Hybrid Domainer

Quick Chat with Caroline Temple - Affiliate Marketing - Name.com

By: Raymond Hackney

Quick Chat with Caroline Temple

Today I am  chatting with Caroline Temple who is one of the nicest and smartest people you will meet in the domain industry.

Caroline heads up the Affiliate Marketing department at Name.com ( an advertiser on Hybrid Domainer).

I wanted Caroline to give us a look into the Name.com affiliate program and how domainers and webmasters alike, can earn money with the program.

1)Tell us a little bit about the Name.com affiliate program Caroline, things such as cookie life and the % affiliates can hope to earn with the Name.com affiliate program ?

Name.com affiliates enjoy a 30 day cookie life, 15% commission on most products, customizable reporting, monthly payments, and a real live human being for support.  That's the general rule, but we are starting to have fun with the program with unannounced bonuses and new offers.  For example, last month we ran a special bonus for our affiliates sending qualified traffic.  The goal was to reward and incentivize our affiliates for reaching new bench marks in the amount of conversions they received.  It was out of the blue and we'll do it again.  As far as offers go we just released a special offer that allows your referrals to search for a domain right from the banner.  They are then directed to a page with the domain pre-populated in the cart.  This offer is already beating some of our former conversion rates!  Later in April, we plan to release a limited time offer on our new RapidPress product.  This one will offer around a 66% commission for each RapidPress sale! (by the way - RapidPress is our 1-click install WordPress hosting)

2) How long has Name.com been offering their affiliate program and how many affiliates do you currently have ?

Can you believe our Name.com Affiliate Program has been around since 2010! It started with a very simple beta version and has been through a lot of changes since then.  Originally, the work was outsourced. Mid 2011, we realized with a Name.com team member dedicating part of their day, we could really develop the program's potential.  That's where I started the long road of recruiting and developing the program.  We now have an official Name.com Affiliate Program Page, multiple offers, an official AffiliateBlog with resources for online and affiliate marketing, and even a Name.com Affiliate Twitter with general affiliate tips and news as well as program announcements. To date we have not used an affiliate network and organically are enrolling 20-30 new affiliates each week.

3) Since Go Daddy dominates the domain industry and has a wildly popular affiliate program, can you give us some areas where Name.com may be more advantageous to the affiliate marketer ?

Certainly, we pay attention to the market in terms of our competitors' affiliate programs, but have focused more on what our affiliate needs rather than how we can one up our competition.  Ironically, maybe that is our advantage! 

I've found success by catering to the affiliates' specific website and audience. The Name.com website appeals to our target audience, but the website of the affiliates may have a different audience.  I work to understand the specific audience for a given affiliate and help them increase their conversions.  This can be through tips on placement of banners or text links, supplying information for Name.com specific blog posts, or even helping to create new banners that speak to their audience. We have chosen to be dedicated and tailor specifically to different types of affiliates unlike a giant program like GoDaddy.  I work to keep you motivated in your web presence - because honestly - if you're getting more traffic, you're happier and we're happier too with the increase in conversions!  In short, we hope to develop mutually beneficial relationships with our affiliates.  Even if that means going outside of our basic offers. 

4) How is customer support for affiliates ? Do they have an account manager, is support limited to just email or is there a person available to speak to if needed ?

We provide as much support as possible for our affiliates.  Upon joining the program, each affiliate is assigned an account manager and provided with resources for keeping in touch.  Most support is handled via email - it seems everyone is shy on the phone these days - but there is also phone support.  I believe that support is not restricted to when you need something, so I provided extra resources for education.  Our Name.com Affiliate Twitter and Name.com AffiliateBlog are additional resources that proactively support you as you develop your web presence. 

No matter if you choose to go through your account manager or Name.com support or our additional resources- we'll work to get you what you need. 


email: affiliates@name.com
phone: 720.249.2374
blog: http://affiliateblog.name.com
twitter: http://www.twitter.com/namedotcom_aff

Quick Chat with Jacob Fedosky - Vessio

By: RH

Quick Chat with Jacob Fedosky, Director of Domain Development - Vessio 

Many know Jake from his first blog DotJake.com and his second blog JacobFedosky.com. He is now the Director of domain development at Vessio.com.

1) Please tell us a little about Vessio ?

