After Gaining Sole Control of ParkLogic Michael Gilmour Transforms the Traffic Monetizer Into a Domain Asset Management Powerhouse 

2024 was a big year for ParkLogic.com Founder & CEO Michael Gilmour - in fact the biggest in the 18 years since he and partner David Gibbs established the company back in 2007. They have been a leader and innovator in the domain monetization business ever since (and one of the very few who are still standing after all these years). ParkLogic has been doing much more than standing though - they have been in an all out expansion sprint since early last year when David retired and sold his share of the business to Michael, making him the sole owner.

Michael (who was profiled in a 2008 DNJournal Cover Story) already had plans in mind to take ParkLogic far beyond the domain parking business and turn it into a one of a kind, one-stop domain asset management company. As the sole decision maker he and his team were able to quickly set about turning his vision into what is now a reality. I recently got on a zoom call with Michael for a tour of what ParkLogic enables clients to to do today and what I saw was truly remarkable. As you would expect, making life easier for Domain Investors was at the heart of the platform but there are also next level services for  Domain Registries and Registrars. 

Michael Gilmour
ParkLogic Founder & CEO 

For investors who have quality traffic to monetize Michael said, "The recent release of ParkLogic Next provides hyper-local targeting capabilities that will ensure continued returns from domain traffic into the future. Each day, over 300 metrics are analyzed for each domain name to determine which monetization solution will provide the highest yield for clients. For example, the rules based decision engine can now target all German speakers, on IOS devices, in New York between the hours of 10am and 1pm with a particular advertisement."  

With that data in hand, ParkLogic is able to increase your revenue by selecting the best of several monetization options to get the best price for that traffic in that location at that time. They point to five levels of monetization that are involved:

1. Being part of a larger pool of traffic instantly scales new clients revenue. ParkLogic will establish and manage monetization accounts on behalf of clients with all major partners. You will receive the highest payout levels everywhere due to the massed volume of ParkLogic traffic.

2. Algorithms manage the flow of traffic to the highest paying monetization solution. Effectively we are auctioning your traffic each day to the highest bidder.

3. Optimization of the page content to better match domain traffic to the right advertiser.

4. New technologies to help extract every bit of value from domains traffic.

5. Portfolio management to reduce revenue leakage

Over the years, Michael Gilmour (center) has been a featured speaker at major domain conferences around the world. In this shot, Michael chats with attendees at the 2020 NamesCon Global conference in Austin after appearing on the Keynote Hall stage. 

ParkLogic also works closely with Domain Registrars all over the world, helping them grow their own domain portfolio so they can either enjoy the revenue from the traffic or resell the domains for a higher value. From experience, they have found these opportunities for Registars:

1. Domains that have been registered and have their nameservers still pointing at the registrar

2. Domains that have been purchased but not paid for.

3. Domains that have expired

4. Domains that are a part of the registrars growing portfolio

ParkLogic provides registrars with a report that helps them determine which are the best domains to keep and add to their own portfolio. They can also register domains that meet an agreed set of business rules in a nominated registrar account -  a completely outsourced solution for registrars to grow a new revenue stream. 

For Domain Registries, ParkLogic works closely with registry partners to help them to better understand their non-existent domain traffic (NXD) and the potential commercial opportunities it represents. In particular, if you are a country based registry (ccTLD) then there is a significant opportunities with NXD traffic and building your own domain portfolio for resale or retaining it for the ongoing revenue. The ParkLogic Registry platform provides detailed analytics at the registry, domain and IP address levels. This provides registries with an unprecedented level of data to assist them in meeting their business goals. Check out this page for screenshots of their registry dashboard and some of the statistics available for NXD domain traffic.  

In addition to everything noted above, I was equally impressed with the  advanced new interface that allows you to track all of your domains and revenue data with multiple ways to display, slice and dice the information so you can quickly review your assets and their performance at a glance. It's something you really need to see for yourself to appreciate. If you will be attending the Internet Commerce Association (ICA) Annual Meeting in Las Vegas Jan. 26-28, 2025, that is something you may be able to do in person with Michael Gilmour or Chief Revenue Officer Matt Herbert as they will both be there. You can email [email protected] to check on setting up a demo. 

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Sedo Premium Broker Mark Ghoriafi Gets 2025 Off to a Flying Start With $600,000 Sale 

After a big year as a Premium Domain Broker at Sedo in 2024, Mark "Mr. Premium" Ghoriafi has rocketed out of the 2025 gate with another huge sale. Mark contacted me on this Saturday (Mr. Premium apparently never sleeps!) to let me know he has just closed a $600,000 deal for Pack.com. 

