2011 was a very quite time for this blog / podcast due to other projects that I needed to focus on.

2012 will be a very different story as I am very pleased to announce that I have partnered up with Danny Batelic from www.tradingwebsitesblog.com & www.dominiche.com and also the Dominiche Podcast that Danny co-hosts with Ed Dale from Challenge.co

Danny has had great success with developing and flipping websites over the past few years, so not only will we be talking about domain names but also what is involved in developing out your domains to sell on platforms such as Flippa.com

The podcast will now be once a week and run for approx 30 mins or so. We will also have every month an industry expert guest on the show that either Danny or myself will interview. To revisit some of my past interviews with the top domain experts on the planet, please visit my interview archives here www.ozdomainer.com/category/domain-names-podcasts/

So please feel free to suggest any topics that you would like to see covered over the next 12 months and we will do our best to cover them for you.

Thanks for your time and we look forward to bringing you a great podcast in 2012.

Cheers

Ed & Danny

Marc Ostrofsky - Get Rich Click

Here is a piece about Marc from his website -

Check out his latest interview with Frank Schilling where Frank discusses his new domain parking and monetization service www.InternetTraffic.com Keep up the great work Michael.

Optometrist.com.au

This is a major win for this business that is a smaller company competing against the larger ones such as OPSM, Spec Savers etc. As it happens, it appears that Spec Savers were the previous owners of Optometrist.com.au.

So congrats to the folks over at The Eye Practice.

If you have not herd of Flippa.com yet then come out of your cave and have a listen to what they have to offer. They are one of the biggest website sales marketplaces on the web at the moment and are getting very good results for their customers.

I have not used Flippa as yet but will be listing a few of my sites for sale there shortly.

Flippa.com

If you have been contemplating listing a website for sale on Flippa.com but have yet to do so, it would normally cost you US$19 to list a website with them.

Andrew has kindly organized a discount code for OzDomainer Podcast listeners which will give you 15 credits towards your first listing so you will only have to pay the balance of US$4. Just use the discount code “ozdom1” to claim your 15 free credits.

If you have already used Flippa.com in the past please feel free to leave a comment on how you went and what website / domain you listed or sold on Flippa.

I hope you enjoy the podcast.

This post by Rob Monster from Epik.com is one of those.

http://epik.com/blog/why-200-oil-and-5000-gold-is-good-news-if-you-are-a-domain-investor.html

Brilliant post Rob!

I think we are in for an amazing year where domain names will reach a whole new audience of end users.

To help with that process, I hope that the interviews I have done in the past and my future podcasts will help to educate the general public and domain investors alike.

Some of my upcoming confirmed podcast guests will be -

Adrian Kinderis, CEO of AusRegistry

Adam Dicker, CEO of DNForum.com

Page Howe, CEO of  SiteHQ.com

Frank Schilling, (Second follow up interview from our first last year)

Also on my list but not spoken to or confirmed -

Michael Berkens, CEO of MostWantedDomains.com & Author of TheDomains.com

Rob Grant, CEO of RealEstateDirectory.com

Michael & David Castello of CCIN Castello Cities Internet Network
This will be a follow up interview with the Castello Brothers from my first podcast interview with them back in 2008

I have many more on my list that I will add at a later date. If you have anyone in particular you would like me to have on my podcast, please drop me a line through the comment section and I will see what I can do to get them on the show.

Have a great day!

A focus on my ccTLD domains mainly in my home country of Australia will take up most of my attention & time.

Here are some of the domains that we will be working on in 2011 -

AudioBooks.com.au, Cardboard.com.au, DslrCameras.com.au, SlrDigitalCamera.com.au & SlrDigitalCameras.com.au, ElectronicDrums.com.au, GpsSoftware.com.au, LedDownlights.com & .com.au, LiquorLicensing.com.au, MiningJobs.net.au & MiningJobsAustralia.com & .com.au, Forex-Trading.com.au, StepLadders.com.au, SuperchargerKits.com.au & ShortCourse.com.au.

So there is enough there to keep my developers busy for 2011 and beyond. I will be keeping you up to date on how these sites are going over the new year and will be happy to accept any constructive criticism and feedback on how they can be improved.

In regards to the podcasts on this site, I will be stepping that up with a target of at least one new podcast every fortnight with a wide range of people in the web industry not just domainers but anything and anyone that is related to developing a successful domain name including Web Development, Content Management Systems,  SEO, Pay Per Click Advertising, Social Media, Content Writing, Business Development & Management, Website Images, Graphic Design and a whole lot more. If you have any particular subject you would like to learn about and hear from experts on the subject, please drop me a line and let me know and I will do my best to accommodate you.

I would just like to thank  all of you who have been guests on my podcast as without you guys it would not be anywhere near as interesting! Also a big thanks to all those who have been reading and listening to my blog / podcast over 2010, I apreciate your support. It is hard to believe that this site will have been running for 4 years come July 2011 so there will be some celebrating going on then I can assure you.

I wish you all a very Happy New Years and very prosperous 2011!

Cheers

Ed

As far as I am concerned, Woolworths picked it up for a song!! It sounds like they intend to take on Bunnings in a pretty big way so it will be interesting to see how they go about it.

Owning the single word category killer domain name should help a to get them going.

Here is the full story in the Herald Sun today http://www.heraldsun.com.au/business/dot-dashed-as-domain-name-lapses/story-e6frfh4f-1225971726800

I had some issues with my emails not getting through to Frank which delayed the process, but I finally got it sorted with some help from my mate Ron Jackson from DNJournal.com who passed on some messages to Frank on my behalf. Thanks a million Ron

Ron did a brilliant cover story article about Frank on his blog back in 2007 which you can read here – http://www.dnjournal.com/cover/2007/december.htm

Frank is a legend in the Domain Name industry and very nice guy to boot.

For someone who achieved so much in a smaller amount of time than most other domain investors, he is a true champion of this business.

Frank’s blog, Seven Mile (named after the beach where he lives on the Grand Cayman Islands) is by far one of the best domain name blogs out there even though he only posts once a month or so but when he does it is true gold. If you have not read it make sure you put on your list of “must do” items.

Anyway, that is enough from me! Get stuck into the podcast.

Enjoy

Kajabi Marketing Software

Hi all,

It is not very often that I have been this excited about an online product or service, but Kajabi is a different beast completely.

If you have no idea what Kajabi is and what the heck I am talking about then you can check it out here www.Kajabi.com.au

If you have already watched the first video then the latest video with a look behind Kajabi and what powers it, to its pricing structure are all revealed on the latest video. Just click on the “Get Kajabi” tab at the top of the page.

I have decided that I will be going for the Ultimate package as it just seemed to be the best value for my business model, but there is an option for everyone.

There is a 14 Day Free trial with no strings attached but it is for a very limited time.

Disclaimer: Ed Keay-Smith & OzDomainer.com are affiliates of Kajabi and will make affiliate commissions on products or services purchased through these links.

For those of you who don’t know who George is, he started up the Domain8.com drop service for the .com.au ccTLD which was later sold to Fabulous.com and renamed to Drop.com.au which is its current service. Watch the video to see what George is up to now and his views on the domain industry at the moment.

I have wanted to interview Frank since I began this domain names podcast almost 3 years ago.

It should happen within the next week or so, hopefully in time for my birthday on the 14th October.

If you have anything you would like me to ask Frank on your behalf, then please leave a message in the comments section of this post.

Cheers and have a great day!

Ed

Anyway to topic of this post, .Co domains.

Well it am pretty dam sure that it won’t be .Co, not in my life time anyway!

I have waited for a while to let the initial rush of the .Co registrations die down to see how things have gone. As far as new registrations go, it has gone very very well with close to 500,000 .Co’s registered in the first few months. Not to bad at all. 

I have been reading posts on many domain blogs where people are talking up the .Co like it was going to knock the .Com off it’s number 1 spot in the next few years, it makes me laugh that these folks are so ignorant. Domain newbies would be the best way I can describe them and ignorant ones at that.

Now I am NOT saying that they don’t have a place and that they are not valuable, far from it. I think that the .Co is one of the better gTLD’s to come along in the past 10 years and I own about 30 of them myself. But to even suggest for a moment that they will take over as the king of domains is just delusional IMHO!

At the time of this post there are over 80 Million .Com’s registered and has taken 25 years to get to that number. With Billions of dollars of marketing and advertising dollars behind the brand of .Com it just won’t happen. 

So let’s re-visit this post in 5 years time to see how the .Co has gone and if it has overtaken the .Com. If it has I will eat my hat live on video.

Have a great day folks.

This weeks guest is Jeff Kupietzky from Oversee.net where Jeff talks about some interesting facts regarding Oversee that I have not heard discussed anywhere before.

After talking with Simon this afternoon he told me who will be on his next episode (but has sworn me to secrecy) and I am sure that it will be a great show, don’t miss it.

Well done Simon for getting this show of the ground.

The radio ad was for a new Australian business directory company called Bloo www.Bloo.com.au.

At the end of their ad spousing all of their great features and benefits they gave out the web address just as it sounds BLUE, they did not give the alternate spelling of BLOO to the listeners. Big mistake in my book! If they owned www.Blue.com.au and it redirected to www.bloo.com.au then that would be fine, but they don’t it just goes to a dead page.

So if you are going to run radio ads make sure you have the right combo of domains to cover yourself and if it is a different spelling make sure you let the listeners know how to spell it so they can at least find you.

Domainer Income

Simon has a huge amount of experience in the domain industry and has been flying low under the radar
so far, but that is all about to change with his new domain name management service.

In my opinion Simon has put together one of the best domain name investment tools available
today and I have looked at them all! He does have a limited version free trial so make sure and check it out.

Disclamer:!!! I am an affiliate of Domainer Income and will make a commission if you purchase the Pro version of Domainer Income but if that bothers you then just bypass my links and type the domain in yourself.
The product is that good I just think more people should know about it regardless.

Here is a short Bio on Simon.