Vessio provides website development, design, and open source application services to help you maintain a productive and active presence online. We are located in Houston, Texas and are committed to being a trusted leader in delivering innovative web solutions obtained at enterprise, campaign, and assignment levels.

2) What does Vessio do for domainers that they won't find anywhere else ?

We offer a custom domain development solution. In the past, "minisite developers" churned out hundreds of low quality websites that didn't always perform well for domain investors. We're not concerned with volume - we're concerned with the success of our clients. Each domain we develop has a strategy and is custom designed from the ground up to achieve targeted results defined by the domain name itself.

3) What is the experience of the Vessio team in domaining and development ?

Our team has been developing websites for more than 8 years and been involved with domain development for more than 6 years. The combination of experience achieves the best of both worlds - great, functional websites that perform well for domain investors. 

4) How does Vessio handle customer support ? Strictly email or is there a person to talk to ?

We have made support a major priority for our customers and feel that personal support is a must, we offer both email and phone support. We're also happy to arrange a Skype call for our international customers.

Quick Chat with David Slutzkin, CEO - Flippa

By: RH

Quick Chat with David Slutzkin, CEO - Flippa

The staff of Flippa in Melbourne

1) How is business for Flippa this year ? Up or down vs last year ?

“We are up upon last year in overall sales.  In fact, we  just hit $90,000,000 in sales and have our eye on the $100,000,000 mark.  We are predicting growth in 2013 to be more modest as we tighten our listing criteria in order to improve the offering on our marketplace.”

2) What kind of websites sell best ?

“Top level sites sell the best.  By top level, we mean sites with substantial revenue, traffic, and that are aged.  A good example is militarybases.com, which sold for $125k.  At the time it was listed, it had 125,000 unique visitors and more than 386,000 page views each month, generating about $6200 in passive advertising revenue. Beneath that, WordPress sites that rely on ad revenue from networks like AdSense sell well. From our experience in just over $90 million in websites sales, we have found that sites with modest reserves are a strong driver for a successful sale.”

3) How do you prevent fraudulent bidding ?

“Fraudulent bidding falls mainly into two camps; shill bidding and bidders that do not complete the transaction. We’ve employed some incredibly sophisticated internal and third party technology that we use to match accounts and determine if they are connected (in the case of shill bidding).  To further this, we require a verified landline or cell phone number, (see http://flippa.com/blog/update-to-flippa-phone-verification/)

,  and require credit card verification on bids over $200, http://flippa.com/blog/minor-changes-to-bidding-on-flippa/.  Since the implementation of these safety features, we have been able to lower our dispute rates, yet we remain focused and vigilant in our efforts to protect our users and improve on dispute rates.”

4) Do you keep any stats on the multiples of revenue that websites sell for ? If so what is the average multiple a website sells for ?

“Most sites will sell with multiples that fall between 10 and 36 months. However, it is highly dependent upon the niche as well as the reliability of past performance indicating potential future performance.  For example, black-hat SEO tactics when relying on search engine traffic tends to drive down the multiple.”

5) What are the fees to sell on Flippa ?

“It’s $29 to list a web property and a further 5% success fee if it sells, which is capped at $2k.”

6) Does Flippa allow employees to bid on auctions ?

“We do allow our staff to bid on auctions as long as the bidders are clear about this with sellers, however we’re usually so busy working with Flippa, that our staff of 12 doesn’t have the time to be buying more sites.

Thank you David and a special shout out to Lara Miller for all her work.

Quick Chat with Anthony M. Beltran - 101Domain.com

By: RH

A Quick Chat With Anthony M. Beltran Coo/Cfo 101Domain.com

1) What makes 101Domain.com stand out as a registrar and why should someone use your website ?

101domain has been around since 1999 with a primary focus on bringing domain names to customers worldwide in all TLDs available at a good price with good service.  If it can be registered, we can do it.  This focus has resulted in us offering the largest list of gTLD and ccTLDs available to be registered anywhere, from the simple, most popular extensions, to the more exotic and restrictive jurisdictions.  With our vast registry connections, accreditations, and trustee service network, we are able to provide these services on a stable platform at incredible prices. 

With the website, we aim to make the search, registration and management process as transparent and easy as possible, providing our customers with loads of information on every TLD and reliable systems that work.  The world of ccTLDs is not always as easy and automated as customers are used to with gTLDs like com/net/org, but our goal is to make it just that.

