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Jul 20

2009 First Half Domain Name Registrar Scorecard

Domains 1 Comment »

A look at winners and losers in the domain race in the first half of 2009.

The first half of 2009 was tumultuous for many domain name registrars. But a few — including GoDaddy — continue to grow their registration base.

Here’s how the top 10 registrars (plus a couple others popular amongst domainers) fared in terms of domain registration base from January 1 through June 30, 2009. This data is from RegistrarStats, and only covers .com, .net, .info, .org, .biz, .us, and .mobi. They are listed in order of size from biggest to smallest.

GoDaddy – up 8.42% to 34,453,064 domains. This includes Wild West Domains, GoDaddy’s reseller unit. Bob Parsons has proven that marketing is simple: girls and low prices. Works for everything else, so why not domains?

eNom – up 2.6% to 9,039,185. Will it break through the 8 figure barrier? The last million is always the hardest.

Tucows – up 3.3% to 7,432,309. Started adding ItsYourDomain domains in late 08/early 09. Reseller channel working well. Will new direct-to-consumer Hover brand boost volume?

Network Solutions – down 1.1% to 6,563,744. Given that many of its customers pay $35 a year for domains, I’d be willing to put up with a bit of churn as an investor.

1&1 – up 3.9% to 4,797,417. “Take our domains. Please!” Cut rate prices and big ad budget.

Melbourne IT – down 3.5% to 4,798,615.

Register.com – down 0.7% to 2,726,896. Another registrar getting away with murderous pricing.

Moniker – down 2.4% to 2,587,695. Loyal customer base trimming portfolios, but sticking around.

PublicDomainRegistry – up 2.75% to 2,331,684. Directi’s army of resellers is working hard.

Fabulous – down 13.7% to 1,110,624. Big drop likely due to culling its own portfolio, but surely doesn’t account for 176,000 domains lost.

Dotster – down 2.8% to 1,036,550.

domainregistration-changes

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Jul 20

Castello Brothers to Keynote at Domain Convergence

Click here for a detailed account of their story in an article written by Ron Jackson of DNJournal.com in 2006.

The Castello Brothers - Michael and David - of the Castello Cities Internet Network will be giving the keynote address and host a session at the Domain Convergence Conference in Toronto, Canada, August 13-14, 2009.

The duo have a unique success story that is inspirational to both domainers and entrepreneurs alike - morphing their careers from struggling musicians to domain millionaires thanks to their perseverance in registering domain names in 1995 and beyond.

The Castello Brothers’ keynote address at Domain Convergence will be “The Future of Domaining - Building Your Brand”. They will also host a special interactive session where conference attendees can submit their development and monetization ideas for one-on-one review and feedback.

“David and I are looking forward to speaking at the 2009 Domain Convergence Conference,” said Michael Castello. “Some of the world’s most successful and innovative domainers are in Canada and we look forward to what will surely be a vibrant and creative conference.”

Domain Convergence will take place on August 13 and 14 at the Radisson Admiral Harbourfront Hotel in Toronto. The Early Bird special admission rate of $649 CDN (approx. $585 USD) expires on July 25. Visit DomainConvergence.com to register today.

[Domain Convergence]

Full Disclosure: Frank Michlick of DNN is also the Chairman of Domain Convergence.

DomainConvergence | August 12-13, 2009 | Toronto, ON, Canada

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DomainConvergence | August 12-13, 2009 | Toronto, ON, Canada

Jul 20

Rick Latona Announces ‘No Reserve’ Summer Slow Auction - Still Looking for Domain Submissions

Domains 1 Comment »

Rick Latona Auctions has announced a NO RESERVE Summer Slow Auction which will start on Thursday July 23, 2009 and run for one week - and there is still room for new submissions.

“We are running the best 100 names that get submitted,” the auction house said in a recent press release. “We still have room left; in fact, we’ll have room left up until the very start of the auction. If a better name gets submitted, the worst name drops out…the auction will last one week and it starts Thursday so submit your names!”