Simon Johnson
Co-Founder Domainer Income

* Co-Founded one of Australia’s first ISPs (isp.com.au) and Internet Security companies (shake.net)
* Former writer for Australian Personal Computing Magazine
* Author of best selling book on Internet Safety (Keep Your Kids Safe), published worldwide by McGraw Hill.
* 12+ years working for large multinational companies in the areas of Security, Fraud and Risk.
* Co- Founder of DomainerIncome.com

Enjoy the podcast!

Coincidentally yesterday the domain name www.CaravanParks.com.au sold on Drop.com.au for AU$10,100.00

I did not go after the domain myself but I did say to my wife Lois that I thought it would go for between $8 – $10 thousand dollars.

Anyway that is enough work for 1 week, congrats to Shaun Pilford from DIRECT NAVIGATION DOMAINS for picking up the domain, it is a great one.

Great to hear from you again Frank, In my mind once a month or so is better than not at all.

Here is the link to Frank’s blog http://domainnamesales.com/sevenmile/blog/

Over the last 6 months the traffic to many of my Indian sites .IN & .CO.IN such as WaterPurifiers.in & SolarPanels.in has at least tripled and they are getting thousands more visitors per month than they have been getting in the past.

On average they are both in the Top 5 results on Google.co.in and are competing up there with the multi million / multi Billion dollar companies that are targeting the same premium keywords that I am.

This now opens up some possible opportunities for me to either sell the domains to these companies or enter into some type of JV partnership with them.

One such company is Tata BP Solar India Limited which is one of India’s largest companies comprising a partnership with Tata & BP which are both Billion dollar companies.

Although I am at this moment only monetizing these sites with Google AdSense, it will not be that way for much longer as I have always had bigger plans for these websites.

I also own many of Tata / BP’s core product domains such as -

SolarHotWater.in

SolarInverters.co.in

SolarLantern.co.in

SolarLantern.in

SolarLanterns.co.in

SolarLanterns.in

SolarPanel.in

SolarPanels.in

SolarPowerInverters.co.in

SolarPowerInverters.in

SolarStreetLight.co.in

SolarStreetLight.in

SolarStreetLights.co.in

SolarStreetLights.in

SolarWaterHeater.co.in

SolarWaterHeater.in

SolarWaterHeaters.co.in

SolarWaterHeaters.in

SolarWaterHeating.in

With the middle class population of India growing at a rapid rate and expected to be larger the the total population of the US within the next 10+ years, I think there are some very exciting times ahead for the Indian domain name market.

On average their prices are 20% – 50% cheaper than what we pay in Australia and they offer Free Book Delivery Worldwide which is a huge saving alone for us in Oz as the shipping prices we can pay from sites like Amazon are sometimes more than the cost of the books themselves.

I think they are also fairly competitive with Amazon on pricing for customers in the US so check them out.

I have ordered 7 books so far and have saved approx $45.00 and have told many of our friends who have also found it to be a much better deal.

In terms of a well developed website I think they have done a great job and have won some awards for the business in the UK as well.

The Book Depository

I think we have some very exciting times ahead for the .AU market.

Here are some screen shots of some names that sold at auction last Friday 28th May on Drop.com.au

Drop.com.au Secondary Market Domain Auction Part 1 of 3 28.05.10

Drop.com.au Secondary Market Domain Auction Part 2 of 3 28.05.10

Drop.com.au Secondary Market Domain Auction Part 3 of 3 28.05.10

David Lye, CEO Netfleet.com.au

I believe that the .AU market has huge potential and with the help of sites like Netfleet.com.au and partner company Netregistry.com.au that the general publics awareness of the value of quality generic domain names will only get stronger.

I hope you enjoy this podcast.

Cheers

Ed

Only half of Australian small businesses have a website and of those businesses that have a website, less than a quarter of them feel they use their website and the Internet well enough to get a real tangible dollar benefit from it.

Achieve More Online is part of the Federal Government’s $14M Small Business Online program. The program will help small businesses, particularly those in tourism and professional services – get online and achieve more.

You may already have a website and want it to work harder for you. Or you may be looking to go online for the first time. Whatever stage you are at, the Achieve More Online program has 7 small business specialists who will show you, in simple steps, how to improve your online presence to ultimately put more $$ in your bottom line.

1 day hands-on workshop, 12 locations across WA and NT

In just 1 day, you’ll learn the 8 fundamental building blocks of a successful online marketing and website strategy and have a complete action plan to help you put that knowledge to use.

The 7 small business owners and specialists in their field will show you how to use the Internet to promote your business and create a website that works to deliver real dollars to your bottom line.

From business planning through to optimising your site for search engines and simple online marketing tools, everything you need to know about developing a better online business will be delivered to you in an interactive workshop and 1-to-1 mentoring sessions where we will help you solve your business’ specific problems.

At the end of the 1 day workshop, you’ll understand the 8 building blocks of a well balanced, effective online marketing plan:

• business plan, target market & purpose
• website design
• content building & copywriting
• graphic design & layout
• website imagery & photos
• website traffic generating tools such as pay per click advertising (PPC) & search engine optimisation (SEO)
• website promotion & relationship building tools such as Twitter, Facebook & other social media
• and the often underutilised and powerful email marketing tools you have at your disposal

All it costs is just 1 day and $49

In just 1 day you will have a complete action plan to create or upgrade your small business website and all for only $49.

You’ll know the right steps involved, and you’ll have a smart detailed action plan to get you started. You can contact us for follow-up support if you need further help or guidance throughout the program.

Want more information or to register?

Workshops commence in June across several locations throughout metropolitan and country WA and the Northern Territory.

Visit our website www.businessbalance.com.au/sbo for more details and to register online or alternatively fill out the attached form and fax it back to us to secure your place.

If you have any questions please phone us on 1300 856 274.

We look forward to helping you get the most out of being online.

This is an Australian Government funded initiative under the Small Business Online program

First up www.CarParts.com.au went at auction on Drop.com.au for AU$18,012 and was picked up by Michael Sojevic from the domain blog www.DNTrade.com.au. Well done Michael, that is a record for Drop.com.au where the biggest previous drop was for www.Printing.com.au that went for AU$9221 last year.

I was bidding on this name but only got to AU$5000 as that was my budget, damm!!

The other big name to go was www.CurrencyTrading.com.au which went for AU$5206 and was also picked up by Michael Sojevic, well done again mate!
I got to AU$2500 for that one!!

ccTLD’s are alive and very well DownUnder.

If you have been keeping an eye on what has been happening in the domain world over the past 18 months or so you will have noticed a significant increase in ccTLD sales across the globe. Most recently the sale of Fly.co.za at Traffic in Vegas for US$65,000.  Now yes of course I hear all the .com crazed domainers yelling “but Fly.com would be worth at least 10 times that price”.  No SHIT!!

But how many of them could pony up and pay the price for the .com?? Very few! So as far as opportunity and price of entry go ccTLD’s are great value are are overlooked by many domainers for reasons that are usually based on ignorance!

Just go and take a look at Ron Jackson’s DN Journal Website and the domain sales list and see how many of the top 10 sales of last week were ccTLD.

ccTLD’s Rock and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise!

I have learned a great deal from him over the years regarding Google AdWords and my AdWords Consulting business would not be where it is today if it were not for his help and guidance.

Using Google AdWords is just another way of getting targeted traffic to your website and I know many domainers are using it as they get more into developing their domains.

If used correctly it can be a brilliant marketing tool that can bring you instant results but if you don’t know what you are doing it can max out your credit card very very quickly.

If you have not already read Perry’s brilliant book The Definitive Guide To Google AdWords then do yourself a favor and grab a copy as it will save you a great deal of pain and expense in learning the tricks of AdWords.

I hope you enjoy the podcast!

I am happy to announce that my business partners & myself have just picked up the domain www.AudioBooks.com.au from the www.drop.com.au (owned by Fabulous.com) auction yesterday. The name up until then had been registered since 1999 but had not been developed for whatever reason.

Audio Books are big business these days and getting bigger as time goes by. I have about 20 books that I have picked up from various places online to listen to on my MP3 player when I walk or exercise or just relaxing.

The plan is to develop the website into the leading authority in Australia for Audio Books and being a book worm both paper & audio this should be a fun project.

So if you know anyone that would like to do a deal and list their Audio Books for sale on our site when its completed please let me know.

Cheers

Ed

Happy New Year!

Over the past 2 + years since I started this domain names blog / podcast I have had many people email me who know I am a Google AdWords Consultant asking if I can do a podcast on Google AdWords relating to the synergies that it has with domain names. The two go hand in hand as far as I am concerned and a great domain name used in a great, well targeted & written AdWords campaign can be unstoppable if implemented properly.

Perry Marshall

Perry’s eBook  that he co-authored with Bryan Todd  The Definitive Guide To Google AdWords is the Bible for AdWords users and I have been reading the latest 2010 updated 277 page edition which is packed with brilliant examples of how to get the most from AdWords.

Perry is probably best known with his association with AdWords but is a brilliant marketer of which Google AdWords is just one of his weapons of choice online.
If you have never heard of Perry before then I guarantee you are in for a treat and will have access to some powerful marketing tools by following what Perry has to offer.

I will be recording the podcast with Perry early next week, so if you have any questions relating to Google AdWords then please email them to me ed@ozdomainer.com before the 10th of Jan.

Cheers

Ed

His “Clay’s 10 Commandments” are a great read and resonated with me completely. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

The only Drop service that I am aware of is www.drop.com.au (formally www.domain8.com.au up until a few weeks a go when it was sold to www.fabulous.com)

Added 02/12/09 Sorry forgot about www.domainwatch.com.au, I use www.drop.com.au a lot more though.

There have been many names dropping over the past weeks and months that should just never have been allowed to expire,  someone has taken their eye off the ball!!

