|
family
hosted a very large party to celebrate my
Bar Mitzvah with around 300 friends and
family. I was graciously given $50,000-$100,000
in gifts. The next week I was home alone
when two people broke into my parents home
and stole everything. In addition to
my parents’ jewelry and valuables, all
of my gifts, gold and even my Playstation
2 were taken. This was a big turning
point for me, as I felt responsible for
losing my family’s valuable
possessions."
Negari
said, "From that point forward, my risk
tolerance went through the roof and I
decided to live my life like there was no
tomorrow. I was not afraid of anything,
and continue to live my life under that
mantra. Over the years, I have learned to
take calculated risks and hedge my bets by
managing them carefully. Thankfully, most of
my risks have paid off in spades."
It seems risk
taking could also be embedded in Negari's
DNA. His parents immigrated from Iran
to America in 1979 because of the
Iranian Revolution and the rise of Ayatollah
Khomeini. They were forced to leave
everything behind and start a new life
in Los Angeles's famous Beverly Hills
community. Part of the hit TV show Beverly
Hills 90210 was filmed at Daniel's
elementary school and he also went to
Beverly Hills High School.
|
Entrepreneur
Daniel Negari was born
to run and he hasn't
slowed down yet. |
While
Beverly Hills is known for its wealth,
the Negari family had to start from
scratch. Negari noted, "My
parents got married in Los Angeles and
I am proud to be a first generation
American. Growing up with an upper
middle class background and watching
my parents build their lives -
starting out in an apartment and
eventually buying a house - showed me
that if they were able to move to another
country and be successful,
then the bar was set much higher for
me since I had more advantages growing
up. My parents always demanded more
from me. I always knew that anything
was possible, which has molded my
mindset as an entrepreneur.
"
"At
8 years old, I really wanted to go to
the Six Flags Magic Mountain
amusement park," Negari recalled.
"My parents declined my request
and told me if I wanted to go, I could
make my own money and
go. So I did. I worked for my uncle
for a weekend and he paid me $32,
the price of a ticket.
"
"At
12 years old, while most of my friends
traveled over winter break, I decided
to stay home and get a job at
a computer store. I then started my
first venture and needed a URL to
market my service which was building
custom made computers for friends
and family. That was when I registered my
first domain name, GetAPCNow.com (as
in get a Personal Computer now), which
I ultimately let expire (more on that
later)." |
"At
13, when I started high school, there was a
job board where local businesses posted
positions available to high school students.
I was interested in earning some money, so I
applied for a job at Crystal Cruises,
a cruise line. I worked there every day
after school (across the street in Century
City) doing data entry and filing.
Computers were natural to me, so I
was able to process gift orders at least ten
times faster than any of the full time
employees there. In order to do this, I had
to get a work permit from school. This was
one of my first experiences dealing with bureaucracy,"
Negari smiled.
The
next year, at 14, Negari was ready to go
into business for himself. "I learned
about the Black Friday sale at Best Buy
and camped out so I could be one of
the first to enter the store. I had recently
obtained my first credit card, which my mom
cosigned for me. I was making money at
Crystal Cruises and I was looking to
generate a return on my cash. This was the
perfect opportunity - I bought a truck
full of electronics worth $100 per
item for $20, then sold them for $50
on eBay. I did this for three
years in a row until the eBay market got
too competitive and I couldn't make enough
of a return," Negari recalled.
|
"At
15, I had a friend who worked at Foot
Locker and shared his 50%
discount with me. I would buy
retro basketball jerseys, which were
in style at the time, and pair them in
with headbands and wristbands, then sell
them online. Using my marketing
skills, I would attract people from
all over the world to my listings. I
would buy an $80 jersey and a $7
headband for $43.50 and
sell the set for an average of $150.
This experience showed me the true value
of marketing," Negari said.
While
still in high school, Negari took a
quantum leap ahead. He told us how
it happened. "My mother was
working for Bank of America as
a business banker and also handled
real estate loans. I saw how hard |
Destined
to "fly like an eagle"
Daniel Negari (bottom)
soaring with skydiving instructor on a
recent jump. |
|
she
worked and how focused she was on
succeeding, and it really helped
solidify all of the lessons from
earlier on in my life about hard
work leading to success.
She introduced me to a local real
estate broker around the age of 16 or
17, and I offered to teach him how to
use computers more efficiently in
return for him teaching me the mortgage
business. Before I had even
finished high school, I was already
finding success in mortgage brokering,
and had earned upwards of $20,000
in a month," Negari said. |
"While
in high school, I also enrolled at Santa
Monica College and took classes to get a
head start on college. I went to SMC for one
year and accumulated 66 credits, including
the night classes I took while in high
school. I then applied to the University
of Southern California (USC) and New
York University, but because USC boasted
a top ten entrepreneurship program
and I intended to start my business in the
LA area, I chose USC.
