I have been making daily posts for more than a decade. Long before the "Blog" came to be. So I have no deep passion to continue to do that. However I do want to get some of what I have shared privately with other domain owners out to a larger and more general audience. It was hard enough to convince domain owners that "Type in"" traffic was a very valuable commodity and it had direct connection with the value of a domain name. I think I have done a good job here comparing that traffic to "Mineral rights" like an oil well. I am trying to melt things down to some simple foundations. The first being to have folks understand how bad they screwed up by missing this multi billion dollar business that is STILL under the radar.
If I encounter folks that STILL can't grasp how valuable and
important that a domain like Hotels.com is and still sees no value in having
thousands of NEW customers lined up each and every day at their business, well,
do you think I am going to waste my TIME with THEM?? At least come to the point
where you smack your palm on your head and say "OH!!!" If you can't
do that......don't waste time here. Follow the plan of etoys.com. They spent
tens of millions in advertising and their GENIUSES in their IT department
FAILED to have the traffic folks were typing in directly to the browser bar get to their site. It was
Thanksgiving Day 1999 I think. Commercial after commercial. etoys.com all day
long. So I typed "Etoys.com" into the browser bar. Guess what?? I get
a 404 error!!!! Why?? Because the GENIUSES in IT could not get into the minds
of a customer watching a commercial and figure out that they won't type in http://www.etoys.com.
So they lost a HUGE amount of the customers and to this MOMENT, they don't even
know. Why do I bring this up? Well besides losing hundreds of thousands in the
stock, it illustrates why Internet ONE collapsed. Tech guys ran marketing
because marketing guys were clueless and they had to depend on folks that had
no clue about marketing. Add that to the flawed impression based ads and you
had the makings of a collapse.
So now I rambled a bit. But it connects to something I said
last week that needs to be understood. "The single biggest cost website
owners incur is the invisible cost of sales being lost." I often say, and
I truly believe, that more sales are being lost on the net than actually being
made on the net. Read more about it on my April 17th post "Truth to
power."
So now that I have defined a couple things let me get back
to the purpose of this blog post. This is a blog that I know domain owners will
appreciate. But as much as I like you guys, it isn't for you directly. It is
for the masses in the corporate world that don't get it. It is for the masses
in the investment community that are missing one of the easiest way to grow
money with the lowest entry fees of any commodity ever. It is for the guy on
Main Street that
has 5 customers a day walking thru his doors that can easily be transformed to
thousands if they knew the path. It is for domain owners to point to so that
others may have a quick understanding of what a GREAT domain name represents.
Then taking it a step further.
I hope folks will use these limited posts to help folks
grasp the power of domain names. It can be overwhelming and complex at times.
My job is to simplify how folks look at domains and the importance they have.
Besides the outright business of a domain name it is also becoming
a status symbol, a collectible and a statement.
What once was a game played by a few dozen people is now a
thriving industry that is supported worldwide and now has a dozen or more trade
shows each year. The premiere event is T.R.A.F.F.I.C. which is the largest and
is by invitation only. This just illustrates why domain names are in such
demand and why prices of this commodity has gone up faster than ANY other
commodity EVER KNOWN to mankind. Besides .com there are some 330 country codes
plus other extensions and new ones coming. So the opportunity is not over. On
the other hand each day that passes makes entry more difficult unless you come
with a thick wallet. It is not uncommon for a domain purchased for $100 in 1996
to sell for $100,000 just a few years later.
People will be leaving comments on posts here for many years
to come. The debate may be heated at times, but the blog today with 15
posts in April 2007 will be more active a year from now with limited posts.
Consider this ground zero for the great domain debate. The debate is really
over. The story has been written, but there are about 6 billion folks that
still need to understand and embrace.
Have a GREAT day!
Rick Schwartz