2) Your company offers a large variety of Country Code Domains, Do you think Country Codes will be affected more or less than the big three (com/net/org) by the New Tlds coming to market ?

If you look at the current market, we see ccTLDs registration volume growing at nearly 20% year over year.  com/net/org is considerably slower than this, less than 5%.   The stronger ccTLDs will be less effected by the onslaught of new gTLDs coming to market in 2014.  If you look at the successful ones – co.uk, de, ru for example – these TLDs have gained strong acceptance from their country user base due to registry marketing efforts and are entrenched and growing in their markets.  The smaller country code registries have become more active the last couple years in marketing their TLDs and pushing out initiatives to broaden their market reach in anticipation of new gTLDs taking away market share.  We’re seeing registries like .PT and .FR liberalizing their requirements to open their markets to more people and its working.  We’re seeing others creating 3^rd level extensions to cater to smaller market segments.

3) Will 101Domain.com be an active participant in the new tlds when they are launched ?

Of course!  Our mission is to bring domain names to the public in all TLDs available, including new gTLDs.  We’re very excited over here to begin working with new registries to market and expand the domain name space – this is the biggest expansion we will probably ever see, and fantastic for business owners, entrepreneurs, and Domainers alike.  We’ve already started taking pre-reservations in September and have taken over 100,000 pre-registrations already.

We have plenty of experience in new TLD launch procedures and are looking forward to a busy next couple years.

4) What is the biggest challenge for a registrar in today's market ?

Integration, launch and marketing of new gTLDs.  New gTLDs are products just like any other.  A registrar has to prepare its systems and people to sell and service these products en masse.  Integration involves technical staff, testing, legal, operations, marketing and sales.  There are many new registries going down this road for the first time with registrars they have never worked with, this could pose problems for the less experienced registries and registrars.  We’re ready for this part – 101domain is built to be scalable and we add new TLDs every month which you’ll find on our New Releases page on the website. 

Our bigger challenge is on the marketing end – getting the product in front of the right customers with limited shelf space.  You’ll find in our site search an always improving TLD suggestion engine for both active TLDs and new gTLDs.  Customers won’t buy what they don’t see so were working hard to position the most beneficial domains in front of our customers.  We’ll be pouring over this data and other analytics going forward to see which suggestions are selling to which customers to put the right product in front of you.

5) Do you believe the more exotic country codes with their higher reg fee are a wise investment for domain investors ?

This can really go both ways.  We see a lot of short premium keyword registrations in newer ccTLDs in zones like .AE which have become pretty popular but we also see quite a few vanity name registrations at higher prices like .AL, .ST and .GE.  The tech world and general public seems to be catching on to some of these and there are many entrepreneurs working to build business models around catchy URLs, which in the end is great for domain investors.

Quick Chat with Robbie Birkner - Hexonet

By RH

Quick Chat with Robbie Birkner (Founder, Chief Strategy Officer) Hexonet

Q1) Robbie can you tell us your background in the domaining industry ?

Thank you very much for this interview and for allowing us to provide you some background on HEXONET.

I have been working in the Domain industry for over 12 years specializing mainly in registrar operations.  My career started back in 2000 with a small registrar that no body knew about.  With a good friend of mine, Jens Wagner, we took this small registrar and grew its reseller division into a multimillion dollar operation.  Today that small registrar is now one of Europe's largest and is a major player worldwide. 

In 2006, I left Germany to pursue an opportunity with DomainPeople Inc., a pioneer and one of the industry's first ever registrars. I was to head up DomainPeople in Vancouver, Canada and be an executive in its parent company Hostway.  Within a year, I was promoted to General Manager of Canadian Operations of Hostway.  And though Hostway was a great experience, in May of 2008, I decided to consult for the .ME registry as the Director of Sales.  Hosting was an experience, but I really wanted to get back to my roots and passion which was always domains.  So at .ME, the fantastic team and I went through a number of highly successful launch phases, built out an amazing registrar distribution channel, and even executed a premium domain strategy that produced multiple high value domain auctions for the registry.  

In 2009, Jens Wagner and I decided to get back together and open the Canadian division of HEXONET.  Jens, had also moved on and was building another great registrar and reseller business - HEXONET.  And though he had an amazing technical team of engineers and support personnel, we knew that by combining forces once again, we could take HEXONET into overdrive.  The growth, success and fun we have had with HEXONET has since been amazing.  Most of this is however due to the amazing employees we have who are all truly HEXONERDS.

