their direct navigation efforts year after year showing that Direct Navigation apparently isn’t going away.

More Traffic + Higher Conversion Rates = Direct Navigation

At least that’s how it is from an Advertisers perspective. But what about the end user?

From An End Users Perspective

Direct Navigation has everything to do with the end user knowing exactly what he/she wants. The end user is not looking to “search” for something becauses he/she already has found what they want, and is simply going directly back to where it is they want to be. Type-in traffic lessens that just a little bit, since the user is typing in a keyword followed by a TLD (.com, .org etc.) which implies the end user is still searching for something.

From this perspective you can see why this kind of traffic converts so well. So for example let’s say you were the owner of Amazon.com. Which let’s be honest if you actually did you probably wouldn’t be reading this article. But if you did own Amazon.com, purchasing every possible misspelling variation of your brand would be a very good idea. Your ROI would be very positive on these domain purchases because they would be attracting visitors who are actually really wanting to come back to your website.

What This Means for Advertisers

OMG This Traffic is Cheap!

Let’s think about this for a moment. You go to a domain registrar like Namecheap and you spend $10 or so on a domain name. Now lets be super conservative and say that domain generates 5 direct navigation visits per month. That’s 60 visits over the course of a year. That traffic converts at the direct navigation standard of 4.23% and you end up getting 2.5 conversions per year, per domain. Your marketing ROI on that 1 domain purchase is outstanding!!!

Now you can see from an Internet marketing perspective why buying large amounts of high quality domain names is so important. The cost for a good domain name is so cheap, and the return on the investment is often times so high. This is assuming of course that you buy the right domain name. which is a whole science in and of itself.

Bypassing the Search Engine(s)

In theory, Direct Navigation is a form of organic traffic that is not dependent on search engines. For example if Google decides to change it’s search algorithm again (which they do quite often) you are not at all affected by it. Now don’t get me wrong. Obtaining short and long tail SERPs in Google and other search engines is still the most important source of traffic. But direct navigation as a traffic source gives you some good solid diversification in your traffic building efforts, and a traffic source that you have much more control over.

Another Organic Approach to Internet Marketing

Similar to the organic nature of SERPs (search engine ranking placements), Direct Navigation is also a type of organic traffic. Once you own a domain name it’s yours assuming you continue to renew it year after year. All type-in traffic directly to that domain is free from there on out. And it’s not controlled by a 3rd party search engine algorithm like Google or Bing. Needless to say Organic traffic is always better than Paid traffic. That is why Direct Navigation should be added to any company or individuals organic traffic strategy.

The Ugly Side of Direct Navigation = Parked Pages

Just like with most things in Internet Marketing there is an ugly side to Direct Navigation. This monster rears its head in the form of domainers 1) capitalizing off other peoples brands/trademarks and 2) the use of the parked page. You know what a parked page looks like right? Chances are you have ran into tons of these…

These parked pages really don’t help people find what they are looking for. All they really do is present the end user with paid contextual ads that are sort of relevant in some cases. From there the end user is almost forced into clicking on one of these paid ads which of course makes the domain owner some cash. At the end of it all the end user ends up not getting to where they intended, and feels the frustration that usually comes from spamming.

The Bright Future of Direct Navigation for Internet Marketers = Redirects!

In my opinion the bright future of direct navigation for Internet Marketers lies in the “Redirect”. What do I mean by this? Instead of ugly ridiculous parked pages, these same domains can be used to redirect (301, 302 etc.) to high quality websites, blogs, landing pages etc. What are the benefits of this you ask?

1. For the Advertiser – instead of having to pay for 1 spot out of many on a contextual ad on a parked page, the advertiser can pay a domain owner for a redirect that redirects the user directly to the advertisers website. This will mean more exposure and more conversions. Something that makes every Internet marketer excited.

2. For the Domain Owner – a change from a CPC to a CPV. The Domain Owner can now get paid per redirect (CPV) rather than per click on a contextual ad on that ugly parked page. This simple difference means double the income for the domain owner. Not to mention the fact that Google continues to lower its payouts on its Google Adsense platform.

3. For the End User – rather than being presented with a stupid parked page that does absolutely nothing for them, the end user is now redirected to a destination where they can at least make a logical decision and be presented with some good information.

More and more domainers are turning to this CPV or Redirect method as opposed to parked pages because of all 3 of these reasons. Companies like Trellian and Elephant Traffic are spearheading this type of new Internet Marketing method and both companies are doing really well from it.