Names like Townsville.com.au one of Australia’s most popular towns with tens of thousands of searches per month on Google Australia, who in their right mind would let that name drop. Surely it was not because they could not afford the AU$25.00 for 2 years renewal fee?? It went in the drop auction for AU$17,000 if my memory serves me (don’t quote me on that figure!) Then today we saw MotorHomes.com.au drop and was picked up for AU$5555.00 again with tens of thousands of searches on Google Australia.

So my question to you and other domain owners is this – Who Is Renewing Your Domain Names??? Who Has Been Given the Responsibility?? of making sure that you don’t lose your precious assets.

If you have a business / company and you have staff who’s job it is to manage the renewals of your domain names, make sure that you are included on the email list for renewal reminders even if you have it set within your registrar for Auto Renewal. Things can still go wrong with Auto Renewal in place such as credit cards expiring and what if the staff member responsible for these domains leaves the company and more than likely there company email address gets cancelled by the IT department not knowing that all of the renewal or domain related notices are set to go to that now non existent email address.

So go and double check all of your domains now to make sure you are protected from this happening, I am not sure about everyone else but paying the AU$25.00 renewal fee is a dam site cheaper than having to pay for it at auction due to ignorance or being lazy. Go check them now!

Cheers

OzDomainer

Just a quick update about a couple of podcasts -

Rick Silver from www.n49.ca

I am also happy to announce that I will be doing a podcast with Rick Silver from www.n49.ca / www.n49.com and we will be talking about his new role with Rick Latona & the Traffic shows as Panel Moderator. I met Rick in Amsterdam in June at the Traffic ccTLD conference. He is a great speaker and has a fantastic portfolio of generic .CA domains that he has developed over the years. So I will keep you posted on that interview when it goes live sometime in the very near future.

If you have yet to listen to my Podcasts with the other 2 Ricks, Rick Latona & Rick Schwartz then please have a listen to them at these links.

http://www.ozdomainer.com/domain-names-podcast-episode-5-with-rick-latona-from-ricklatonacom/

http://www.ozdomainer.com/domain-names-podcast-episode-10-with-rick-schwartz-domain-king/

This was the first time we met in person but we have conversed on the internet many times and he was a guest on my Domain Names Podcast several months back. Here is the link to that podcast for those of you who have not listened to it yet. Morgan Linton Podcast.

We went out for a nice meal and talked about (you guest it) Domain Names! in particular ccTLD domains as we both have a strong interest in that market place. We also talked about the Apple iPhone (doesn’t everyone???) as we both have the latest 3GS which IMHO is just brilliant and a complete game changer in the Smart Phone game!

Morgan is a very switched on young man and has some great plans for his website DomainVestors.tv and will be conducting a series of video interviews with various domain name investors next year so watch out for those!

Thanks for your visit to Perth Morgan, it was great to finally meet you in person. I hope you enjoyed your trip down south to Margaret River and did lots of wine tasting. It is Gods country down there, one of my favorite places on earth.

I met Gregg at the Traffic ccTLD conference this year in Amsterdam but did not get to spend any time with him which would of been great but he was very busy and hard to get a hold of, maybe we can have a talk on a podcast at some stage as I am sure it would be great listening.

Well done again by Ron Jackson, he truly is the master of interviews! I especially love the bit with the cow giving birth (thats where Gregg gets his hands dirty)

Every time I look in forums or on domain blogs there seems to be some dickhead trying to flog their worthless domains to some poor unsuspecting domain newbie that gets sucked into the who “Premium Domain” bullshit. Excuse my French but this reeeeeeally pisses me off.

Trust me on this one, www.i-bloody-great-bullshit-domain-name.biz does not class as a “Premium Domain” in my books.

People who are new to domains and reading this blog, please please please!!! DO YOU RESEARCH before you hand over your cash for these rubbish domains.

I could go and register 100 new hand registered names that are better than 80% of the crap that I see being bought and sold in the domain aftermarket. STOP and THINK! before you buy a name, ask yourself, Is this a generic word or phrase that is being searched on in Google or the other Search Engines or is it just some made up crap that someone thinks is a great idea and is sure to catch on one day or be “Brandable”.

Sorry to rant on guys & girls but this has just gotten beyond a joke and I had to say something.

PS. My above Premium Domain i-bloody-great-bullshit-domain-name.biz is for sale for a limited time only for the bargain basement price of just US$10,000!

Any takers???

Regards

Ed

Paul Sloan

My guests today on Domain Names Podcast are Paul Sloan & David Carter from www.PlayingTheAngles.com

David Carter

Paul Sloan is a longtime journalist, who has worked for Fortune Magazine, National Public Radio, CNN and a bunch of other places, on staff and as a freelancer. Paul has interviewed people such as Kevin Ham in that great article that was published in the Business 2.0 Magazine back in May 2007 before the magazine closed down.

Paul has teamed up with David Carter, an Internet Marketing specialist and domain name investor from the UK and together, they plan on building an interactive site, based on interviews and business experiments with some of the world’s finest entrepreneurs.

One of their first guests in Frank Schilling who does not do that many interviews and has some great gems of wisdom in the interview with Paul.

These are two very switched on guys who I am sure will have great success with their new project at Playing The Angles

Thanks to them both for being on my podcast, I hope you enjoy what they have to say.

Chef Patrick

On this episode of Domain Names Podcast my guest is Patrick Ruddell from www.ChefPatrick.com.

Patrick started his Domain Names Blog only 12 months ago and has built it into a fantastic resource for the domain industry. With its unique blend of Video, Comic Strips & Reviews it stands out from the crowd of often same old same old domain blogs.

Patrick has put a great deal of effort into his WordPress based website and I think he has done a great job for a “Non Techie” as he calls himself.

I hope you enjoy the podcast.

If you have any questions you would like me to ask Johns in the interview then please email me ed(@)ozdomainer.com or make a comment on this post. Cheers Ed

Morgan has had various websites relating to the Domain Name industry running over the past few years and has a wealth of knowledge on the buying and selling of domains, development on domains, SEO & domain brokerage.

Morgan kindly offered a discount on his services to Oz Domainer Podcast listeners and by simply quoting “OZ 111″ in an email or over the phone to Morgan he will give a 20% discount on his regular fees. This was not a planned thing and just happened during the podcast and I get NO commissions or kickbacks from Morgan for this referral.

I think Morgan is a very smart young guy who has a great business mind and work ethic and will be one of the domainers to watch out for as he is very focused and doing some great work.

I hope you enjoy this podcast.

They are all listed on the no-reserve auction. Please let me know what you think.

They are as follows -

accesscontrol.info
adsl2.org
artdecofurniture.info
bluetoothheadset.info
broadbandcard.net
businessclassairfares.info
cameratripods.org
classiccarshows.info
cranescales.net
electricalswitches.net
fifthwheels.org
fifthwheelrv.net
fifthwheelrvs.net
firepits.info
gpssystem.org
hosefittings.net
hvacsystems.org
hvacfilters.net
industrialclothing.org
industriallighting.org
industrialtools.org
industrialvacuum.org
industrialvacuums.org
learnfirstaid.org
ledglobe.net
onlinetravelagents.net
pdareview.net
retailindustry.org
smallbusinessvoip.net
swimmingpoolcovers.org
toggleswitches.net
touchscreenmonitor.org
wirelessaccesspoints.net
wirelessopticalmouse.net

So while I was looking at these names that I own -

www.mountain-bike.com.au

www.mountain-bikes.com.au

www.road-bike.com.au

www.road-bikes.com.au

www.bmx-bike.com.au

www.bmx-bikes.com.au

I came across this website www.bicyclestore.com.au which on its own is a half decent domain name to have, but I also discovered that this same business owned www.mountainbike.com.au, www.mountainbikes.com.au, www.roadbikes.com.au & www.bmxbikes.com.au, which all redirect to his main website, not a bad effort and who knows how many other generic domain names he owns relating to his products and services.

Now without talking with the owners of the business I can never be sure of how much traffic that those names are bringing in but I did a quick calculation using the Google AdWords Keyword Tool set for “Australian” stars and it would be over 360,000 searches per month just on the exact match phrases alone for those names.

So its great to see that more and more businesses seem to be getting a grasp of the true value of generic domain names.

On this episode of Domain Names Podcast I talk with my mate Ben Wilks, Domainer & SEO Guru! Now I do not use the word GURU very lightly as it gets used a great deal where it shouldn’t be, but in Ben’s case it would be an understatement if anything.

Ben has been working in SEO & Web Publishing since his mid teens (he turns 30 this year) so for 15 years or half his life. Now I know for a fact that Ben would more than likely be cringing when I use the word “Guru” as it is something he would never say about himself.

So in this podcast we mainly talk about SEO and its relationship to domain names and cover some of the important facts relating to SEO. Ben has only one client and is not actively looking for more, he uses his talents these days to work on his own domain development projects rather than having to deal with clients.
But as he you will hear in the podcast, if you are very very very!!!! serious about an SEO project he is happy to talk turkey with you.

During the podcast we mentioned a very good SEO Tutorial website Called Hobo Web, here is the link.

Enjoy!

Zappy shares his years of experience online and talks about what lead him to where he is today, what he thinks the future of the internet has to offer  & we discuss his latest project www.InternetWarrior.com

A special thanks goes out to Andrew Hazen from InternetIdeas.net for helping me contact Zappy when my emails to him were not getting through for whatever reason. Thanks mate!

I would also like to thank everyone who has made comments and posted links on their blogs/websites about how much they enjoy this podcast. I have had a few requests from listeners about who they would like me to interview on future podcasts such as Frank Schilling, Mike Berkens & Rob Grant to name but a few. So if you do have someone that you want to hear from please let me know and I will endeavor to get them on the show.

So starting with Frank Schilling! if you are reading this or if someone knows how to contact Frank I would love to hear from him. Same goes for Mike Berkins & Rob Grant.

Regards

Ed

I was fortunate enough to meet Edwin on the first day of the Traffic ccTLDs  conference in Amsterdam and spent many hours talking about domains with him. He is a very switched on guy and has been around the domain industry since the mid to late 90′s and started one of the first ever if not the first website all about buying, selling and investing in domain names called www.igoldrush.com.