Q2) What makes Hexonet a good choice for someone thinking about opening an account ?

That is an excellent question.  There are multiple reasons for choosing HEXONET.

1. Though it is a cliche, we actually care about our partners and customers.  Our clients will tell you that HEXONET goes above and beyond.  Our clients let us know what they need and if it is possible we try to make it happen.  This is our passion and drive.

2. HEXONET makes domains super easy.  The idea is to offer a wide (one of the widest anywhere) selections of TLDs with some of the most competitive prices connected through a single interface.  Companies, resellers, and clients come to HEXONET to consolidate and simplify their domains under a single roof.

3. HEXONET also offers multiple ways to connect with us, whatever way is most simple for the client.  Clients connect with us through our 6 different APIs, two different plugin modules (WHMCS/AWBS) or our comprehensive and free web control panel.

4. Large resellers or domainers with big portfolios come to us to become an ICANN accredited registrar.  We provide an efficient solution for them via our registrarOC (registrar Operations Center) product, that basically takes care of everything technical (operational testing, WHOIS Services, Registrar Data Escrow, and more) so they can easily become their own registrar.

At the end of the day, business is always personal.  Our clients appreciate the fact that we are approachable and that we are willing to listen to their needs.  Customer service and personal relations always trumps technology.

Q3) Can you explain the process for placing back orders and how things work at PremiumSale.com ?

Absolutely. 

HEXONET accepts backordering directly through an individual's own account or through a reseller for the following TLDs:
- gTLDs: .ASIA, .BIZ, .COM, .INFO, .MOBI, .NET and .ORG
- ccTLDs: .CA, .CC, .CH, .CO, .DE, .LI, .ME, .NU, .SE, .TV and .US

Step 1:  Search for a domain by looking through our various DELETE LISTS.  The lists provide deletion dates and also rank values (based on a HEXONET algorithm).  Simply choose from the list or enter any domain (even if the domain is not expiring).

Step 2:  24-hours prior to the drop date of a domain, a deposit is withdrawn from a user's account to cover a successful backorder registration.  If the backorder is unsuccessful, the deposit is automatically returned.  If the backorder is the only one on system (single backorder) and is successfully registered, the deposit is used for registration and the domain is automatically assigned to the user's account.

Step 3:  When multiple backorders are received for the same expiring domain and HEXONET is successful in registering the desired domain, then the following steps are taken: 
- All deposits are immediately returned to their respective accounts at HEXONET
- Only those individuals who placed a backorder for the domain receive a PRIVATE AUCTION invitation (via email) to be conducted at PremiumSale.com
- At the conclusion of a private auction and payment is secured at PremiumSale.com, the domain is automatically allocated to the HEXONET account of the winning bidder.

A significant feature of Backordering at HEXONET is our reseller backorder commissions.  Resellers like promoting backordering to their customers since they could possibly earn fairly large commissions without doing anything.  And larger portfolio clients happily use the commission as a direct rebate savings on their auction cost. 

As a side note to our backorder system, though obtaining .COM and .NET domains is more a pure numbers (threads) game, many of our customers are reporting that our system seems to be better at obtaining domains from other TLD registries.  HEXONET does use a propitiatory algorithm for these other TLDs and has historically seen many good results.

Q4) What are the challenges you see in the registrar business ?

I foresee multiple challenges for registrars:

a. Renegotiation of Registrar Accreditation Agreement with ICANN. 
Registrars are likely to have increasingly more difficult obligations surrounding WHOIS Verification.  The additional verification burden on the registrars will raise operating costs and will likely result in higher prices.

b. NewTLDs - Preparation and Customer Education
The first few hundred newTLDs are just around the corner.  Registrars need to figure out which newTLDs to offer.  Depending on their operational platform, this may be a simple endeavor or something more difficult (technology barriers, engineering resources, etc.).  Additionally, registrars need to find ways to present the newTLDs that make sense.  Ideally, asking 3-5 questions in the domain search could produce more meaningful options for the customer, but unfortunately this takes way too long.  As you see, at HEXONET we are already experimenting with solutions to this problem.

c. Shrinking Margins - Outsourcing
Margins are shrinking and as a result the challenge is how to lower your costs.  This exact problem is why many of HEXONET clients are registrars themselves.  Outsourcing is a path that makes a lot of economical sense since at least with HEXONET there is zero upfront capital cost and registrars pay on a per domain basis.  A challenge for each registrar is to identify which operations to keep in-house and which to outsource. 