"
|
Daniel
Negari (at right) during his
college years with friends
at the Los Angeles Memorial
Coliseum watching his
beloved University of Southern
California Trojans play. |
"At
USC, I had the opportunity to meet many
mentors and some of the best
professors in the world, such as Paul
Orfalea, the Founder of Kinko’s.
USC also allowed me to fine-tune my
raw entrepreneurial instincts and
skills, and taught me the valuable
lesson of learning from other
people’s mistakes. I was also an
advisor of the USC Entrepreneurship
Club, where the President and I
successfully convinced the Dean of the
business school to sponsor an E-Club
trip to Brazil, where I got to
participate in some philanthropy
efforts, as well as meet with top
Brazilian business executives, such as
Hans Stern, the founder of H
Stern," Negari noted. |
"Also
through USC I was also able to meet
legendary investor Warren Buffett on
a trip to Omaha, Nebraska. I had
several meals with him, which I used as an
opportunity to pick his brain about
investment strategies and ask for advice
about business and the world. I even watched
him, in very Warren Buffet style, pick up
a penny of the ground and say, “this
is to my next million!,”
Negari smiled.
USC
faculty also took note of the budding
entrepreneurial star in their midst, giving
Negari the prestigious USC Networking
Award in 2006. It is an honor that had
been reserved for MBA students in the past
but for the first time the university
bestowed in on the young undergrad by
unanimous decision. Negari also received
USC's Technology Scholar Award, which
was awarded to one student out of the entire
USC undergraduate population. He was even
called upon to co-teach a class on
Technology Entrepreneurship while still in
school.
|
Negari
said "It wasn't all success
though. I remember receiving a C
on a business plan I prepared for one
of my classes. This experience taught
me that in the real world, even when
you work your hardest and think you
did everything right, things do not
always work out as expected. The
important thing is how you bounce
back and respond.
"
Negari
also got a good lesson in branding at
USC where he was a “Founding
Father” of the Beta Theta Pi
fraternity. "As a new
organization on campus, I helped shape
the culture of the house," Negari
said. "We took on the challenge
of not only creating a brand
for ourselves to stand out from our
peers in well-established houses, but
also competed for, and won, some of
the brightest and most successful
students on campus to join our
organization. I was able to develop a
number of |
Daniel
Negari with his sister Charlene |
|
longstanding
relationships from this experience,
and even hired two of my fraternity
brothers to help me launch new gTLDs .xyz
and .college."
When the
new millennium dawned and the early
2000's go underway, Negari was working
at a real estate company and
helping them with their computers.
"I began doing loan processing
during the refinancing boom and
eventually got my real estate
license and began brokering
loans" Negari said. That
produced a solid income that let him
turn a business plan he had written in
college into a reality. |
|
|
"The
plan was for Beverly
Hills Mint - a real estate
brokerage firm," Negari said.
"I had so many credits that two
years into college I was only one year
away from graduating. So I went
part-time at USC and filed the
articles of incorporation with the
State of California for Beverly Hills
Mint - my first real company.
In 2007, I was able to hire the person
I trusted most - my mother.
While in real estate, I bought several
properties and even had my own
30-minute show in the TLC Network's
Flip That House
series." |
For
his first real business Negari also wanted
his first high end domain name.
Negari recalled, "I bought Mint.net
for Beverly Hills Mint on SnapNames,
and I tried to buy Mint.com
from the then-owner. I offered him $20,000,
but another startup called MyMint.com
bought the domain name and built a business,
which they eventually sold to Intuit.
While running a booming real estate company,
I was making great money and again needed to
invest it somewhere. Domains were my
solution," Negari declared.
|
"During
this time, I had continued to buy and
sell domain names as a hobby and my
interest in the internet increased
more and more. I always knew that
domains were my passion, but
early on I didn't have the capital I
needed to really make a big push. Over
time, my investment capital grew and I
began to shift more of my energy into
the Internet world. I
eventually sold my |
|
ownership
stake of Beverly Hills Mint to my
mother to focus on my new baby, Cyber2Media.
"
One of
taglines for Negari's new company is
"Cyber2Media - we’re the the
company behind the |
|
|
company,
suggesting they are a force you may
not have heard a lot about but a
force none the less. Negari
concurred, noting, "At first
glance, people generally do not have
much of an idea about our size,
however, we have a team of about 30
individuals and we are steadily
growing.
