usually if you google "godaddy promo" godaddy themselves offer .99 .com's all the time, I have never paid more than $1.17 for a domain, but you have to use a CC to get the promo, paypal wont work.
Plus I use weebly to make my websites, its free and super easy to use.
here is one of my many sites that I play with, pmjokes.com , I have a whole $1 invested in it.
edit:
Just googled it, currently godaddy isnt offering .99 domains, but as I said, they do it all the time.
But there is other coupon codes listed on fatwallet etc sites.
What I do, is sometimes when i am bored, I will google it and if godaddy is offering the 99 cent domain offer, I will then research a niche idea and then buy a domain for it and play around.
Note, if and when you do get the godaddy promo, upon buying your domain, it will auto set payment for 2 years, so you have to change that to one year, or you will have to pay regular price for the second year.