Walkthrough: How to Use Carrd As a Domain Landing Page

Recently, domain investor Bar Franek revealed on Twitter that he closed a $150,000 domain name sale. Although Bar didn’t tweet the domain name in question, he did reveal that the initial inquiry that lead to the six-figure sale came via a custom Carrd landing page.

my 3 largest domain sales (and top declined offer which would've been my best domain sale) have come from simple https://t.co/KuYpTsc6o2 landers, not "for sale pages"

there's a lesson in there

few

— barman (@ppcbz) April 20, 2021

DomainInvesting.com publisher Elliot Silver also shared his use of Carrd for a selection of his company’s top domains. What is Carrd, and why are domain investors using the service?

Carrd, operating on Carrd.co (referral link), is a platform for designing and publishing simple, responsive landing pages. The service isn’t built for domain name investors specifically, but domainers are making use of Carrd.

 

How Much Is Carrd?

Carrd is free, but free usage is limited. Fortunately, Carrd’s Pro version isn’t too expensive. For $9 per year, you can host 3 Carrd sites. Importantly, a Pro subscription allows you to host a Carrd landing page on a custom domain name, rather than a Carrd.co URL. Carrd’s Pro subscription price increases if you want to host a higher number of landing pages. At the most, Carrd Pro allows 500 hosted landing pages at a cost of $469 per year.

 

Creating a Carrd Landing Page

To create a Carrd landing page, follow these steps. I’m using a Carrd Pro subscription here.

 

Step 1

Navigate to https://carrd.co/dashboard and click on the “New Site” button:

Step 2

Choose a page design. Hover over the design that you want to use, and click “Select”:

Step 3

Design your page. Carrd uses a WYSIWYG design platform, so what you’re editing will look identical to the eventual live version. Each element can be edited, deleted, or moved by clicking on that element. If you need an image for your landing page, you could use a free image source such as Unsplash. Image areas are usually designated using a cross, which you can click on to make changes:

What do you put on your landing page? That’s entirely up to you. Some domain investors type the domain name (Example.com) plus an email address (info@example.com) and do not explicitly say that the domain is for sale. Others link directly to a marketplace listing. Test what works best for your domain names.

 

Step 4

Once you have perfected your design, click on the “Save” button:

 

Step 5

A box will appear titled “Publish.” Enter your site title (this could be your domain name) and a description.

 

Step 6

This is the important bit. Scroll down to “Action,” and click on “Publish to a custom domain.” This is only available with a Carrd Pro membership.

 

Step 7

Enter your domain name in the box provided:

 

Step 8

You’ll see a box containing two “A records” and a “CNAME” record. These will be needed to allow your domain name to host the Carrd landing page.

 

Step 9

In a new browser window, head to the registrar where your domain name is registered, and enter the two A records and the CNAME record. Each registrar should have instructions on how to do this. Here, for example, is a NameCheap knowledgebase article describing the process.

 

Step 10

Back in the Carrd.co window, click “Publish” and your domain’s landing page will go live. It may take an hour or two to display, depending on how quickly the A record and CNAME changes propagate.

 

You’ll then have a brand new domain landing page:

 

Adding Google Analytics

If you want to track visitors to your Carrd landing page, you can add a Google Analytics tag.

Step 1

Once you’ve published your site, go to https://carrd.co/dashboard and click on the settings cog wheel for your landing page, located in the bottom right-hand corner:

 

Step 2

A panel will appear. Click on “Settings” to access the landing page’s settings:

 

Step 3

Find the “Google Analytics” section and enter your domain’s Google Analytics ID. This can be found in Google Analytics once you set up your domain’s Google Analytics property.

 

Step 4

Click “Save Changes” to complete:

If Carrd isn’t for you, or you want more backend domain-specific features along with well-designed landing pages created specifically for domain owners, you can check out Efty.com. Efty recently announced a brokerage partnership with Saw.com, allowing inbound inquiries from your Efty landing pages to be assigned to a Saw.com broker.