" |
While
Negari's focus became fully locked on the
virtual world in more recent years, he said
the seeds for his domain passion were
planted years ago. "As a kid I
collected, bought and sold basketball
cards," he recalled. "This
helped me to internalize the concept of supply
and demand. In 7th grade, as I was
beginning to start my first entrepreneurial
business, I tried to register a good domain
name and everything I could think of
was taken! This was around 1998 or
1999 and I remember being in the computer
lab of my school trying to find a domain
name that I could register. I sat for hours
manually looking up every three letter
.com I could think of and none of
them were available. I eventually settled on
GetAPCNow.com, which became a
successful custom computer company. The
lesson that really stuck with me was there
was a strong demand from
entrepreneurs, and certainly others, for quality
domain names, but there was a scarcity
in supply."
|
Daniel
Negari behind the wheel during a
yacht cruise
along the French Riviera at the
2008 SedoPro Forum |
"At
the time, I was largely a user of AOL,
which as a tween in the 1990s seemed
like the entire internet,"
Negari said. "Since .coms
were expensive, I had the idea of
registering AOL/AOL Instant
Messenger screen names, which I
could do for free. Eventually I
had around 900 three-letter
screen names and several thousand
generic screen names. I would
sell these on eBay or by
convincing people who messaged me on
those names that they were valuable
enough to buy."
"Years
later, when I still had no
understanding of the world of expiring
domain names, I was curious what had
happened to my first domain
registration, which I had let expire.
I found that someone else had
registered it and built an entire
business on it. But luckily, this
inspired me to take a look at the
world of expiring domains. I
found SnapNames.com
and TDNam.com
and started dabbling in the purchasing
of |
|
old
domain names. This started while I was
in college around 2006 - just before I
met Alan Ezeir, the .WS
co-founder, and Greg McLemore,
the founder of WebMagic.
Meeting them changed everything,"
Negari declared. |
"Back
in College, I had joined a group called SCEA
- Southern California Entrepreneurship
Academy. SCEA was run by Maureen Ford
and consisted of some pretty powerful
alumni, such as Bob McNight, the
founder of Quicksilver, Alan Ezeir,
the founder of .WS, and Greg McLemore, the
original domainer and founder of
WebMagic, Pets.com, Toys.com
and many, many more.
"
|
"Meeting
them in person and hearing their
stories gave me the confidence to know
that I could do it too. I
remember when I was at Greg’s house
once, Alan mentioned that he had met
with the King of West Samoa and
had made a deal to acquire .WS. The
analogy between real |
|
estate
and domains had always been with me,
but this brought it to the next
level. I immediately researched
other country codes and even tried to
find a country to buy to acquire my
own extension.
I was never able to get my own
ccTLD, but luckily ICANN began
their new
gTLD initiative. Soon I
will get something better than my own
country - .xyz!"
(Editor's
note: Negari was the only
applicant for .xyz and has been
granted that TLD. He then won an
auction to operate .college and
also hopes to win the rights to
operate .now which is still in
contention). |
|
Negari
noted, "Although I’ve acquired many
domain names, I think what I’ve really
excelled at is building brands and
marketing. With the right branding and
marketing approach, an already-valuable
domain can be made many times more valuable.
Still, a list of my best acquisitions
would have to include XYZ.com, Driving.com,
BestHotels.com, Degree.com, Ringtones.com,
PHD.com and many more.
"
Negari
added, "I have a special affection
for PhD.com, Degrees.com, and CommunityCollege.com
which were part of the inspiration for me
going after the .college extension.
These top tier education domains helped me
understand the large demand of
education-related organizations for an
online presence. Similarly, I have a special
attachment to XYZ.com, as it was some of the
inspiration behind .xyz.
"
|
Daniel
Negari under the giant neon-lit .xyz
guitar
at Cyber2Media headquarters |
Negari
explained why he thinks .xyz is a
string that he can make successful
despite competition from hundreds
of other new extensions expected to be
released in the months and years
ahead. "It started with what I
originally envisioned for XYZ.com,"
Negari said. "I saw it as a
diverse web services company,
offering domain registration, website
design and build out, and hosting
services. When I learned about the new
gTLD program, I was extremely excited
as I had always wanted my own TLD. I
even gained experience managing a
domain |
|
extension
by launching .com.de with
CentralNic
as a third levelregistry, which was
very successful.
So, I considered a number of possible
TLDs, but in the end I believed that
.xyz, .college and .now were the best
positioned for success." |
".xyz
is a low-cost, high-volume domain
extension that is neutral, memorable and
truly for everyone. .xyz gives users
the most amount of flexibility out of any
domain extension because it has no
built-in meaning or connotation like
every other option out there. This gives
people the freedom to build a platform to
express themselves, share their knowledge,
and innovate without being limited by a
label. Just as important, it carries with it
instant familiarity. .xyz has received a
great amount of interest overseas because of
this, since people recognize XYZ and
understand the value of having a English
extension, but may not actually speak the
language," Negari said.
|
Of
course, as a veteran domain
investor Negari knows that many of his
peers believe that new gTLDs have
little chance to make inroads
against the incumbent champion .com.