The auction has a similar feel to the SnapNames Summer Stimulus auction which is underway and ending on July 21. I suppose there are only so many marketing angles available at this time of the year.

[RickLatona.com]

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Jul 20

Thought Convergence Answers Jay Westerdal’s Complaint

Company denies Westerdal’s counterclaims.

Thought Convergence (TCI) has filed an answer to Jay Westerdal’s counterclaims in an ongoing lawsuit over TCI’s acquisition of Westerdal’s company Name Intelligence.

The 12 page response (pdf) basically denies all complaints Westerdal made.

So what’s next, now that both sides have lodged their allegations at each other? Most likely a settlement.

“Neither side will want to air their dirty laundry with so may people watching,” said Enrico Schaefer, an attorney with Traverse Legal. “Most of the issues really amount to unnecessary ambiguities in the contracts, poor drafting and poor setting of expectations.”

A settlement would probably be a calculated decision based on how much money is at stake, future legal bills, and if one or either side doesn’t want the public exposure a lawsuit brings.

“If it does not settle, it will go to discovery where everyone will send oppressive questions and demands for documents seeking leverage,” said Schaefer. “Depositions will then be taken of people who already have an axe to grind with the person or company they are testifying against.”

Schaefer says that discovery would proceed at a snail’s pace and be costly for both sides.

Domain Name Wire will continue to keep you posted on the lawsuit.

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Jul 20

Think Tank Loses Hilarious Arbitration for .Com of Its Name

Conservative “think tank” gets mud on its face by not registering .com domain name.

Many domain arbitration decisions are dry reads. But I found myself cracking up this morning reading the case of SutherlandInstitute.com.

Southerland Institute is a Utah-based conservative group that purports to promote family, limited government, and religion. Its web site is SutherlandInstitute.ORG, and it failed to register the .com version of its name. Nick West registered the domain name in 2006 and created a parody of Sutherland Institute’s web site. West won the arbitration.

It’s the sworn statement from Sutherland Group’s president Paul Mero that made me almost cry laughing:

…On February 26, 2009, I personally met with the largest donor to Sutherland Institute. This donor had compiled a list of ideas to improve Sutherland Institute, and we discussed this list in detail. One of the ideas in the list was to improve Sutherland Institute’s website. Our donor appeared to be very troubled by certain content on the website. I was surprised by this suggestion because we had recently updated and modified the website. Furthermore, I could not believe that our website had caused such a negative reaction from a donor who has been such a long-time supporter of Sutherland Institute. Upon further investigation, I determined that our donor was referring to sutherlandinstitute.com, not the official Sutherland Institute website sutherlandinstitute.org. It required several attempts to clarify to our donor that the ‘.com’ website was not sponsored by Sutherland Institute because our donor did not immediately understand that ‘sutherland institute’ could be used as a domain name for both the ‘.org’ and ‘.com’ top-level domains. More specifically, our donor did not understand the significance of top-level domain differences.”

To understand how funny this is, consider the “Sutherland Governing Principles” on the think tank’s real web site:

Limited Government
Family
Private Property
Religion
Personal Responsibility
Charity
Free Markets

and on the parody web site:

Oppose The Gay Agenda
Limited Government Except When We Don’t Get Our Way
Our Bigoted Definition of Family
The One True Religion
Personal Responsibility & Taking Away Others Choice
Anti Same Sex Marriage Legislation
Free Markets, Exclude Homosexuals from Places of Employment

Can you imagine a major donor coming to the web site and thinking the organization he sponsored had this actual content on its web site?

A statement by another Sutherland Institute employee reads like a checklist of why owning a .com is important, particularly for security reasons. The think tank’s own web site designer was sending invoices to an email address at the .com version rather than .org. That’s a great example to show someone who’s thinking about starting a company with a domain name other than .com.

You can read the entire decision here.