Mark, who we profiled in this 2023 article, represented the seller in the Pack.com transaction, combining his innovative marketing approach with outbound efforts to find just the right buyer for this premium asset. Mark said, "After seven weeks of negotiations intertwined with ongoing relationship building throughout the Christmas holidays, the deal officially concluded on January 10th." Like I said, the guy never sleeps.

We will be charting the Pack.com sale when our next bi-weekly domain sales report comes out on the evening January 22 where you will no doubt find it at or near the top of the leader board. 

By the way, if you will be attending the Internet Commerce Association's 2025 Annual Meeting coming up January 26-28, Mark and I will both be there and will be looking forward to catching up with you and our fellow ICA members in Las Vegas.

Mark Ghoriafi (right) and Ron Jackson at the 2023 NamesCon Global conference in Austin.

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It's hard not to love a new year! When you start off with a blank page or canvas to work with, the possibilities are limited only by your imagination. Whatever you want to accomplish in 2025, we hope this this will be the year you create your masterpiece!

(Posted January1, 2025)   

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Domain King Rick Schwartz Closes Year With a Seven-Figure Bang - His Latest Sale is One of 2024's Top Five

There's a reason they call him the Domain King. For the past 30 years Rick Schwartz has been posting one blockbuster sale after another. Hs revealed his latest this morning - the final day of 2024 - when Rick announced the closing of a $1,025,000 sale of BestOdds.com. He had hand registered the domain back in 1996 and has been patiently waiting for the right buyer to arrive ever since then. In recent years, online sports betting has become legal in many states (including Florida, where Rick resides) - a development that has made this an especially desirable domain.

Rick noted that the original agreement set the price at $1,175,000 and gave the buyer 3 years to pay. However, with this year nearing a close, Rick offered the buyer a $150,000 discount if they paid the $525,000 balance due six months early. They jumped on the offer to finalize a $1.025 million sale that is one of the five biggest publicly reported sales for 2024. We will be adding the BestOdds.com sale to our charts when out next bi-weekly sales report comes out the evening of January 9 (a report that will close out the 2024 sales season).

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Kudos for Colin Campbell - Serial Entrepreneur's Best Selling Book Earns a Coveted Star from Kirkus Reviews as One of the Year's Best

Serial entrepreneur Colin Campbell (who was profiled in a 2016 DNJournal Cover Story) is widely known in multiple industries after starting, scaling and exiting over a dozen companies worth almost $1 billion, including two of particular note in the domain industry -  Tucows and .CLUB Domains (the latter of which he sold to GoDaddy in 2021). There were also successes with Hostopia and GeeksForLess among others and to this day, Colin continues to build multiple businesses, including his current personal favorite (due to his love for dogs), Paw.com.

After exiting .CLUB, Colin launched Startup Club as a Fort Lauderdale based incubator that nurtures projects from other passionate entrepreneurs. He also shares his wisdom in regular podcasts on Clubhouse, where nearly 1 million people have signed up to listen. 

As if all of that was not enough, Colin wrote a book, Start. Scale. Exit. Repeat., that was released by Forbes Books. It drew rave reviews and quickly became a best seller at Amazon. While every author loves and appreciates positive customer reviews, there is one review in the book world that is most desired but received by few. That is the coveted Star from Kirkus Reviews. Only about 10% of the books reviewed by Kirkus get a star (and an automatic entry in competition for the $50,000 annual Kirkus Prize that will be rewarded next October). Well, Kirkus just announced that Start. Scale. Exit. Repeat, has earned a star and also been named one of the 100 Best Indie Books of the Year.

Now, that is not just the 100 best business books, it is the best from all categories with Fiction, Non-Fiction, Biography & Memoir and Teens & Young Adult titles all competing for the honor. When he heard the news Colin said, "We are so excited and grateful for this recognition. This book took 10 years, and over 200 interviews. It includes 180 call outs, 30 illustrations, and was written for the ADHD entrepreneur. Congrats to the team at Startup.club for making this happen!"

Colin C. Campbell

Coincidentally, the Kirkus Star news came right after I  had spent an extended weekend in Fort Lauderdale that included a visit to the Startup Club offices last Friday (December 13). My wife and I has made the trip over from Tampa after being invited to the annual Fort Lauderdale Boat Parade Party that Colin and his wife Kim host at their home each year (this year's event, that raised funds for the non-profit organization Help for Ukraine, was held Saturday night).

