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It started at the registration
desk where attendees were issued electronic nTags (see photo
at left) - multi-function
devices (about the size of a small TV remote control) that are worn
around the neck. They replaced
traditional business cards, conference programs and messaging
systems while also enabling polling on a variety of topics with
instantly tabulated results.
When you met someone new you just pointed your nTag
at theirs, pressed a button and your contact information was
instantly exchanged and recorded for later retrieval. If you weren't
sure what was up next on the daily schedule, you could just check
the electronic agenda. If show promoters wanted to let you know
about something big going on they could send the message to every
nTag in the building.
During seminars, the audience could vote on
various topics (such as what features were most important to them in
choosing a registrar) and the results could be shown within seconds
on a projection screen. A lot of the service providers who spoke in
the seminars were fascinated by this instant feedback on what their
customers really wanted. |
Later in the week, Domain Roundtable staged
their first live auction and again they pulled a revolutionary new
platform out of their hat that wowed those in attendance as well as
people around the world who were able to not only watch the
proceedings live on the Internet, but to actually bid for domains in
real time right along with those sitting in the auction hall. That
potent combo produced over $3.8 million in sales and gave the
already exploding live auction format a powerful new weapon to use
in the fight for aftermarket dollars.
While the new advances in technology gave
Roundtable a serious wow factor, the person to person human element,
as it always does, underpinned the event and opened doors for
attendees that only face to face networking can push open. In this
article we'll take you along with us for the entire ride so you can
experience the people, places and programs that made show week in
the Pacific Northwest such a special treat.
| While the official opening day was Monday
(August 13), Westerdal and Douglas arranged a Sunday night cocktail
party to entertain those who arrived in Seattle early. Our plane
from Florida arrived in time for us to catch the second half of this
soiree. That allowed us to catch one of the first of many cool
"photo ops" as we saw Jothan Frakes who produced
the first two Roundtables hand the baton off to new producer Stephen
Douglas (Frakes moved to a new position with Oversee.net's
DomainSponsor after the 2006 conference, opening the door for
Douglas to steward the third edition of this event).
Fortunately, we also caught Internet Real Estate Group
co-founder Mike Zappy Zapolin's turn at the podium near the
end of the evening. His pep talk about the endless opportunities in
this industry (illustrated with examples from IREG's |
Current
Roundtable Show Producer
Stephen Douglas (left) with his
predecessor Jothan Frakes |
| many successes)
served as a perfect stage setter for the week ahead. Also
Sunday night exhibitors started setting up booths to show
off their products and services in the days ahead (see our
Roundtable Photo Gallery for shots of several of these
displays and the company representatives who were there to answer
all of the attendees' questions). |
After registration and a sumptuous breakfast
Monday morning, the main agenda got underway. I had the privilege of
sitting on the opening panel with Ali Farschchian (CircleID.com),
Andrew Allemann (DomainNameWire.com), Frank Michlick (DomainNameNews.com)
and Ezra James (Modern Domainer Magazine). Our session was
about the ever growing domain news media corps. The fact that these
(and many other) media outlets have sprung up to cover this industry
is proof positive that this is a business that a lot of people are
interested in. It is an extremely healthy development for the
industry and we are fortunate to have dedicated, knowledgeable
people like those on the panel reporting on developments in the
domain world and giving their unique perspectives on industry
events.
|
Mike
"Zappy" Zapolin
Co-Founder, Internet Real Estate Group |
The next session was a domain industry
roundtable featuring Name Administration chief Frank Schilling (who
would return to deliver the conference's keynote speech Monday
night), IREG's Mike Zapolin, Sahar Sarid (Recall Media Group) and
Adam Strong (DomainNameNews.com). This was a wide-ranging 90-minute
discussion with many highlights. Schilling and Zapolin agreed that
more and more traditional capital investors are looking at the
domain space and Schilling noted that they are pushing prices up
because they are competing for a very limited number of high quality
domain names that are available for sale.
Zapolin commented on the amazing price
escalation involving premier generic domains. For example his
company originally bought CreditCards.com for just $100,000.
In 2004 they turned around and sold it for $2.75 million. The
buyer put some development
|
| work into the domain and just this month
filed a $115 million IPO plan for the property. That
kind of run-up is understandably drawing attention. |
Sarid said his company has little interest in
selling their domains as today's 20-cent click could easily become a
$20 click in the future as the value of targeted traffic
becomes recognized by advertisers. As millions of new businesses
(and domain investors) search for suitable domains, Strong noted
that longer, more descriptive names are increasing in value,
deflating the long held notion that only short (preferably one-word)
domains were worth investing in. The sheer magnitude of the
migration to the web is creating many different models for
success.