Q5) Will you be a participant in offering new tld registrations and why do you think someone should register a new tld ?

NewTLDs are here to stay, so HEXONET recently launched an Expression-of-Interest (EOI) service for newTLDs.  Our EOI service is necessary to learn from our customers, which newTLDs they are interested in.  Since our EOI service is available via API and Control Panel, we can check the demand for certain newTLDs all the way down to our resellers and our reseller's customers.  This information will help us to plan our prepare properly with the right documentation, education, reseller marketing, and technical resources when the newTLDs become reality.

Some TLDs will be very successful, others will not.  However, we believe that some newTLDs will actually drive innovation on the Internet and will make substantial impacts on our industry.  HEXONET's role as a registrar remains the same, to enable individuals/corporations worldwide to register and manage their domains, quickly, securely, and reliably.

Ray, once again thank you so much for this opportunity.  I greatly appreciated it.  If anyone has any additional questions they should feel free to email me directly at rbirkner@hexonet.net.

Quick Chat with Donny Simonton - Voodoo

By: RH

A quick chat with Donny Simonton - Voodoo.com

Donny it seems everyone wants to post on forums and blogs that parking is dead, Is parking Dead ?

The idea that parking is dead usually comes up every 6 months or so.  It’s usually brought up by the same people who have decent domains that just don’t have a lot of natural traffic.  And when you don’t have traffic, parking your domain is probably not the best way for you to generate money from the domain.  If you have natural traffic on your domain, it’s really hard to beat parking your domain without fully developing it.

What are the best kind of names to park at Voodoo ?

This is one of those questions that gets asked quite a bit.  To me it’s domains that have traffic; those are the best domains to park with us.  We accept traffic from every country in the world.  We accept IDN domains.  We accept domains from all categories.  Basically we accept pretty much every type of domain that is out there and our just job is to help you make the most money from that domain.

From a payout standpoint would you say Voodoo is near the top ?

My finance team tells us that we are paying out an insanely high revenue share, and I have no plans on lowering it.  Just ask around we seem to be paying out a lot more than the other guys.

With the mobile Internet growing by leaps and bounds, how does mobile traffic perform and are the payouts per click the same ?

We usually classify traffic into 4 categories, desktop, tablets, smartphones, and dumbphones.  Desktop and Smartphone traffic are usually on par with each other as far as RPM goes.  Tablets usually have the highest RPM and Dumbphones have the lowest.

Mobile traffic has definitely been increasing since the beginning of the year, but desktop traffic has been staying very steady as well.  I would have expected to see a drop in the percentage of desktop traffic when there was an increase in mobile traffic.  But overall, the numbers continue to go higher month over month.

Put on your crystal ball if you can and tell us where you see parking five years down the road ?

I remember 11 years ago when I first got my hands on a domain parking feed and I thought the whole concept of parking domains was a joke.  Back then I had hundreds of domains that didn’t make any money and in most cases I could barely afford the renewal fees.  But over time it began to grow on me and I started to see how you could actually create a business on buying, selling, and parking domains with traffic.  The business has changed over the years, but the overall concept is still the same 11 years later.

I think you will continue to have a thriving domain parking business in the next five years.  If ICANN has its way we will have another 1,500 or so new gTLDs, with half of them failing within 5 years.  .com will still be king.  Domain parking companies will continue to be around, whether it’s helping you monetize your domain, helping you buy a domain, or helping you sell a domain, as long as domains are around, parking companies will be around.

Are you going to start your own sales platform?

We have been working with a few clients on creating a domain sales platform that will be integrated in our Voodoo.com domain parking platform.  It will allow you to handle everything yourself, allow us or one of our approved brokers to handle the transaction, or just allow us to handle the escrow for you.  It will be completely up to you how much or how little you want to be involved in the whole process.  For most domainers domain sales is just another source of income and we want to make the process as easy as possible.

Thank you very much for your time Donny, all the best to you and Voodoo.

Interview with the youngest domainer in the world

By: RH

Interview with World's Youngest Domainer

I happen to know the youngest domainer in the world because she is my niece.