Above: Inside the spacious Startup Club headquarters in Fort Lauderdale. The incubator has co-work space, equipment and private offices with 10 startup companies currently on site. 

Below: We visited at the end of the day Friday when Paw.com CEO Michele Van Tilborg, Colin and several fellow entrepreneurs like Ed Nussbaum (at far left with Colin), e-commerce guru Norm Farrar and FATVillage Arts District Founder Doug McCraw were still there talking about business after others had headed out for the weekend. Hearing them bounce ideas off each other was a great illustration of the kind of productive cross-pollination the incubator atmosphere provides. Regardless of their specialty, every one of them has inspired another with a random idea or lesson learned from their own entrepreneurial journey.

Above: Colin also gave us a peak inside his state of the art podcast studio located in the Startup Club building. When you listen to Colin on Clubhouse, this is where that invaluable advice is coming from. 

All of the people I mentioned above were among the 150 guests at the Campbell's Boat Parade Party Saturday night. Many of us there knew Kirkus Reviews would be awarding their 2024 Stars soon and, having read Colin's book, fully expected Start. Scale. Exit. Repeat. to get one. Still, you can never be sure until it happens, so when the news finally came, it was especially gratifying to see the blood, sweat and tears that Colin poured into his business masterpiece rewarded. 

Colin and Kimberly Campbell at the Fort Lauderdale Boat Parade Party
 they hosted Saturday night, December 14, 2024.

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Hugs and Kisses Abound on Both Sides After .ART Acquisition Gives Artists an Easy Way to Elevate Their Presence Online

I was in Fort Lauderdale over the weekend and took advantage of the opportunity to drop by .ART CMO Jeff Sass' office there. Jeff has been a friend ever since he entered the domain industry as the CMO and Co-Founder of .CLUB Domains in 2012. We were on our way out of town late last week when I heard .ART had made a big move by acquiring HUG, a popular social marketplace co-founded by Randi Zuckerberg (whose brother you may have heard of since he is Facebook Founder Mark Zuckerburg) and Debbie Soon. So, in addition to seeing Jeff,  I wanted to get some of the details about the deal.

.ART CMO Jeff Sass in his Fort Lauderdale office.

The acquisition was a perfect fit for ART’s stated mission - empowering artists globally with innovative tools and opportunities across Web2 and Web3 .ART and HUG had announced a strategic partnership this past summer and both sides liked what they saw of each other since. Jeff told me "The acquisition of HUG aligns .ART’s goal of providing artists with advanced tools to showcase, protect, and monetize their work. By integrating HUG’s platform with .ART’s robust suite of services, creators will have access to an expanded range of resources designed to elevate their digital presence." 

For HUG's 35,000 members the benefits include a free 1-year PRO subscription to ID.art that provides unlimited artwork uploads, customizable Certificates of Authenticity (COAs), and enhanced features for digital portfolio management - all designed to help artists establish a professional presence and connect with a wider audience. Each HUG artist also gets a free standard .ART domain for one year, with additional discounts and credits if they want to secure a premium .ART domain.

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The 1st Edition of WebMix Confirmed Poland's Place as an Important Player in the Global Domain Industry

The domain industry's 2024 global calendar was stuffed with an extraordinarily rich variety of conferences and events. The success of those many meetings underscored how broad the appeal of this business has become around the world. We covered most of those shows for you, especially the ones primarily oriented toward domain investors and developers. However, I just recently got details about an important one that occurred September 27, in between London's Domain Summit in August and Domain Days Dubai in November. That was the inaugural WebMix conference held at the Browary Warszawskie in Warsaw, Poland, an event put together by industry veterans Daniel and Agnieszka Dryzek (seen in the photo below).

We met for the first time many years ago when the Dryzeks attended the TRAFFIC conferences held in 2007 and returned for several that followed. Back home in Poland, Daniel started up a conference of his own, Meet Domainers, to give the domain business a boost there. Several years have passed since the last of those but Daniel and Agnieszka decided the time was right to come back with something even more ambitious - an event for all sectors of the regional Internet industry - domains, hosting, e-commerce and SEO. WebMix, with the support of industry leaders: NASK (.pl registry), Aftermarket.pl, Shoper, Brand24 and justjoin.it, was the successful result with over 130 attendees turning out for the September event.