To that Negari responded, "I
think that we need to move away from
using .com as a measuring
point of success for a TLD."
".com
came along at a special time in
the life of the internet and that time
will never repeat itself. We
are living in 2013 and should be
judged by 2013 standards. Similarly,
at the end of the day, each registry
has to be based on its own standard of
success. I don’t expect to overcome
.com instantly or even within the next
10 years, but my lifetime goal is
to |
Daniel
Negari (far left) with friends at
the
June 2009 ICANN meeting in
Sydney, Australia |
| provide
internet users with competition and
choice with .xyz. I hope to give
internet users a better option and an
opportunity to stake their ground in
.xyz . It might take me 50 years,
but thankfully I am a healthy 27-year-old
and I have at least 99 more years
to accomplish this goal!," Negari
smiled. |
Negari
added, "It is also important to
remember that a TLD does not need to be massively
popular in order to be successful.
It is largely about perspective. From the
perspective of a domainer who may only care
about ratios between the costs of acquiring
domains, the traffic they receive, or the
amount they can be sold for, a high degree
of popularity of a domain is quite
important. However, from the perspective of
the owner of a registry operator,
it is more a matter of comparing yearly
costs to yearly expenses and about providing
a quality service and namespace. For
consumers, it is really just a matter of
getting the name they want at a price they
like. For me, I have to focus from the
position of the registry operator.
"
|
|
"Internet
usage is still growing
exponentially. We no longer talk
about just the U.S. and Europe.
Emerging economies are a remarkable rising
tide for the internet industry.
This is especially true in areas like Africa,
which have extraordinarily young
populations when compared to the
established western-dominated
internet. This substantial growth
means that that there is space for
a number of winners," Negari
said.
"The
youth of the growing internet
population means that there will be an
openness to change that cannot
be underestimated. Instead of the same
old focus on .com, I think choice
will reign as the new standard.
Additionally, |
|
the
growth in mobile phone usage requires short
domain names for easy navigation.
Our preliminary tests show that
registrants prefer a 8 character or
less .xyz over a 3 or 4 word .com
domain - 8 out of 10 times
." |
"As
far as .xyz specifically is concerned, we
are confident that registrants will respond
to its affordability and mass-market appeal.
So far, we have received great responses and
attention from registrars and registrants.
Combining the natural appeal of the domain
extension with the extensive marketing and
brand awareness efforts we plan on putting
into the domain extension, we’re confident
that people all over the world will soon
sense that domain names simply should end in
.xyz.
Readers can pre-register a .xyz
domain name at www.xyz.com.
For information on which major registrars
will be carrying .xyz, visit www.xyz.com/registrars,"
Negari advised.
Daniel
Negari (far left) and friends at the Atlantis
Resort in the Bahamas
for the March 2011 Domain Roundtable
conference
With
respect to the new gTLD program as a
whole Negari sees it unfolding in this
way, "It will have many successes
and even more failures," Negari
opined. "Obtaining a domain extension
is only part of the challenge. The most
critical component for success is the operator.
Many large gTLD applicants simply have too
many domain extensions to market and I
believe this will leave a lot of poorly
thought out and poorly executed marketing
plans, and ultimately a large scale flop.
Some other applicants do not have much
experience in the domain world and may not
have the knowledge of what it takes to
succeed.
"
"Historically,
Verisign has dominated the world with
one domain extension, .com,
and they barely market at all. This is
because the world has adopted .com
so the user demand is built in. For new
domain extensions, the demand will need
to be built because it is not inherent
for most extensions. It will be interesting
to see if ICANN decides to use some of its $300
Million+ war chest to drive public
awareness to new domain extensions, as
this would increase the success rate for new
gTLDs," Negari said.
|
With
a steady hand on the wheel Daniel
Negari is
looking forward to what the next 27
years will bring. |
In
closing Negari noted, "I am the
youngest new gTLD applicant. I am
proud about being a part of Generation
Y and the innovative changes that
my generation has brought to the
internet. XYZ will be a disruptive
force in the domain namespace, and we
have created the concept of “Generation
XYZ” to express this force. We
are giving all generations, including
Generations X, Y, and Z a chance to
explore the limitless potential of the
internet. We are creating a new,
integrated Generation XYZ. As an unrestricted
platform, .xyz will help
facilitate the next generation of
internet users and creative minds to
exchange information and express
themselves."
While
many will continue to have their
doubts about new gTLDs, you don't have
to know your ABCs to know that
when a relentless and experienced
young entrepreneur like Daniel Negari
sets his mind to it, people might end
up knowing their XYZs as well. |
|
***** |
|