After a lunch break sponsored by NameDrive.com,
the afternoon sessions switched to dual-track mode - meaning that
seminars on different topics were held simultaneously, increasing
the options for attendees so they could customize a program to
better fit their specific interests. For dual track sessions I split
my time evenly between competing sessions so we could bring you at
least some of the flavor from every seminar. Though I did that for
reporting purposes I also found it to be a productive strategy for
learning more about a wider variety of topics. So whether you picked
one seminar and stayed wire to wire (as most did), or opted for
conference room hopping as I did, the time wound up being well
spent.
| As you would expect, the Domains 101
seminar in the Aspen Room attracted the many industry newcomers at
the conference. A panel including GoDaddy's Domain Business
Manager Nate Curran, Matthias Mueller (NameDrive.com),
Sean Stafford (DNZoom.com) and Jothan Frakes (DomainSponsor.com)
covered all of the basics. Curran gave tips on finding a good
registrar, Mueller explained how to get started with domain parking
and Stafford detailed why good domains make sound investments noting
that there are few assets that you can buy for $8 and
potentially sell for $8,000. Frakes also focused on the value |
Sean
Stafford (DNZoom.com) comments
during Domains 101 seminar as Matthias
Mueller (NameDrive.com) looks on. |
|
inherent in domains as platforms for advertising and branding a
business as well as providing a revenue stream from your investment. |
While that session was going on, another group
of attendees was in the Willow Room listening to a Registrar
Executive Panel moderated by attorney Derek Newman.
The panelists were Enom.com President Paul Stahura, Rebel.com
CEO Dave Chiswell and Moniker.com VP Victor Pitts.
Stahura expressed his opinion that other extensions besides .com
will grow in popularity in the years ahead. Using population centers
as an analogy he said "New York was a big city 200
years ago and it is still big, but that doesn't mean that other
cities won't become fairly large too. For example, Las Vegas
has become a large city in less than 50 years."
Registrar
Executive Panel (left to right): Paul Stahura (eNom.com),
moderator
Derek Newman, Dave Chiswell (Rebel.com) and Victor
Pitts (Moniker.com)
Chiswell went a step further saying that
acceptance of alternate TLDs had already happened in many parts of
the world. Speaking of his own country, Canada, Chiswell said
"There has been great growth in .ca and we are now
seeing almost as many businesses in Canada using their ccTLD as use
.com."
During this session the power of the nTag was
demonstrated as attendees were invited to vote on some registrar
related questions. When asked what was the most important thing they
wanted from a registrar the largest number of attendees chose
"extensive domain management features" (43%)
followed by "low prices" (25%) and "great
customer service" (21%). A couple of other choices
barely registered; "easy transfer in/out" (6%) and
"regular email notifications about expiring domains" (3%).
| The first of several sessions devoted to search
engine optimization SEO 101 and Beyond was next. The
all-star panel for this seminar included Aaron Wall (SEOBook.com),
Malcolm Lewis (Local.com), John Tompkins (Trellian), Dave
Bascom (SEO.com), Dustin Woodard (AllRecipes.com) and John
Andrews (Johnon.com). Some of the key points made by this
distinguished group was the importance of having original content on
your site, focusing on the right keywords and if possible, using a
domain that defines the category your subject matter is devoted
to.
Woodard showed a series of slides showing how
good SEO could produce a 40-fold increase in revenue over a standard
parking page. Another tip was to check out the local directories
offered by Local.com
that will help you add relevant localized content to your site. You
can also sell your own ads in these turnkey directories. SanFrancisco.com
and Nashville.com are among the sites already using this
service. |
Dave
Bascomb, SEO.com |
A pair of back to back legal sessions; TM
Bullies and Intellectual Property Workshop,
featuring attorneys Brett Lewis, Aaron Kornblum
(Microsoft), John Berryhill, Jeremiah Johnston (Sedo)
and moderator Derek Newman also drew well. While a lot of
attention is paid to cybersquatters (those who register and profit
from from trademark-related domains) Berryhill noted that this is a
two-way street. Some trademark owners try to reach far beyond the
boundaries of their marks. Berryhill pointed to the Target
Corporation as just one example. They have lost three recent UDRP
decisions and in the last two the panels made a point of telling
them they had no universal right to the word "target" in a
domain name when those names are not used in relation to the
narrowly defined scope of Target's mark (as a general merchandise
retail store).
|
Aaron
Kornblum
Microsoft Senior Attorney |
Kornblum said that Microsoft owns over 25,000
domain names and that they are delighted to be part of the domain
industry. He said the company is supportive of domainers - but not
cybersquatters whose activities harm the interests and image of
legitimate domain owners. Kornblum said, "Microsoft would like
to see the domain community grow and expand. It is the
cybersquatting community that we would like to see contract."