Many of you may have seen it of late as it is still around but was sold by Edwin several years ago to its current owners.

One of Edwin’s current projects (of which there are many) is his domain sales website www.memorabledomains.co.uk which lists many of his domains for sale targeted mainly at the .CO.UK domain market.

This is the longest podcast I have done at 1Hr & 16Mins in length. (yes I know I could cut it in half and have 2 separate podcasts, but time is just not permitting on that front) as Edwin has some great insights into many other domain related subjects such as domain development, mini-sites, marketing of domains and much much more.

Make sure you take notes as there are some gems in this podcast for those of you who have your ears and your mind open!

So grab yourself a cup of something, sit down and enjoy the podcast.

Jeff and I talk about the Indian domain names market, Traffic ccTLD Amsterdam and the ccTLD market in general.
Jeff is a very smart guy who really gets the .IN domain extension and his Indian Domain Forum is the leading authority on the subject.

If you have any interest at all in Indian domains make sure you have a listen to this podcast and check out his forum.

I have been trying to get in touch with Mike “Zappy” Zapolin from www.internetrealestate.com & www.internetwarrior.com to arrange to do an interview with him but both emails I have sent to him (two different emails as well) have had no response.

I am unsure if he is getting them at all?? So if anyone who reads this has a way of passing on a message to Zappy then I would be very grateful.

I think Zappy would be a great person to interview for my Domain Names Podcast if I could only get in touch with him.

Zappy can email me on ed(@)ozdomainer.com or just make a comment on this blog post.

Regards

Ed Keay-Smith

Rick is a “tell it like it is” type of guy which is one of the reasons I like to read his blog religiously over at http://www.ricksblog.com

The conversation started in the toilet and progressed from there. (you will have to listen to it it to find out more).

We talked about everything from his start in domains, some of his recent sales and what he thinks lies ahead for the industry.

I greatly enjoyed my talk with Rick and I hope you learn something from this very sharp business man.

Enjoy!

I have been asked by a few people if I thought flying all the way from Perth to Amsterdam (which is about a 24 hour trip including layovers) was worth it?

I think the answer comes back to the type of person you are, If you are the type of person who is shy, sticks to themselves and only goes to the sessions in the day then it may not be the best investment of your time and money but you may just pick up one thing from a speaker that could be very important to your business.

If you are the type of person who is outgoing, like to meet new people and network then you would be crazy not to go as you will learn more in the first day (especially if you are new to domaining) than you could imagine.

This is what these seminars and conferences always come down to for me, THE OTHER PEOPLE ATTENDING! I look back over the past 5 years at some of the conferences I have been to and some of my closest friends and business associates have come from them. Even though I live thousands of miles away from them we always keep in tough on a regular basis through the magic of the internet and programs such as Skype www.skype.com

Howard Neu Singing

********************************************************
The one thing I am sure of is that everyone who attended Traffic ccTLDs Amsterdam left with something different, new business connections, new ideas of how to do business, new friends and a few hangovers as well LOL but the important thing now is what is done with this new found information or business associates. If nothing is done then you may as well not have attended. Massive action is the key, act now while the information and inspiration are still fresh (I am speaking to myself here as well LOL)

One thing I did learn is that Howard Neu has a great voice as he demonstrated on the second evenings dinner event at West India House where a great time was had by all I am sure.

So thanks to all the people like Rick Latona, Howard Neu & Rick Schwartz for putting on these events and bringing people together from across the globe to share their information and view points regarding domain names. I still consider myself a very small fish in a very large pond but I am having a great time learning from everone else and hearing their stories. Thanks to all of those people who I talked with at Traffic ccTLDs and until the next time we meet I wish you all great fortune and happiness.

I was going to give a detailed blow by blow description of the event but then I realized it was pretty pointless after reading Ron Jackson’s coverage of the event in his recent June 2009 cover  story at www.DNJournal.com.  The guy does such a great job it would be very very very hard to do it better.

So rather than just repeating what Ron covered so well I will just give some of my viewpoints and opinions of what I thought of the event.

First point is to again thank Mark Fulton from the Domain Blog www.DotSauce.com for passing on the ticket to me to for the event that he won from Rick Latona. If you have not been to Mark’s blog check it out as it is one of the best out there!

One of the main reasons myself and others go to these industry events / conferences is to meet people and network. The sessions are great most of the time and I always learn something, but what you learn from just having a chat over a drink with someone is so much more rewarding that I would go just for that reason alone.

Considering it was Rick’s first major event it was run very well with only a few teething problems that you can only learn from over time which I am sure they will. If I had to give it a score out of 10 for how the conference was run I would say it was about an 8.5 /10 which is very decent in my books.

But the devil is in the details and I have been spoiled in the past by some of the internet marketing events that I have attended in the past where the details really really matter! Even to the point where they will get the attending guests to fill in a quick survey at the end of the conference to get feedback on what the attendees did and did not like about the conference and what could be improved.

I thing this is an important step and I have done this myself at seminars that I have run through my own business at home. If you don’t ask you will never really know as most people are polite and even if they did not like something they may still say it was “fine”. However if you give them an anonymous opportunity to speak their mind they will be free to tell the truth about what they think.

(From Left to Right) Jeff Behrendt, Ed Keay-Smith, Edwin Hayward & Matt Asher.

***********************************************************
I came away from the conference with some new friends and business associates and thats what it is all about in my book. It was great to get to know people like Jeff Behrendt from www.InForum.in as we have chatted many many times online about Indian domains but this was the first time we had met. Jeff’s Indian domain name forum is the leader in regards to the Indian domain space and is well worth your time if you have any interest in the .CO.IN or .IN domain extension (a sleeping giant IMHO). I shared a hotel room with Jeff and we had some good laughs, he’s pretty funny for a Canadian LOL!

Another kindred spirit that I met at the conference was Edwin Hayward from www.MemorableDomains.co.uk. Edwin was one of the panelists at the conference and did a very fine job of covering the UK domain extension. I got talking with Edwin on the very first day of the conference and we seemed to get on well and had a great appreciation of the .CO.UK ccTLD of which Edwin is a leading authority on the subject. Some of the things I picked up from Edwin in the first few hours of meeting him were well worth the time and effort of getting from Perth to Amsterdam for the conference. I came home with a completely different view on my domains and what I would be doing with them in the future but more of that in an upcoming blog post!

Matt Asher was someone who I only got to know in the last few days of the trip but was a great guy with a very nice collection of names who is also from Canada. Mark own www.freebeer.com which is a name many males would appreciate! Matt is American by birth but moved North to Canada from the US and now calls it home.

All of the guys I have just mentioned and I spent the Friday morning after the conference checking out Amsterdam on foot and on a boat ride and had lunch at a very nice little restaurant to top it all off.

It was great catching up again with Elliot & Karen Silver (from www.elliotsblog.com) who I met in New York last year when I was travelling with my family and also meeting for the first time Ron & Diana Jackson & Rick Latona who have both been a guest on my Domain Names Podcast.

Well this is all for now, more to follow in Part 2 where I will discuss my upcoming project idea that I decided to work on from talking with people at Traffic ccTLD’s.************************************************************

Ron & Diana Jackson

Ben picked up the name www.Pay-Per-Click.com.au so we are developing that into a full Pay Per Click services website.

I have been a Google AdWords consultant for 5 years now and it works in well with my domaining business (I like to call it the same dog, just a differnet leg) as they both work at achieving the same goal, more targetted traffic and conversion of that traffic into leads and sales.

I am very happy to say that this time next week I will be in Amsterdam attending Rick Latona’s TRAFFIC ccTLD conference in Amsterdam.

I was fortunate enough to win a ticket from Mark Fulton from www.dotsauce.com Domain Blog. Mark was awarded the ticket himself for being the person to make the most number of blog posts on Rick Latona’s new www.cctlds.com website / forum, unfortunately for Mark his passport was out of date and he was not going to have enough time to get it renewed. He put it up for grabs on his site and I put my name down for it and gratefully he chose me to have the ticket.

So a quick airfare purchase and room reservation and I am now all set. So thanks very much again to Mark Fulton for the ticket.

I look forward to catching up again with Elliot & Karen Silver and also meeting for the first time Rick Latona & Ron Jackson who have both been interviewed by myself on this blog / podcast.

I will be sharing a room at the hotel with Jeff from www.inforum.in so no doubt we will have lots to talk about regarding the Indian domain name industry.

So all in all I think the conference will be great knowing the quality of the organizers and the speakers, but I look forward mostly to getting to meet new friends and business partners and catching up with others.

Wake up Corporate World Exec’s because if you don’t you will be left in the dust scratching your heads wondering what the hell just happened.

Enjoy!

I am looking forward to this interview as I have huge respect for what Rick has done in and for the domain industry over the years.

The interview will not happen until after TRAFFIC ccTLD in Amsterdam as Rick has a full schedule and some holidays between now and then so that gives anyone who has specific questions that they would like to ask Rick the time to get them to me.

Funnily Rick and I were both quoted in the same article in the Australian newspaper The Sydney Morning Herald in Jan 2008
I spoke about that in this post http://www.ozdomainer.com/rick-schwartzs-rivers-of-gold-story-from-the-sydney-morning-herald/

Cheers

Ed

The Career Advice website is a long term development project run by my wife Lois who is a Career Advisor and we will also be working on joint ventures with other career practitioners across Australia.

It is only a few weeks old but getting a nice traffic flow and has brought in 2 consulting leads straight off the bat.

This was a domain that was dropped after being registered for 5 years or so by the original owner but for some reason was not renewed.

Just goes to show that you can find some great domains out there at registration fee if you keep your eyes peeled.

Cheers

Ed

I consider Ron to be the top guy when it comes to reporting on whats happening in the Domain world with his great interviews that he does with the who’s who of domainers, his coverage of all the major domain name conferences and his relentless tracking of the sales that are happening in the domain industry.