She owned a domain coming out of the womb, SoleilRose.tv. She has gone on to upgrade and get a few others. She will be 5 years old in a few months and by far one of the smartest domainers I have ever met. She is also a blue belt.

HD: So you got in on domains right away is that correct ?

Soleil Rose : Yeah, I did, my generation will come to rule the Internet and I wanted to start early.

HD: SoleilRose.tv was your first domain, why ?

SoleilRose: I figure I want to have my own show about me some day, so tv made sense.

HD:  But you dropped that name, why ?

SoleilRose: I was able to upgrade to Soleil.tv, short and sweet, just like me.

HD: Now you registered SoleilMedia.com, what happened there ?

SoleilRose: Sold it for a huge roi. I hand regged it and resold it for $150. Do you know what $150 is for a 4 year old ?

HD: How come you never got SoleilRose.com ?

SoleilRose: Well here is some interesting stuff, that name was somehow registered a month before I was born, A MONTH ! come on. How did they know.

HD: Who registered it ?

SoleilRose: Someone in France.

HD: Well Soleil is French for Sun

SoleilRose: Gee, thanks I didn't know that genius. They get the .com a month before I was born, I am thinking of contacting John Berryhill for help with a udrp.

HD: A udrp ? You were not born yet.

SoleilRose: But I was conceived prior to that, and my mama already had my name picked out for months. I think the name belongs to me. I have to protect my brand Uncle Ray.

HD: Well our readers might have a problem with that.

SoleilRose: I am four years old bring it.

HD: Do you have any plans to get any new tlds ?

SoleilRose: I want Soleil.web, I think I should have tm rights to that name, I mean I am Soleil and have been on the web everyday for years.

HD: It doesn't work that way.

SoleilRose: Oh really ?

HD: You seem to be obsessed with your own name, any chance you will register a domain that does not contain Soleil ?

SoleilRose: My birthday is coming up maybe you can get me a nice LLL.com

HD: Thank you for your time Soleil.

SoleilRose: You are welcome Uncle Ray.

Quick Chat With Paul Nicks, Go Daddy Aftermarket

By: RH

Quick Chat with Paul Nicks, Director, Product Development - Aftermarket

Paul Nicks is the  Director of Go Daddy's Domain Name Aftermarket. I oversee the future of Go Daddy's domain name parking products and the domain name aftermarket. I work closely with our product development teams, customer care and marketing to ensure Go Daddy's customers' needs are understood and addressed.

What is the usage of Go Daddy Auctions by those outside of the domaining industry? Would you say many companies use the platform to buy domains ?

 

When we first started in auctions, we were really focused on domainers. The more we investigated, the more we knew we needed to bring end users into our auction platform while keeping domainers happy.

 

We were able to blend the two segments seamlessly by adding auction listings into the domain registration path, giving customers a way to purchase domain names they didn't know might be available.

 

My goal at Go Daddy is to use the power of GoDaddy.com as an Internet on-ramp for end users and to expand their knowledge and confidence in the secondary domain name market.

 

As more and more customers learn the exact domain name they want to register can often be purchased from the current registrant, an overall understanding of how the primary and secondary markets work together will develop. With this understanding, more end users will start purchasing more domain names from the aftermarket.

Many users who bid daily, would love to know who they are bidding against, any plans to change the bidder id system?

In talking with Go Daddy aftermarket users, many of the frequent bidders want their identity hidden. We adopted the mindset that a person needs to know how many people they are bidding against, but not necessarily the identity of those people.

Do you guys pay attention to those who exploit loopholes in the auction system. For example we have written about how there are people who see an auction close for four figures, then contact the previous owner to get them to renew and buy the domain from the previous owner. Do you follow this, we read on Namepros one member said their account was suspended. What is the Go Daddy policy on this?

We have sophisticated fraud checks in place to ensure that our platform remains fair to both bidders and sellers. Although I can't discuss our policies publicly I can say that we are doing everything we can to uphold the integrity of the auctions. 

Another source of frustration for many bidders is winning and waiting for the name. Sometimes the name gets renewed and they are out the name and have to wait for the refund. Could you make a system where when the auction ends the bidders wins the name with no possibility for the previous owner to renew the name ?