While the legal panels were underway a Traffic
Domains for Rent seminar was being conducted in another
room. Ofer Ronen (Sendori.com), Jonathan Boswell (LeaseThis.com)
and Yossi Goldlust (LookSmart.com) covered the ins and
outs of the rapidly growing domain leasing field. Sendori's system
is a hybrid that allows you to use standard parking that shifts
traffic to a specific advertiser only when that advertiser bids more
for your traffic than the parking page |
| will provide. Many large
protfolios owners have used the Sendori system with very good
results. LeaseThis.com was featured earlier this year in a DN
Journal article and they continue to gain momentum in the leasing
space with four million domains now available on their
platform. |
That session was followed by a wide-ranging Parking
Services Summit featuring eight leaders in the PPC space; Ron
Sheridan (Domain Sponsor.com), Donny Simonton (Parked.com),
Jeremiah Johnston (Sedo.com), Jacob Knightley (NameDrive.com),
Brian Carr (NamMedia), John Smrekar (RevenueDirect.com),
Michael Robertson (Fabulous.com) and Ammar Kubba (TrafficZ.com).
Parking may be the single most competitive sector in this industry
and Johnston said domain owners are benefiting from the continual
one upmanship in that category.
Speaking of one upmanship, after most of the
panelists spent much of their time talking about their new graphics rich
landing pages, TrafficZ's Kubba made a point of saying (with some
justification) that these were features his company had rolled out
three years ago, a time when competitors said fancier pages were a
mistake because they would not convert traffic as well as
"plain jane" pages. Though everyone is now offering pages
that look more like websites, several companies still believe the
plain pages work better and one said they only offer the fancier
pages because customers are demanding them. Kubba said there is more
to the equation than traffic conversion. He said more attractive
pages have "curb appeal" that make domains more attractive
assets to those interested in buying domains who land on more
stylish pages.
TrafficZ's
Ammar Kubba (at podium) says "we've already been there and
done that"
as Sedo's Jeremiah Johnston (far left) and NameDrive's
Jakob Knightley look on.
All of the companies on this panel have been
successful. The best advice is probably to try several of them to
see where you portfolio will perform best, as well as whose
management system and customer service appeals to you most. The
Parking Summit closed the Monday seminar program and led in to the
main event, the after dinner keynote address from Name
Administration chief Frank Schilling.
|
Schilling is one of the industry's greatest
success stories as well as one of its nicest, most down to earth
guys (also a key measure of success in my view). Schilling shared
the story of how he built his empire from scratch and, in the
question and answer session that followed, what he would do today if
he had to start over with just $5,000-$10,000 to spend.
On the latter point he said he would try to buy a
category-defining generic domain in an affordable niche, using his
own RumCakes.com (for which he paid $6,000) as an
example. A full-blown business could be developed on such a domain
that could provide a lifetime income for the owner. Of course, this
approach involves development rather than basic domaining (acquiring
names that provide a revenue stream without development through
either resale or PPC monetization). However as any development
proponent will tell you, that approach can yield far greater profits
if you have the time, energy and commitment needed to do the job
well.
|
Frank
Schilling (Name Administration)
delivering his keynote speech |
I could spend a lot of time pulling highlights
from Schilling's talk, but there is no need for that as the entire
presentation is available on the web. You can view it here and I can
tell you that the 54 minutes spent watching and listening to Frank
will be time well spent.
After Schilling's speech everyone boarded buses
for the short trip to Seattle's Sugar night club and
TrafficZ's official Domain Roundtable party. In a nice twist, the
event was set up as a fundraiser for a very worthy cause - Grassroots.org,
an organization that supports and enables many other non-profit
organizations to help them fulfill their missions.
A bevy of
beautiful models was brought in with partygoers then bidding on the
right to bodypaint their favorites. While there was a preponderance
of women on the auction block, there were also a couple of males for
female domainers to choose from. One of those was attorney Brett
Lewis who a good enough sport to completely drop the legal
profession's usual decorum to help drum up money for the cause.
|
|
Above:
attorney Brett Lewis
shows his true colors at TrafficZ fundraiser |
At the end of the evening $7,500 had
been raised - a number that was short of the kind of support that
Grassroots.org really deserves. I encourage you to check out their
site to learn just how much good work they do, then visit http://donate.grassroots.org
to make the largest donation you can.
Coming
Up on the Next
page:
-
Experts
Tell You Where the Best Domain Investment Opportunities Are Now
-
See
Who Won the Name Intelligence Industry Awards
-
We
Take You to Domain Roundtable's Multi-Million Dollar Live
Auction
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