I hope you enjoy the Podcast.

I then started my consulting business AdWords Marketing in 2004 and have been involved in the PPC (Pay Per Click) advertising industry ever since.

One area of setting up a PPC ad campaign that often gets overlooked is the display URL used at the bottom of the ads.

Google allows a maximum of 35 characters including spaces to be used for the display URL so having the most relevant keyword rich domain name
as a huge benefit when it comes to getting a higher click through rate and quality score for your ads.

I have run tens of thousands of ads on AdWords over the past 5 years and without a doubt a campaign that has the most relevant domain name used as its display URL will kick the ass of the same ad doing an A/B Split test where the only thing that is different in the 2 ads running at a 50/50 split is the display URL.

Let me give you an example where the search term is “Factoring Finance”-

Considering Factoring?
New Free Service Finds the
Right Factoring Finance for You!
FactoringFinance.com.au

vs

Considering Factoring?
New Free Service Finds the
Right Factoring Finance for You!
JohnBrownFinance.com.au

Although the only difference is the display URL, it can make a HUGE difference in the click through rate of the ad just because the URL matches the search.
It has been effective for me 9 times out of 10 over the years. Google has made it much harder in recent times to test different URL’s within the same Ad Group
but I can assure you it is very very effective.

This is another reason to have high quality keyword rich domain name that does not get talked about a great deal by domainers, food for thought!!

Here is what Google has to say in its Google AdWords Guidelines -

Display URL must be accurate.

• Your Display URL must accurately reflect the URL of the website that you’re advertising. It should match the domain of your landing page so that users know which site they will be taken to when they click your ad.
• Where you have keyword URLs, these are considered to be your Destination URLs and the Display URL must accurately reflect them.
• The Display URLs within each ad group must have the same domain.
• The Display URL field cannot be used as another line of ad text.
• Your Display URL must include the domain extension, for example: .co.uk, .net or .org.
• If your actual Destination URL link is too long to use as your Display URL, use a shortened version (such as your homepage) that meets the character limit for this field.
  Example:
  Destination URL: http://www.TravellingDog.net/toys.html
  Display URL: www.TravellingDog.net

For those who have not seen it yet, Rick Latona has opened up his new forum dedicated to ccTLD’s.

You can fin out more about it here www.cctlds.com , If you join the forum (which is free) feel free to mention
me as where you heard about it from. My forum user name is OzDomainer, look me up when you drop by.

Ron is the main man in the Domain Industry for covering all the major events and is responsible for some of the best domainer interviews I have ever read.

I think it would be great to get some questions for Ron to answer from readers of my blog, so please feel free to submit them to me during February so I can put them to him on the day.

Well it is!

Ron Jackson has just posted this today – The State of the Industry January 2009: 15 Leading Experts Break Down What Went Wrong in 2008 and Predict What Will Happen in 2009 and it would have been worth reading if it had only been the last post by Leading Expert #15 (you will have to read the article to find out who it is)

DO NOT WASTE A SECOND MORE ON MY BLOG! GET YOUR BUTTS OVER TO THE ARTICLE NOW

It can be a mine field of information to follow and process and if you have tens of thousands of dollars invested then you had better start paying attention.

You could be in for a rude awakening one day when the law or a company that thinks it has the rights to ownership of one of your names comes a knockin!

My mate Erhan Karabardak from Cooper Mills Lawyers based in Melbourne Australia is a global authority in the areas of Domain, ISP & Telco law.

Erhan was a guest speaker at the recent Traffic Down Under Seminar held in Queensland Australia (check out Erhan’s talk on video here)

Now seeing as I am a Pro Reseller of GoDaddy through my website www.DomainNamesJunction.com that makes me a happy camper as I can register them for only $12.99 which over the next year will be a big cost saving exercise when I will transfer my 320+ .IN & .CO.IN domains across to GoDaddy.

Are you ready to grab your share of over 60 million internet users in India?*  *Figure comes from internetworldstats.com

I like to keep an eye on my domains as often as possible to check their traffic stats which may be as often as every 3-4 days or so for my different accounts and domain TLD’s & ccTLD’s.

It always grabs my attention when there is a large traffic spike in particular when its not just over a day or so which could be news or current event related to cause an increase in searches. But when the increase stays there and does not drop back down again it usually points to one thing, Google!

I have had quite a few domains that this has happened to recently and I don’t think that it is a coincident that all of these domains are parked with the same parking company www.parked.com as I think they have one of the better custom domain setups that seems to be very “SEO friendly”.

One of my domains on the subject of Electrical Switches www.electricalswitches.net is ranked about number twelve on Google’s global search using a broad keyword search which is not to bad at all considering that it is only parked. The exact match phrase “electrical switches” lists about 433,000 websites that have that phrase on their site according to the Google results and www.electricalswitches.net is listed at number 9 on Google.

So needless to say that the ppc income has gone up accordingly from what it was a few months ago of about $2 per month to approx $15 per month now.
Now this is not going to buy my New Nissan GT-R any time soon (the best sports car ever to come out of Japan IMHO and a “super car killer“)

The downside to parked.com is that as yet they don’t have a domain sales after market to handle any enquiries about the domain if you have it listed for sale, just a basic contact form which is ok. I would prefer the best of both worlds but with all of the parking companies I am yet to find it.

Still I am impressed with the rankings of my indexed parked pages and while the domains are waiting to get developed they are paying for themselves then well and good.

My daughter Sasha who is 10 years old has just published her first website called Horse Obsession (www.horseobsession.com)

We registered the domain name back in November 2004 for reasons mentioned here http://www.horseobsession.com/about-this-site/

Sasha wrote all of the content herself other than the “About HO”  page which we helped with and with a bit of help from Daddy (Me) setup the WordPress blog to run it on.

We are hoping that over time the site will help to pay for or at least to lease a horse for her to ride on a regular basis other than her fortnightly riding lessons.

All of the 410 horse related pictures that are and will be on the website are from the trip that we are currently on (see Laptop Nomads)

The banner was created using Banner Maker Pro 7 in about 10 minutes by Sasha and me using her photos.

I think that it is great that we can teach Sasha about websites, affiliate & internet marketing, domain names etc based on her working on a subject that she is “obsessed” with and that it can give her some options of how to generate an income when she gets older rather than having to go and trade hours for dollars (not that there is anything wrong with that!)

Any links back to Sasha’s site would be greatly appreciated, also any comments left on www.horseobsession.com to Sasha would be great as well.

Cheers from Ed in Japan

Perry is one of the best all round marketers that I have ever met and what he has to say in this video is well worth the 15 mins or so it takes to watch it.

Do yourself a favour and check out the video at http://www.perrymarshall.com/bite-the-hand-that-feeds/

Me playing drums at my 40th Birthday Bash

What do drummers have in common with domainers you may ask.

Well the successful drummers (like the ones you will see in a moment in the video below) didn’t take any shortcuts to get as great as they are.
To get where they are and their level of success they work hard, practice and are always looking at improving their chops and perfecting the art of playing the drums.

Being a drummer myself I know how hard it can be and just when you think you are are getting somewhere you watch a video like this one and realise that it is a life long learning process.

I think the the domain business is the same. I am a bit over hearing people complaining in forums etc about how hard it is and that they are not making any money. When they have only been in the game for 5 minutes! Stop whining and start learing from people that have walked the path before you. Stop looking for the quick buck and focus. As my good mate James Martell always says “No Hocus Pocus, Just Focus”.

The drummers in the video (Dave Weckl, Vinnie Colaiuta & Steve Gadd) are some of the very best in the business and they did not get that way buy accident, they have invested tens on thousands of hours practising just like successful domainers can spend thousands of hours looking over domain lists to find a great domain or developing websites.

Master you art people!  Drummer or Domainer its all the same principals.

I hope you enjoy the video as much as I do as it keeps getting better as it goes along ( it is quite a few years old so please forgive Dave Weckl for his hairstyle LOL)

I like to look at the traffic stats and see which keyword phrases are being used the most to bring in traffic to my sites and it can often be phrases that you may not have thought about. Then I will check that phrase and see if it is available to register as a .com or the equivalent ccTLD for the market that your site is targeting.

Here is an example of what I am talking about -

My wife has had a site for her Career Consulting business for the past 4 years called Career Wisdom (www.careerwisdom.com.au) One night about 9 months ago I was looking over the analytics stats to see which keywords / phrases were bringing in the most traffic.

The number one phrase that brought in the most traffic was (and still is) “career quotes” which is not of any great targeted value to Lois for her consulting as she mainly deals with clients in Australia. The domain name www.careerquotes.com was taken so I did not bother with any other extensions and seeing as she is number one or two most of the time in google we are still getting lots of traffic (just not sure what to do with it at this point, any ideas are welcome )

But the next highest keyword phrase that was bringing in great traffic was “career advice” so I checked the availability of the .com & the .com.au. The .com was taken but to my surprise the .com.au was available. It was 2 am by this stage and I checked the whois 3 times in different places and sure enough it was available. Excellent!!

As it turns out it had been registered for 6 years by someone who let it expire for whatever reason so I snapped it up as quickly as I could fill in my reg details at my registra.

Now www.careeradvice.com.au brings in a very decent amount of type-in traffic every month to www.careerwisdom.com.au and is going to be developed in 2009 as its own website seeing it is one of the top searched on phrases in the career industry in Australia.

I have done this with many other websites such as my www.waterpurifiers.in website and registered www.homewaterpurifiers.co.in & www.homewaterpurifiers.in as well which is one of the higher searched on phrases for that industry in India. You get what I am on about now I am sure.

My point is that if I had not checked my analytics stats I would never have found that www.careeradvice.com.au was available and also many of the other domains that now bring in type-in traffic to my other sites.

You can get similar stats from your hosting plans (such as Host Gator Web Hosting) using stat counters such as AW Stats or Webalizer but I much prefer the detail and user interface that Google Analytics provides.