 

Go Daddy's system was created to give our existing customers the ability to keep their domain name as long as possible. In the same vein, we created our system to give the aftermarket a way to bid on these expiring names. Go Daddy allows the original registrant the ability to redeem their domain up to the final drop date. As a result, we can't immediately transfer a domain to the auction winner.

 

Go Daddy is aware of the inconvenience this could cause to auction bidders, but we tried to be as fair as possible to buyers and sellers.

What is the current wait time to get paid for a premium listing sale, and why is the premium listing commission still so much more than the auction sale commission?

Premium Listing payments are made within 45 days after the last day of the month in which the sale occurred. For instance, if a domain name sold August 25, it would be 45 days after August 31.

 

Go Daddy believes domain names are 21^st century real estate and just like real land, it's location, location, location. According to Google Ad words, the term "domain name" is searched 1.5 million times each month. "GoDaddy" on the other hand iis searched more than 4 million times each month.

 

The 30 percent commission on Premium Listings is due to the far higher sell-through rate of and the benefit the seller receives from Go Daddy's marketing presence versus a straight auction listing.

 

End users who use GoDaddy.com for domain name registration are used to selecting the domain name they want, adding additional products and services and checking out. Integrating Go Daddy's secondary market domain names into the purchase flow is what makes our Premium Listings product so powerful.

I would like to thank you for taking the time Paul to do this interview and continued success to you and Go Daddy.

Thank you, Raymond. I'm always happy to chat via email or in person at the various industry conferences. Have a great day.

Quick Chat With Brad Mugford, DataCube.com

By: RH

Brad Mugford is a domain investor who runs DataCube.com. DataCube.com had its 25th birthday this year and is the 68th oldest domain registered.

Here is our quick chat with Brad.

1) When did you first start getting into domains and why?

 

I have been online since 1996, but did not consider domains as an investment vehicle until much later.

 

By 2006 I only owned around 40 domains that I had registered starting in the late 90's.
These domains were mainly used for development projects.

 

What turned me on to domain investing was when I let (3) LLLL.com expire on accident.
After doing some research I was able to find out how much the domains sold for at auction.

 

The numbers surprised me.  I knew domains had value, but had no idea what quality domains were selling for.

 

This led me to see the opportunity in domain investing.

 

Since that point in time I have been buying and selling domains consistently.

 

2) What was the first domain you registered?

 

The first domain that I hand registered that I still own is Infad.com (1999).

 

There is no real meaning behind it.  It was just a brandable name I came up with at the time for my tech company.

 

3) How is business at DataCube and how do you feel about the overall domain market?

 

My sales have increased every year since I started investing in domains.

 

I rarely sell to domainers though as the vast majority of my sales are to end users.

 

There are two domain markets - Reseller & End User

 

Reseller -

 

Overall, right now the domain reseller market is struggling.
One major problem is the lack of liquidity.

 

I think many people were drawn to domains as investments because they see it as easy money.
This is no longer the case.

 

There is still plenty of money to be made but it takes more effort and skill now than ever.

 

End User -

 

The end user market is as strong as ever.

 

I get a constant stream of inquiries via contact forms, SEDO, whois, etc.

 

There are still plenty of big sales going on, but at this point the vast majority of end user sales fall in the $1K - $5K sweet spot.
Afternic and SEDO reported sales will confirm that.

 

4) What do you specialize in and what have you had the most success buying and selling?

 

I specialize in end user sales - however I don't really have a specific niche that I deal in.

 

I buy domains with end users in mind, so I am interested in any domains with commercial value that I think I can sell.

 

I generally stick to the Big 3 (COM/NET/ORG).  Those extensions are not going anywhere.
They have global awareness, usage, and credibility.

 

I will consider other extensions as well depending on the quality of the keyword. 
The worse the extension, the better the keyword needs to be.

 

I believe a top 500 keyword in an extension like .BIZ/.INFO is far more likely to find a buyer than the 20 millionth best .COM.

 

5) How do you think the new tlds will change the domain industry?

 

I could write an entire novel on my opinions on the gTLD program, but I will keep it simple.

 

The program was not passed by popular demand, or for the greater good, it was passed to make ICANN a lot of money.

 

I see the entire program as a solution to a problem that does not exist.

 

Some people will make a lot of money (Registries / Registrars / Consultants / Lawyers) and others will lose a lot of money.

 

It seems to me like the new extensions are mainly a game for the 1%.