What This Means for Everybody Involved

The World of Internet Real Estate

Domain names are a form of modern day real estate. They are also one of the more pure and consistent forms of traffic. Owning a domain name that gets type-in traffic is the only Traffic Source you can actually ever own yourself. Having a personal or company asset that also gives you traffic at the same time is a huge double bonus! It’s still the Wild Wild West in the domain world. The more real estate you own the better. And all parties involved, both companies and individuals are constantly making more domain purchases to “get the gold” that’s over ‘them mountains’.

Brand & Trademark Infringement

Companies and brands (including self brands) need to buy up as many variations of their brand as possible and they need to do this as quickly as possible. Typos and Mispells of brands are among the most popular and valuable domains on the web. On the flip side, domainers need to be extremely careful and cautious in the purchasing of domain names that include brands/trademarks of other companies and brands outside of their own. The keyword domains however are anybodies ball game.

Direct Navigation & Affiliate Marketing

In my opinion, companies should allow affiliate marketers to purchases domains with their brands in them. Why do I feel this way? Because of two main reasons:

1. The affiliate marketer is already pitching a brands product or service which puts the affiliate marketer in a position to deliver the right content to the end user.
2. Most brands do not and cannot completely cover their brand across every domain name possibility. There are simply too many typos, mispellings, and keyword combinations with 1 single brand for one company to control. It’s a control issue that is simply too broad and should be trusted with partnerships and affiliates.

Having said that, it is in some company strategies to own all domain name variations of their brand. This is a good thing. But for everyone else, affiliates can do you a huge favor by snagging up domain names with your brand and putting your offers on those domains before a competitor does!

3 Steps to Help You Increase Direct Navigation Traffic

Here are 3 simple activities that people are doing to increase their direct navigation traffic…

1. Buy mispellings and typos of YOUR brand
2. Buy keyword domains for keywords relevant to your niche or industry
3. Purchase redirect traffic from other Domain Owners

Note: one great method you can use to find domains with potential type-in traffic is do use the Google Keyword Tool, export that list and append a .com, .org, or .net to the end of each keyword. Then bulk check to see which are available for purchase.

How Do I Get Domains That Have Type-In Traffic?

1. Purchase brand new, unregistered domains – I personally prefer using NameCheap for purchasing new domains. I wrote here why I use NameCheap rather than GoDaddy. Search for mispellings or use the Google Keyword Tool Method that I wrote about here.

2. Purchase aftermarket domains – Snapnames and NameJet are services that allows you to purchase domains immediately after they dropped. This is one of the best ways to purchase a super high quality domain at a low cost. I personally use Snapnames.

3. Purchase premium domains – if you have a bigger bank account you can think about purchasing more premium domains. For example instead of going after all the smaller domains like cheapenergydrink.com you may want to spend more money and go after energydrink.com. Sedo.com, Moniker.com, and BuyDomains.com are just a few of the companies who either own or have direct access to selling you these high quality domains. Premium domains can range anywhere from $500 to $100,000 per domain depending on how “premium” you want to go.

4. Purchase redirect traffic from domains – Elephant Traffic is a company that acts as a middleman between you and individual domain owners. They provide you with redirect access to thousands of domains in your industry/niche where you pay on a CPV basis the traffic from those domains. CPV costs range anywhere from $0.05 to $1.00 per redirect.

View Your Direct Navigation Traffic Stats in Google Analytics

Viewing your direct navigation stats in Google Analytics is actually very very easy. Once logged into Google Analytics and after you have selected your profile that you want to look at go to Traffic Sources >> Direct Traffic. There you will see all the data on your direct navigation traffic. From there what I would also recommend doing is clicking the little “Add to Dashboard” button near the top to add that report to your analytics dashboard.

Remember Your Moral Obligation

Don’t be a spammer! Just as Google likes to say “do no evil!” The same applies to you. Whether you are an advertiser, or the owner of the domain it is your obligation to help deliver quality content to the end user. You have to constantly ask yourself the question “is this what the user is looking for?” If you can honestly and accurately answer yes to this question, you are going to have great success long term with your domains and/or your direct navigation traffic!

A Quick Case Study

Using my NameCheap domain account I purchased 3 domains to see why kind of traffic I could generate. I spent $10 per domain. The first domain was a keyphrase turned into a .com domain KobeBryantBiography.com and I redirected it to my blog Bestplayerontheplanet.com. The other two were mispells of popular brands. The first being in the Web Hosting industry and the other in the Home Alarm industry. In the first 30 days here are the stats…

I spent a total of $30 on all 3 domains. I was able to generate 1 affiliate sale through one of my Web Hosting partnerships that generated a total of $97 for me. Giving me a net profit of $67. Not too shabby. It was clear that the mispellings of brands returned way more traffic than the keyphrase domain. But you can see that these domains were all able to generate type-in direct navigation traffic on their own without me having to do anything. All I did was purchase the domains and setup 301 redirects for them to the site I wanted them to go to.