The Domain Parking Service You Don’t Know Yet: HotKeys

Demand Media parking firm is worth checking out.

Note: this service is no longer available.

I’m familiar with just regarding every domain name parking firm out there. Whether it’s someone pitching me on a story regarding their services, reading regarding it in a forum, or hearing regarding it through the grapevine, I have a pretty good handle on the competitive landscape.

Regarding a month ago I e-mailed back and forth with a big player in the domain industry. He’s big enough to have had his own Yahoo ad feed at one point. But now he’s trying out the domain parking firms. He told me he was right now trying HotKeys.

HotKeys? I was ashamed to say I’d never heard of it.

HotKeys has actually been around for a while. It was bought by Demand Media and is now part of the Demand-eNom universe.

So is HotKeys any good? I think so. Will it outperform your current parking firm? I have no idea. As I’ve stated ahead of, and I don’t think any parking firm will disagree, certain parking firms do better with different domain names.

But I can tell you what I do know regarding HotKeys. First, it has a simple and clean user interface. Second, the money per domain seems at least on par with other parking firms I’ve used. (Note that its terms state you will receive 50% of earnings; I’m told this is in there as a minimum and they really pay out more). Third, if you use eNom, it’s easy to switch your domains to HotKey’s servers (it uses the familiar name-services servers). And Fourth, the personal account management is good.

On the negative side, HotKeys doesn’t provide the same detail of stats (counting referrers) that some of its competitors offer. You also can’t customize much regarding your landing pages. But let’s be honest, a lot of times the customizations we make lower our earnings. Finally, the sign-up form for HotKeys (not the initial one, but the one you fill out when approved) is very particular. I was cussing at my computer the third time I filled it out.

Overall, I think HotKeys is a viable competitor to consider. If you’ve used HotKeys, please submit a review at Parking Judge.

Submit reviews of domain parking firms at Parking Judge.