I think there are really two different kinds of mini sites. "Company" style mini sites and "Domainer" style mini sites.
1.) Company style mini sites I think are the real mini sites. They are Short and to the point about what they want to get across.
This normally includes a Coupon, with a sign up box (name, email) to get more coupons. Some catchy images and maybe a link or two to get to other sites they may own.
Example: MoveFreely.com (sorry guy’s, it’s just one I remember off the top of my head)
I have never built one, but I would bet they are pretty effective. People get to save money via a coupon, the company sells product and can also gain a customer mailing list if the name / email address sign-up method is used. Pretty low cost in building the site.
You can get customers to come back with "New Coupons" or "New Products" with little change to the site or domain (in most cases).
2.) Domainer style mini sites IMO are a way for a domainer to feel "productive" or to continue on "hope" to make money online with PPC ads (Adsense). They can also be used to get the domain indexed and or rank better in search engines for certain keyword phrases which raises the value of a domain name.
The biggest problem I see with these sites are they are One Hit Wonders. It’s likely that when somebody goes to them, they will not go back. It’s kind of like starting a blog, doing 5 posts about whatever and not writing again.
The majority of Domainer Mini Sites never get updated with new content after being built or do not have anything that really would make somebody come back or tell others about it.
Example: ShedsForSale.com (Done by AEIOU.com)
First, I just picked a Mini Site provider off the top of my head and picked a random domain mentioned on it’s site.
In this example, the header picture is a Barn, not a shed (to me at least). Not a single shed is for sale on the site and it’s loaded with ads which would make me click out right away personally.
The site does currently rank #4 on Google.com for the exact match search (sheds for sale), but ShedsForSale.net ranks # 1 and is a Full Site. Sheds.com ranks # 2, so both of these sites likely get most of the clicks.
The biggest problem I see and why I do not like "Domainer Mini Sites" is because there is nothing really to bring back a user. If the content is Really Good, they may come back but not all that likely. This in return only give you one chance to get a user to click on an ad to make money.
Now the same could be said about Domain Parking, but for some unknown reason, I have better luck with a parking page, then with any mini site I have put up.
The biggest plus about a Domainer Mini Site, is the SERP’s gained, but many domainers miss that point as a Sales Pitch.
Overall, I still think domain parking is still currently the best thing to do with a large amount of domain names. I personally think any site needs to be at least a little interactive with the user. Have auto updating features (not really content, but things like Google Trends or unique stats etc).
If you really think about it, the most popular sites are on Auto Pilot and or are user content created. Search Engines, Forums, Social Networking.
For the same cost of a mini site, I think domain owners can get more creative and come up with a tool, game, widget, service etc working with a developer that runs on auto mode and has the CHANCE to get very popular or grow. Is this for a mass amount of domains, no, but if it becomes popular it will make more then 99% of any Domainer mini site.
Cathy
Interesting take.. I find it also interesting that your example site shedsforsale.com is built around a wordpress blog.
Troy
“and it’s loaded with ads which would make me click out right away personally.”
Isn’t that the point with a mini site? Get traffic through direct navigation, backlinks and search engines, then motivate people to click out of the site? How do you make money with adsense if people aren’t “clicking out”.
Troy
Sammy Ashouri
@ Cathy: A lot of mini-sites are being built with WordPress these days. I’ve had my try, but I normally always end up sending to parking. SERP value is always great, but in the end… I’d rather have more $$$ than traffic, and with a majority of the sites I’ve built, that has been the case.
Still, I always give different domains a try to see what brings in the most amount of cash.
Jamie Zoch
@ Cathy
I think it’s why the site ranks so well also. WP is one powerful tool and is SEO slick!
@Troy
I meant click out as use the back arrow, not ads. I think most net users know those are ads used with adsense like displayed on ShedsForSale.com .
Leonard Britt
Yes, a one-page minisite is no better than a parked page for revenue purposes because the CTR on minisites is usually much lower than for parked pages. And yet a minisite is not much more likely to generate a repeat visitor or referral than a parked page. On the other hand the positioning of a minisite by search engines and additional traffic of a site with backlinks is likely worth more to an end user than a parked domain which the search engines hate. The nice thing with a good domain is you have different options for monetization.
Jason
All these minisite blog posts have finally motivated me to… NOT create a minisite. Totally agree on your #2 about them making domainers feel some-how productive; it’s a fantasy.
You’ve gotta get your hands dirty with real merchants and affiliate programs — get closer to the money! By all means, get good keywords on to your webpage, but you’ve also got to bring value to the table and/or good copy sending clicks to actual businesses.