Regardless of the tool you use, start looking at your website stats you may be surprised at the keyword / phrases that bring in the most traffic to your site and you never know, they may be available to register as well.

Happy domain hunting

It is no surprise to me that China is now the leading country in terms of the number of internet users it has with 253 Million users beating the US with 220 Million and of course the amazing thing is that China has only a 19% user penetration to reach number 1 where the US has a 72.5% user penetration. This leaves room for massive growth over the next 5 – 10 years for China. Even if they only grow to 40% in the next 10 years that is over 500 Million internet users and that is huge numbers in anyone’s book.

But the country that excites me the most is of course India. No surprise there to my regular readers! With over 60 Million internet users to date it is number 4 on the list just after Japan. With a population of over 1.1 Billion people its user penetration is a tiny 4% which leaves massive room for growth. So happy days I think are ahead for the .co.in & .in ccTLD. Every day I am picking up great one & two word domains at reg fee which in time I am sure will be worth 50x times what I paid for them.

I have already seen an increase in interest for my .co.in & .in domains through Sedo and have sold a few over the past 12 months for anywhere between a 50x – 150x return.

I am constantly re-investing my profits into buying more Indian domains and developing the ones that I like the most. I can’t buy them all and don’t have the time to look every day, but there are still GREAT Indian domains to be had at reg cost. I still invest in other ccTLD’s and have several hundred .com, net & org’s in my portfolio and also .co.uk but I think the diamonds in the rough are my .co.in & .in domains. Give it a few more years and I will either be laughing or being laughed at. Nothing ventured nothing gained!

I have spoken about my mini-site www.waterpurifiers.in which is being slowly developed over time and is starting to get some great results on Google.

It now ranked number 10 on Google India for the search term “water purifiers“  and is number 1 for many more longer tail phrases such as “home water purifiers“.

The AdSense revenue is picking up and in the near future I should be putting some advertising on the site as well.

So after only 3 months or so being live it is coming along nicely and should only get stronger over time as more content gets added to the site.

I have also launched about 2 weeks ago my site www.solarpanels.in with which I am following the same principals as www.waterpurifiers.in
There is only a few pages of content on Solar Panels as I am drip feeding the content over time.

My goal with these sites is to have JV partners and advertisers as the main revenue source rather than PPC and more than likely get rid of PPC all together, but for now if they make a few dollars a day it helps to cover the cost of development.

My answer to that is it depends on a few things.

I would NOT recommend putting a great deal of time into developing non dot coms other that ccTLD’s such as .com.au, .co.uk or .in etc as the owners of the .com version of your domain will gain a fair bit of the benefits of your hard work.

I would (and do myself) recommend building mini-sites around .net, .org etc but not a fully developed site. Min sites in my experience produce a much higher rate of return than having the domains parked.

I have no problem in spending time and money building sites on my ccTLD domains as they are usually targeted at the local markets and have a strong domain extention recognition in their respective countries such the .com.au for the Australian market.

I also think that your chances of ranking well in the search engines with ccTLD,s is much better when targeting a local market but you can rank well with almost any name if your Search Engine Optimization is done well.

I have travelled on many Hi Speed strains on this trip and I thought that it would be hard to top the European trains like the TGV & Renfe Hi Speed in Spain but the Japanese are the masters of this form of travel and it has given me some great content for a site I will be developing called www.travelbytrain.net

The train was 16 cars long and seemed to go forever. When the train pulled into the station there was a whole line of cleaners waiting to get on after the passengers were all off so they could clean the train for the next lot of passengers. I counted on average 4 cleaners (all women) per car x 16 cars WOW! They do a great job as the trains were the cleanest we have seen in 6 months except for maybe Switzerland and as for running on time, we are talking to the seconds in departure timing from the trains I was watching, very very impressive.

The Japanese also will the “Fastest Internet Connection Known To Mankind” award (well at least the fastest we havw had on this trip anyway) with an average download speed of 24 megabytes per second and an average upload speed of 14 megabytes per second. NICE!! (Stats taken from www.speedtest.net)

We have had some fast connections in other countries but this just makes life much easier when you are working on the road building websites, buying & selling domains, talking on skype etc.

We start off in Tokyo for a few days then off to Kyoto & Osaka for another 20 days.

What I have noticed so far in Tokyo is that they have some strange domain names indead!

In one of the local magazines which promotes hotels there was a high percentage of hyphenated domain names.

For eg. www.central-inn.net, www.ark-hotel.co.jp, www.toyoko-inn.com I could go on but there were way to many with hyphens it would take me all night.
Lets just say they like their hyphenated domain names!

There was also a Japanese hotel using an Indian Hyphenated ccTLD domain www.e-room.in/royalkj/ go figure???

In the one to top the lot was one we saw walking down the street which was www.eeeeeee.jp/ Look out LLL & LLLL markets, here comes the LLLLLLL.
Now if anyone can guess what the company does at www.eeeeeee.jp/ before you click on the link, I will buy you a beer!

More strange domain name sitings from Japan coming soon.

Looking at most of the dropped domain names these days is its blatantly obvious that most people registering domain names don’t have a clue as to what constitutes a good or great domain name. Yes there can be exceptions to the rule but they are few and far between.

If the people registering these very poor, nonsensical domains had only read Ron Jackson’s great website Domain Newbie first, they may have thought twice about registering them and done some research before hand.

Name Newbie

Ron’s other site that he is much better known for is DN Journal which as MUST read also for all domainers / developers.

I have chatted to Ron via email many months ago (before I left for my 7 month trip) about him being the subject of one of my future podcasts but we have both been very busy so it is on the to do list!

It is a spoof video from “Domain Name Dollar Store”

Take a look you should get a laugh, even if you have watched it before!

The funny (& sad) thing is that most of the names in the video are better than most of the drop lists these days.

Cheers

Ed

Rick Latona had this to say after the Traffic DownUnder show had finished “Clearly the .au names were popular which shouldn’t have been a surprise considering we were in Australia. This only confirms my theory and supports my decision to focus solely on ccTLDs during my own show in Amsterdam this coming June. More on that coming soon.”

I look forward to seeing what Rick has planned for the ccTLD market place next year.

Also Ron Jackson from DN Journal headlined one of his latest posts with this “Year’s Biggest Country Code Sale Takes a Spot Among the First Three on Our YTD Top 100 Domain Sales Chart” read his report on recent ccTLD sales here

To get an idea of just how big the ccTLD market is, take a look at this map of all ccTLD,s made up by John Yunker from Byte Level Research

You can even order prints of the map to put on your wall if you so desire!

Please note this info about the map below-

Each ccTLD is sized relative to the population of the country or territory, with the exception of China and India, which were restrained by 30% to fit the layout. At the other end of the spectrum, the smallest type size used reflects those countries with fewer than 10 million residents.

(Click on the image below to maximise)

ccTLD Map

Here is an extract from that post.

“About 6 months ago I made a list of about 500+ .co.in & .in domains that I was looking at registering.

I purchased about 100+ of the ones that I liked the best and left the rest for later or in this case other people.

One domain that I did not register was pvcpipes.in. A very good name, but I had others to deal with.

Well, checking back on it and others I see that quite a few of them have been registered by companies and NOT (as far as I can tell) by domainers.

The company that now owns pvcpipes.in is a manufacturer in India of you guessed it – PVC Pipes.

It is a trend that I think will get stronger as the Indian domain market gets more recognition from the Indian population.”

To read the whole post go here

We chose The Hard Rock Cafe in Time Square as had been there last year and wanted to take my wife Lois & daughter Sasha there. As it turned out Elliot & Karen had never been there either so off we all went.

We had a great time and great food and of course we talked about domain names and websites in general for most of the night but that is a fun thing to do with someone that really “gets” domain names.

Elliot is organising a Doaminers get together in New York on the 9th of December (read about it here http://www.elliotsblog.com/index.php/new-york-domainer-get-together/) if you live in New York or anywhere near get along to it, I know I would if I lived in New York.

The Gang at The Hard Rock Cafe New York

Here is the link www.trafficdownunder.com Unfortunately I will NOT be there (drats and double drats) but my family trip comes first www.laptopnomads.com

If I was back in Oz I would be there in a heartbeat. Next time I hope!

My fellow Aussie Domainer Michael Gilmour will be there and has posted a very useful guide http://www.whizzbangsblog.com/index.php/20081031482/MyBlog/Saturday-Musings-learninga-about-Australia-and-TRAFFIC-Downunder.html for people coming from oversees on how we talk in Oz and what some of our terms & phrases are. I had a good laugh reading it and it even made me feel a bit homesick

One thing for sure (and I know this is bias) but Australia is dam great place to live and raise a family. Great country, beaches, weather, people & opportunity.
So if you have not been DownUnder, do yourself a favour and get on the plane and get your butts down here.

If you are going to be going please drop me a line in the comments area of this post and I would love to talk with you during and after the event to report on how it is going and how it went when its all finished. Love to hear from you.

I am in Europe at the moment on my Laptop Nomads Trip and have just spent 10 days in Switzerland.

Sasha & Ed at top of Schilthorn Mountain in Swiss Alps

I have been there before but was reminded of how spectacular the place is!

Also how well run it is. Everything was on time and worked well. The trains were fantastic, without doubt the best of our four months so far. If a train is running 15 seconds past its due time then it is running late in Switzerland. You can set your Swiss watch by them.

Anyway domain names are NOT in the toilet far from it (the best long term investment there is at the moment IMHO) But they are on the toilets.

Toi Toi at Top of Alps

It has been very interesting over the past 4 months travelling through the UK & Europe taking note of the domain names on advertising etc. Without a doubt I have seen far far more companies using their ccTLD’s (Country Code Top Level Domains) eg www.toitoi.ch over the .com. This is good news for people getting into the domain name space as there are many many opportunities available for people to focus on their ccTLD’s if the .com is gone. Its a no brainer that if the .com is availble and affordable then you should try and get it but you can still do well without it outside of the US.