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Jul 20

Demand Media Buys Demand.com

Parent company of eNom enters into agreement to buy Demand.com domain name.

The domain name Demand.com is in demand.

Demand Media, parent company of eNom and NameJet, has entered into an agreement to purchase the domain name Demand.com for corporate branding purposes. The sale was announced today in a press release from the seller inter123 Corporation. The sale price was not released.

Inter123 was founded by Jeffrey Peterson, an entrepreneur mostly known for launching Hispanic portal Quepasa.com. According to its web site, Inter123 is a private equity fund focused on information technology and new media companies, although its portfolio page doesn’t show many investments.

Demand Media started as a company trying to bring social media to a vast direct navigation portfolio, but its strategy has seemed to morph since then. In addition to owning eNom, the company owns a number of popular web sites such as Trails.com, Cracked.com, and eHow.com. It also has a partnership with the Lance Armstrong Foundation for LiveStrong.com.

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Jul 20

Jul/20/09 Nora Nanayakkara wins Non Executive Director at Nominet

Nora Nanayakkara has successfully been elected by Nominets membership as a Non Executive Director (NED) of the organization. Non Exec Directors…

Nora Nanayakkara wins Non Executive Director position at NominetNora Nanayakkara has successfully been elected by Nominet’s membership as a Non Executive Director (NED) of the organization. Non Exec Directors are elected every two years at Nominet and this year, three seats…

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Quality Score Surprise! #1 Ad Position Doesn’t Improve QS

Jul 20

Quality Score Surprise! #1 Ad Position Doesn’t Improve QS

SEM & SEO No Comments »

What I love about being an Advanced Experienced AdWords Expert as I have been for years now (and I am using the word LOVE sarcastically here) is that I keep finding out things that I have assumed for years are wrong. And that if I read Dave Barry too much- and I am not making this up- I start to write like him.

It is only because I have teachers in the form of AdWords Dedicated Account Representatives that I have these frequent stunning realizations.

So here’s another myth by the wayside:

If you bid more, your cost per click will go down because your CTR goes up and your Quality Score goes up because QS is so dependent on CTR.

Ok maybe you didn’t follow that- so here’s the myth in visual form:

bidqsmyth

NOT TRUE!!!

Here’s what the AdWords Lady said:

CTR is normalized in regard to quality score so ads in top positions which usually have a high CTR don’t have an unfair advantage. While higher positions tend to have a higher CTR, we expect higher positions to have a higher CTR.

For example, we know that when an ad appears in position 4 it has an x% CTR. When that same ad moves up to position 1, with no other change, that same ad has a CTR of x+y% CTR. When we calculate quality score, we remove the impact of the y variable so that we just have the intrinsic CTR of the ad, independent of position. Therefore, while increasing bid may increase CTR, that increase alone should not improve the advertiser’s quality score.

The below blob posts give more insight into this topic as well.

http://adwords.blogspot.com/2008/10/improvements-to-ads-quality.html

http://adwords.blogspot.com/2008/11/update-on-improvements-to-ads-quality.html

That really got my goat- not only does it appear that my myth may have been true up until October of 2008, but it also appears I should be reading the Google AdWords blob more carefully. And that got my goat even more- I didn’t know Google had blobs. There’s a chance she meant “blogs” but since Google has Waves now, I think they really could also have Blobs. Or maybe I’m just making a stupid joke about her being dumb because I felt dumb. I don’t know, I’ll ask my therapist when she gets back in town.

So, since AdWords shows ads at a variety of positions and really only tells you the average position, they somehow gather a normalized CTR via some statistical magic I’m not educated enough to understand, and use THAT as that CTR to multiply your bid by. Voila!

Very cool. And smart, because if they didn’t normalize CTR, whoever was in the top position would have an unfair advantage.

It also means that you have to care more about the effectiveness of your ad copy again. Because THAT’s what determines your normalized CTR and quality score and required bid for a given position.

Ta da.

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