 

For the average person all there is going to be is confusion.

 

When people are confused they go back to what is known.

 

6) Will you be a buyer of any domains in any new tlds?

 

I have no plans to purchase any at this point because as an investor it doesn't make sense.

 

Even current extenstions like .CO (1.3M regs) and .INFO (8M regs) that have limited awareness and usage.
There is hardly any resale value outside the top handful of keywords.

 

These new extensions exist to make money.  They are not going to just give away their best assets.

 

If you judge by the past, the initial launch of an extension is among the worst possible investments you can make.

 

Most times a landrush price paid is the highest a domain will ever sell for.

 

7) How do you feel the ever growing mobile Internet and apps will affect domain values?

 

Some people seem to see mobile internet or apps as a threat to domain names.  I don't.

 

I still see a major need for domain names on a daily basis.

 

Apps will never replace domain names.  If you go around any major town you will see thousands of small businesses with domain names.
Are all these companies going to have apps?  Does a plumber in Boston really need an app?

 

Apps and domain names both fill a role.  They compliment each other.

 

 

A chat with Igal Lichtman (Mrs. Jello)

Some know the name others new to the industry may not.  Known to the domaining world as Mrs Jello, Igal Lichtman has been a successful entrepreneur for over 25 years.

Lichtman started out in 1986 as the founder, chairman and CEO of Magic Solutions International, a software company in the field of help desk & asset management.  With 300 employees and annual trailing sales over $50M. In 1996 and 1997, Magic Solutions was among INC 500's fastest growing companies in the US, and in April 1998 was acquired by Network Associates Inc. (NETA) (formerly and currently McAfee Associates) for $110M.

Igal has been an angel investor in other tech companies that were acquired such as Quigo.com. That company was acquired in Nov 2007 by Aol for around $340 million.

Igal has a great domain portfolio that not very many know about, he has names such as Jerusalem.com and Satellite.com as prime examples of top quality domains.
Igal  is also one of the top .tv investors in the world. Registrations include names such as Sport.tv,Television.tv  and hundreds others.

He was very gracious with his time and gave us an interview on his take on .tv.

 

When did you start registering .tv ?

As soon as the registry opened up.

How many .tv do you own today ?

900

There is an old myth that has gone around for a long time, it stated the domain Golf.tv was acquired for $600,000. There was controversy around the name that a gentleman from South Korea won the name but the original DOT TV Corp never awarded him the name.  Did you pay $600,000 for Golf.tv ?

No I did not pay anywhere near $600,000 for Golf.tv.  I cannot disclose the price but it was not $600,000.

What do you think about the new tlds coming down the road ? Will they affect .tv ?

Dot Tv is an international extension. When you look at the world the US has adopted .com, but when you go into other countries its all about the CCtld. Go to Holland and its .nl, you can register a dutch word in .com and it will not receive much traffic if any at all.

Now with the new extensions, take for example .music, it does not mean the same in every language.  TV means TV universally.

These new domains will cause confusion and bring back value to the likes of .com and .tv.  Toll free numbers work like domains in some respect. When there was a need to expand from 800, to whatever it was 888 ? The price went down 30%, when the next number 877 or something came it lowered the prices again. But when the next one came out all the prices went back up for the original because there was too much confusion. 800 is 800 and .com is .com, people will revert back to what they really know.

How do you feel .tv has done over the years ?

I think its gaining in popularity but it does not do enough for being 11 years old. I think they are getting smart by lowering the price and getting rid of premium renewal. I was not just a registrant back in the day, but I was also an investor in the Dot Tv Corp, I got my money back on the Verisign buyout.

What do you think about existing legacy premiums ?

They want you to return it, that's why there was no deal for premium holders.  They got your money for a few years and a premium renewal, now you can drop it and they get to resell it.  Brilliant.

What do you think about leasing .tv names to entities not sold on the extension ?

I do it and it works. I leased Football.tv for a long time and then we got the name back, its now currently going to be leased again to another party.

Live.tv is another name we are now leasing, before the lease the name got hundreds of uniques a day. (Editors note NSFW).  There is money in leasing if you have good names.

Do you still register or buy .tv names ?

No. I am done buying as I am focused on many development projects. No time for keeping up with the auctions and the drops.

Thank you very much for the time you spent today Igal.

It was my pleasure.