Above: The WebMix 2024 agenda displayed on an electric board with attendees in the background (all photos in this article are courtesy of WebMix).

Below: Agnieszka and Daniel Dryzek on stage, welcoming WebMix guests to the 2024 conference. 

Above: Daniel Dryzek (left) holding a Fireside Chat with Piotr Nowosielski from justjoin.it.

Below: The audience also heard from Aftermaket.pl CEO Michal Pleban.

After the conference, Michal, who talked about tools that help in choosing the perfect domain for a company, noted "The atmosphere was great, professional, but at the same time conducive to casual conversations and establishing valuable contacts. A great combination of content and networking!"

Above: Rafał Sikora (Sikora & Legal) talked about winning the teslashop.com case against Tesla, Inc. Rafał, along with Artur Piechocki from the APLAW Law Firm, also covered key legal aspects of domain names that all registrants needed to be aware of.

Above: Attendees enjoying a coffee break between the opening sessions.

Below: The breaks are always a great time for personal networking. Taking advantage of that time are (left to right): Artur Piechocki (President of the Polish Arbitration Court for Internet Domains) and Katarzyna Chalubinska-Jentkiewicz (Director of .pl Domain Name Registry at NASK). Artur said, "WebMix was an exceptional event: fresh approach to the conference concept, naturalness and friendly atmosphere, dynamics and diversity! It was well worth attending!"

Above: Back in the conference room, attendees heard from Barbara Kalenczuk (Corporate Communications Specialist at Shoper - Polish ecommerce platform). 

After her talk, Barbara said, ""Sharing knowledge in the field of e-commerce and educating both the market and related industries, such as domains or hosting, is in the DNA of the Shoper Group. That is why we are glad that we could take part in the WebMix conference to share our experiences and tell what the ideal customer path in an online store should look like. Meetings of this type are also an excellent opportunity for us to talk business with potential partners. We can't wait for the next edition!"

Above: Next up, Brand24 CEO Mike Sadowski took the stage to talk about how his company's brand protection tools provide AI-powered access to mentions across social media, news, blogs, videos, forums, podcasts, reviews, and more.

Above: Another popular session featured Krystyna Pietrzykowska (Lecturer at IT Business Management at AGH University of Krakow) who shared her personal experiences from working as an IT team leader.

Below: In the final presentation, Tomasz Guzik (Oblicze Biznesu - The Face of Business CEO) closed provide invaluable information about marketing and sales in the era of automation and artificial intelligence.

Above: During the conference, attendees also learned a lot from the Table Debates - a networking activity that gave them an opportunity to sit down and get answers from experts in a variety of fields. 

When all was said and done, Daniel Dryzek told us, "We managed to achieve the goal of the first edition of the WebMix conference, which was industry cooperation and market education. It was important for me to show clients what new tools they can use to develop their companies." 

Many attendees echoed those sentiments. Monika Sowinska from CoachPrzedsiebiorczych.pl said, "It was a great pleasure to be part of an event where you gathered wonderful participants, created an almost family atmosphere and showed how many opportunities we have to build an effective online business." Jakub Sergiel from expirki.pl added, "Great specialists, inspiring talks and new, interesting business contacts - this was the real value of the conference. The organization of the event at the highest level."  Przemysław Bojczuk from premium.pl summed it up, noting, "It was a fantastic opportunity to meet face to face with people who co-create the landscape of the Polish Internet. I would like to thank the organizers for the idea, courage and heart put into organizing the conference, I am looking forward to the next edition!"

Below: A final shot from the WebMix Afterparty at NINE's Sports Bar (Robert Lewandowski's restaurant) where attendees celebrated and made plans to do it all again next year!

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10 New Interviews in 2024 All About Domains E-Paper from InterNetX Provide Insight Into the Latest Developments Shaping the Industry Today

I spent some of the extended Thanksgiving holiday weekend catching up on my reading, with InterNetX's 2024 edition of their comprehensive All About Domains series of E-Papers at the top of my list. InterNetX launched the annual project, authored by Global Content & Communications Manager Simone Catania.

The original vision was to convene leading voices in the domain industry every year in order to shed light on various aspects of the business as they stand today. The free 2024 paper has stayed true to that

vision. It features 10 domain professionals who provided insight into their respective specialties. In addition to eliciting details on their business strategies, Simone also got them to share  their personal stories, biggest challenges and proudest achievements in helping to shape the domain landscape we have today. Here's the full roster featured in the 2024 paper:

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