Although the US has a very large population of approx 301,139,947 people that still leaves over 6 Billion people who do not necessarily see the .com as their domain of choice.

Travelling is a very very eye opening experience in many ways, in regards to domain names it just confirms my strong belief in ccTLD’s and their future.

Take a look around where you live and see what people and companies are using for domains and don’t miss out on opportunities by having the .com blinkers on.

One thing I do on a regular basis is look over the domain names that are going to auction at any given time and then do a search of my ccTLD’s that I have in my portfolio (mainly .co.uk, com.au & .co.in & .in) to see if that domain name is available in any of those extensions.

Quite often they are and as long as it makes sense to searchers in that country and has a decent search volume for the domain name keyword string, then I will register that name. I do usually stick to commercial based domains as it is much easier to monetise them from parking in the short term and developing mini sites etc with them.

As an example here are a few Indian domains that I picked up after looking over the current list of auctions coming up next week at TRAFFIC in New York.

spreadsheets.in

spreadsheets.co.in

securityalarms.co.in

atriums.in

atriums.co.in

computerbatteries.in

computerbatteries.co.in

researchlab.in

researchlab.co.in

researchlabs.in

researchlabs.co.in

bulldozers.co.in

bulldozers.in

liabilities.co.in

liabilities.in

ticketsales.co.in

partysupplies.co.in

furniturerepair.co.in

furniturerepair.in

Now I now these names are not a .com or .net but they can be very, very powerful in their country of origin as many people relate very strongly to their own ccTLD.

I know for a fact that they will pretty much all wash their faces within 6 months once a mini-site has been put up with some original content, AdSense , affiliate programs & advertises etc. The risk of investment is not very high for a decent return and hopefully a better sale price in the long run.

I have many sites that are set up this way and tick along bringing in $5+ per day from AdSense and some a lot more from affiliate products and advertising and none are .com domains.

It is a no brainer to me that if I can buy a good quality overlooked ccTLD for under $10 and spend another $150 on content and building the mini-site and get that back in 6 months then from then on its all cream on top.

An example of a site I have is www.biodieselkits.co.uk. I have had that domain since Feb 2007 and from about Nov 2007 it has been bringing in between $5-20 per day in AdSense income and it is number 1 in Google UK for its main keyword phrase (and has been for the past 9 months) and in the top 5 on Google globally as well.
I am also talking with some suppliers to sell the product direct from the website (these kits sell for anywhere between $2500 – $25000 depending on the size) now it won’t take many sales even at the low end to make this a very profitable website and I spent $200 bucks and about 2 hours developing it.

I am not saying this to pat myself on the back, I am saying this to try and get those of you who think ccTLD’s are not worth it to think again, they are and they will only get stronger over time as the .com gets stonger and more expensive and out of reach for the small to medium businesses to buy.

At the end of a day it is just a simple formula that works for me, it may not be for everyone and that’s fine by me too. (more for me )

I am looking forward to seeing how much the .com equivalents of my domains sell for if at all. If they do go for high prices it only ads to the value of my ccTLD’s.

Am I full of crap??? Time will tell! LOL

[ad#ad-1]

The answer depends on many things.

But first you need to ask a few other more important questions-

Do you even want to to do them yourself?

If so, how much time do you have available if you are building the sites yourself?

Do you want to create the content for the sites yourself or outsource it to a ghost writer on Elance etc?

How many domains do you have to develop and are you kidding yourself that you will ever get around to building them all out!!??
(I own approx 900 or so domains and I know that I will only ever get to developing a fraction of those)

The answers to the above questions may very well make the first question mute!

If you get to the point where you do want to develop your domain names yourself then here are some of the software platforms that I use.

For anything website / blog related, as far as I am concerned the king of the hill is WordPress. I have tried the others over the years but still keep coming back to WordPress and it just keeps getting better and better each year. It is open source so it if free to use!! Yey!

It has a huge community behind it and most decent hosting companies using C/Panel or alike suck as Host Gator have automated installs and updates available which makes it very easy for the new person getting started with WordPress.

I have about 10 sites that I currently have running in WordPress including my Biodiesel Kits website and of course this one. So check it out at www.wordpress.org

The other software program I use and have done for the past few years is XSite Pro 2. It is a fantastic HTML / WYSYWIG website design package that is taylor made for web marketers and has many great templates, widgets, scripts etc built in.

The latest version 2 has only been out for the past 4 months and is a great improvement over the first version which was still great for its time.

XSite Pro 2 has built in scripts for your AdSense account details so it makes it very very easy with just a few clicks to have ads placed wherever you like on your site.

A site that I have just started which is on the subject of water purifiers in India called www.waterpurifiers.in was built using XSite Pro 2. It won’t win any design awards, but in my experiance in internet marketing over the past 5 years “slick is dick” and as long as the site is fuctional and has good information that is all that most visitors give a hoot about. The more bells and whistles you have on a website IMHO the worse it is for the user.

So thats my 2 cents worth on the matter and I welcome any useful and relevant comments.

Cheers

Ed

We were in the local cafe using the wifi when a very cool van drove past us and it caught our eye and so did the domain name. The domain is www.dogwalking.fr and you will never guess what this company does…. you guest it, Dog Walking. I did not get a chance to check out the domain name until later that day about 7 hours after first seeing it but because they used an easy to remember domain name I went straight to the website no problem at all.

I know to most this may seem like such an obvious thing to do, but on my travels I have seen some really crap domain names and guess what, I can’t remember them!

Anyway check out this website, it is very very cool and one of the stand out websites I have seen this year. www.dogwalking.fr

The train has free high speed wifi on board so my wife Lois, Daughter Sasha and I all had our laptops out making good use of the 4 hour trip.

We had a very funny moment as I was on Elance paying one of my content writers in India for the work that she was doing for one of my Indian domains about Water Purifiers www.waterpurifiers.in (still parked at the moment but being developed). We sat and pondered at the freedom an online business can give you as we are from Australia travelling through UK & Europe using someone in India to write content for our sites that are both globally and locally targeted.

If that is not a sign that the world truly is a global economy these days then I don’t know what is!

I also caught up with another Aussie domainer mate of mine Ben Wilks from Queensland who has been travelling since May. We met at the Tower of Lo

Ed & Ben Wilks - SEO Legend

If anyone needs any top notch serious, kick butt SEO work done, then Ben is your man.

We offer services for you business promotion. Our web development team is the professional in web design and search engine optimization. We also offer you cheap and affordable web hosting packages with emerging services.

As most of you know my family and I are on the road for 7 months taking some time out and having a great time I can tell you

We have a blog about what we are up to at www.laptopnomads.com so I will not repeat myself with that stuff here.

I relation to domaining and domainers I have managed to catch up with some guys I know from the web but have not met in person up to now and am very happy that I have done so.

I first caught up with David Carter and his family at his home in Birmingham UK for afternoon tea and met his children and wife Jan.
Read more on that with some pics here http://www.laptopnomads.com/10/laptop-nomads-are-go/

Then we spent some time with Tommy Butler and his wife Tricia who own www.glasgow.com (very nice domain name guys) Tommy is a very switched on guy and has many many Glasgow related domain names and his a great business based around them.

He took us around Glasgow for a day and we all had a ball. As Lois & I were both born in Glasgow it was a real treat to be taken around buy the man who owns it!!! Virtually at least LOL. More about that on our blog at http://www.laptopnomads.com/38/edinburgh-to-glasgow/

So many thanks to those guys for their time and hospitality, it was great to finally put a face to the names.

Before I left I said I had a new podcast to upload that I hade done with Brian Johnson from www.domainparkingmoney.net, well I am still editing that one as I have had some audio editing challenges since being away but should have it ready soon.

As for other podcasts I have been talking with Ron Jackson from www.dnjournal.com about doing one but the timing for both of us has not been great so as soon as I have more info I will let you all know.

If you have any suggestions or requests on who you would like me to interview on the subject of domain names or internet marketing please let me know and I will see what I can do.

Regards

Ed

Marketing trend is changing into online marketing. There are a lot of website hosting companies which offers online marketing solutions. These companies have increased their services circle into web site design and website development field.

In a few days time my wife Lois, daughter Sasha (who is 9) & I will begin our laptop nomad travels across the globe.

We are heading off from Perth on a 7 month trip covering many countries including and not necessarily in this order-

United Arab Emirates (UAE), England, Scotland, Ireland, France, Italy, Austria, Switzerland, Germany, Spain, Portugal, Czech Republic, USA, Canada, Japan & Malaysia.

It will be a working holiday (much less work and more holiday is the plan) as we will all have our laptops with us so we can do some work, school work and business while we are away.

The fact that this is possible still amazes me! The new Nokia N95 8GB phone that I am getting is a mini computer in itself with full email and web browsing, GPS Navigation, WIFI, 5 Mega pixel camera with video etc etc WOW all in one little package!

To think about doing this 10 years even 5 years ago was just not as easy as it is today. It is the true advantage of having an internet based business rather than a physical based business.

wifi-laptops-on-trains

None of these sites are live at this time but will be within the next 2 -3 weeks. Any feedback or ideas for the sites are welcome.

It should be a blast and I am looking forward to spending this time with my family and creating some fantastic memories for my daughter as she gets older.

The podcasts will continue as normal which should be a hoot using skype all over the world to interview other people who are in different parts of the globe. I just finished an interview yesterday with Brian Johnson from www.domainparkingmoney.net that I will edit and upload next week.

Cheers

Ed

According to Michael it was the first time that both himself & David had been recorded together for an interview.

Michael & David Castello (Michael on the left & David on the right of photo (Picture courtesy of www.dnjournal.com) are great guys with a huge depth of knowledge on domain names especially when it comes to Geo Domains.

They own through their company CCIN (Castello Cities Internet Network) some great names such as www.PalmSprings.com, www.Nashville.com, www.Acapulco.com and many more which are also listed on the Associated Cities website that they joined back in 2004.

They also own some catagory killer generic domains such as www.Whisky.com, www.GolfClub.com, www.Daycare.com & www.Bullion.com

Both have a great story to tell and a wealth of knowledge to share for those who are wise enough to listen. So if you have even the slightest interest in Geo Domains make sure you listen to this podcast.

Michael & David also won the 2008 Domainers Choice Award for both the Rising Star and Domain Ambassador categories at DomainFest 2008

Also check out this great video of the Castello Brothers in their Rock Band Michael Seven, you will see a side to them that you may not have seen before (Michael Lead Singer/Guitar & David on Drums). Great stuff!! www.michaelseven.com

Hope you enjoy it.

kimball-stafford

DNZoom is a domain software startup backed by a team of domainers and industry insiders with years of experience in building solid, feature packed web applications.

The DN Zoom team has been hard at work building the first truly integrated domain management and monetization software, with input from some of the most successful domain professionals. It looks like a great service and to top it off it FREE!! So make sure you go and have a look at DN Zoom.

I also speak with Sean about his new eBook Domain Graduate which is a Definitive Guide aimed at Beginners or Intermediate Level of Domainer.

Click the link below for more info.

These are two very smart guys and were great fun to talk with.

Dan & Sean are talking about coming Down Under to the Traffic seminar in November and Sean has been paired up to have a boxing match with a Boxing Kangaroo!! (Not sure if this will really happen, but the images it conjures up in my mind are very funny indeed). If it does happen, well its been nice knowing you Sean. Those Big Red Kangaroo’s are nasty!

I was providing entertainment with my band playing the drums and my wife Lois was helping out at various stands.

Just as we got to the school my wife parked her little Suzuki Swift with a few other cars under some of the large Gum Trees outside the school grounds. I was busy unloading our other car that had my drums in it.

That was when it ALL happened!!

suzuki-swift-smashed-roof-1

My wife went back to her Suzuki to put a gift basket she had just purchased back into the car so she did not have to carry it around all afternoon.

She put the gift basket in the car, shut the door, took three steps away from the car when CRASH!!!

Down came a big ass branch of the tree she was parked under and it smashed down onto the roof of our car.

Oh My God!! Talk about being watched over by Angels or Guardians or whatever you like to call them.

A few seconds earlier and my wife would have been in BIG trouble and the day could have ended with a very different story. The tree caved in the whole roof and punched a whole through the roof.

Fortunately insurance should cover all the repairs or replacement of the car as it is only 12 months old and the insurance company replaces cars that are under 3 years old with a new one if it is totaled.

We do spend a great deal of time talking about parking companies and which ones are the best etc but we should also watch where we park our cars and be very, very grateful every day for the health and safety of our loved ones.

First up I will be interviewing Dan Kimball & Sean Stafford from www.dnzoom.com

We will be talking about the creation and launch of DN Zoom and what it has to offer domainers also we will be talking about Sean’s new eBook Domain Graduate.

****************************************************************************

michael-and-david-castello

Also later in the week I will be speaking with brothers Michael & David Castello from CCIN (Castello Cities Internet Network)

These guys have a great portfolio of Geo Domains and we will here from them the history behind those names and and their thoughts on this domain space.

I am greatly looking forward to speaking with all of these guests and I hope that if any of you that listen to this podcast or read this blog have any questions for the above guests, please send me them via the comment section of this post.

(Pictures courtesy of www.dnjournal.com)

AUSTRALIAN internet entrepreneurs are raking in millions of dollars a year by spotting the true value of what’s in a name.

The practice of buying up unused names, known as “domain parking”, is estimated to be worth more than $1 billion worldwide — and Australia is seen as a growing market for those with an eye for a dollar.

The Australian Domain Name Administrator (AUDA), the governing body for “dot au” domains, is set to loosen regulations restricting the practice within months, sparking a likely buying boom as a result.

Domainers, as they call themselves, spot generic or popular names that have not been turned into websites and register them for as little as $US7 ($A7.50). They cram them with advertisements and watch as they earn a few cents per hit — big bucks when you have a portfolio of tens of thousands of domains.

Unlike cyber-squatting, where people infringe trademarks and fraudulently obtain internet traffic, domainers say they are supplying people with information.

With two partners, he has built a business around names such as geekwatch.com and bingonight.co.uk — names that receive hundreds of hits through the sheer weight of the billion or so people who use the internet daily.

He now works full-time as a domainer and is auctioning one of his most prized sites, profgolfer.com, which he hopes will fetch him $75,000.

“Enormous money can be made out of parking still in Australia with dot au space, where a lot less penetration has been made than in America,” he said. “It’s as easy as seeing how many times a particular word is indexed on Google then seeing if it is taken or not.”

Click here for the whole article..

Rick speaks about his time in the domain name industry and how he got started, he also talks about his businesses DigiPawn & Offshoring and what is involved with the operations of both those businesses.

He talks off his trip to Tanzania and his climb up Mt Kilimanjaro and what he keeps in his garage next to his office??

Thanks for your time Rick and I hope the listeners enjoy this podcast.

Elliot was awarded this year with Domainers Choice Award of Best Domainers Blog for 2008 which I think was well deserved.

We talk about his life as a domain investor, the development of his domains www.lowell.com & www.salinas.com and the very serious topic of the Snowe Antiphishing Bill that was introduced to the US senate last week that has the potential to drastically effect the way domain investors operate if left unchanged.

Check out ComputerWorld for the entire article on the Snowe Bill and also the link to the ICA Internet Commerce Association where you can join as a member and help support the people that support domainers and are one of the main voices helping domainers to challenge the Snowe Bill.

Elliot also spoke about Sean Stafford’s Book Domain Graduate which is well worth a read for new to intermediate levels of experience in the domain industry.
Click the link below for more info.

I think that Elliot is one of the domain industries movers and shakers and has a very bright future.

Elliot was awarded this year with Domainers Choice Award of Best Domainers Blog for 2008 which I think was well deserved.

If you have any questions you would like me to ask Elliot during the interview please get them in quick via the comments section of this post.

Michael has a great deal of experience in the domain name industry and we talk about how he got started, his recent trip to T.R.A.F.F.I.C in Las Vegas, advice for new people to the domain industry and his favourite subject, Parking Transparancy.

He also has a funny story about the Akubra Hat that he won at T.R.A.F.F.I.C in Las Vegas

I hope you enjoy the podcast and please let me know what you think in the comments section of this post.

If there are any questions that you have for Michael, please let me know and I will do my best to get them answered for you.

Just leave you questions in the comment section of this post.

Thanks

Ed

This just in from www.domainnamewire.com
It is great to see more and more companies spending money on quality generic domains that are targeted to the products and services they own.

” [Updated 9:49AM CST] ESS Data Recovery has purchased the domain name DataRecovery.com for $1.659 million, confirms company President Ben Carmitchel.

The sale marks the biggest reported sale of the year and shows the promise of a targeted, generic domain name.

The seller is competitor Associated Computers, Inc. of Minnesota. Carmitchel confirmed that the transfer took place on February 1, 2008.

In a phone interview this morning, Carmitchel said he’s been working on buying the domain for a long time.

“I’ve been working on it for 5 or 6 years,” said Carmitchel. “I’ve known [the previous owner] for a long time. He wanted to sell it but he wouldn’t let it go for chump change.”

Click here to read the rest

He is in Australia at the moment working on some projects with another domainer and friend of ours Ben Wilks and will be heading back to the UK in a few weeks time. Rob is the owner of www.music.co.uk and others such as www.lol.co.uk, www.webftp.co.uk

In this interview Rob shares his incite into the domain name industry particularly the .co.uk name space. For the links to the websites and tools we spoke about in the podcast please go to this link Domain Web Tools

I hope you enjoy this podcast and if you have anyone that you would like me to interview or a specific topic that you would like covered then please let me know.

In Episode 3 of the Oz Domainer Podcast I will be talking with Australian Domainer Michael Gilmour from Whizzbangsblog.com where we will be talking about his recent trip to T.R.A.F.F.I.C West in Las Vegas and the subject of Transparency that he spoke about at the conference.

I will be interviewing a wide variety of people in the domain name industry and I hope the knowledge that is shared will give value to the listeners.

If you have anyone in particular that you would like me to interview please let me know in the comments section of this or any other of the podcast posts.

Thanks

Ed

It seems that the web address is used as the main way of getting people to remember how to find them rather than a phone number.

I mean lets face it, most people can remember a web address like www.MiningJobsAustralia.com much easier than a regular phone number especially when its flashed up on the screen for a few seconds at best. Maybe businesses are starting to catch on after all.

The same pattern is also happening on TV. How many times do ads finish with “Visit www.MiningJobsAustralia.com for more information” or some type of ethical bribe to get the viewer on the website to hand over their contact details for a competition etc. This is much easier to do than using a phone number even 1300 or 1800 style numbers.

Thats my opinion on the subject, feel free to give your viewpoint on what you have noticed about your local businesses and how they are using their web address in their marketing.

The Sydney Harbour Bridge

I was also interviewed and had a few comments quoted in the article.

Here is a snippet from the story -

quote.gif

In Rick Schwartz’s thriving real-estate business there are no rising interest rates to fret over, no land taxes to deal with and foreclosures are few and far between.

Yet Schwartz rakes in millions of dollars in annual income from his 6000-odd properties and recently sold one for $US750,000 after buying it in 1997 for about $US100.

It sounds too good to be true but Schwartz, the self-appointed “domain king” and full-time trader of internet real estate, says he is shocked more people haven’t tapped into the rivers of gold flowing through the domain name trading business.

For the whole article click here

The domain name industry has been receiving a great deal more press within the last 12 months or so and it looks like 2008 will be no different. A sign of things to come in what I consider to be the best business & industry to be involved with.

I would like to thank Rick Schwartz for being the flag bearer all these years in particular the early days when everyone thought he was a bit crazy for spending money on domain names. He has had the last laugh on that subject!

I still think it is early days for the domain name industry and the best is yet to come. Bring it on I say!