DomainTools

Win One of Three Free DomainTools Professional Memberships

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I’ve said it many times before, but I probably couldn’t operate my business on a full-time basis without using DomainTools. The company’s Whois lookup is quick and comprehensive, and its Whois History tool is what I use to perform due diligence before buying any domain name in the aftermarket. There are more tools than these, but these are what I use daily.

DomainTools is currently running a special Christmas themed contest, and the company will be giving away three free professional memberships. Each membership has a $500 value, and you’ll likely extract much more value than that if you are using the tools daily… even one deal that you close on or choose not to close on will make the membership worthwhile.

Here are the basic details that you can find on the special holiday themed website that was created for this (SantasFavoriteWhois.com):

Send an email to Santa before January 2nd, 2013 about your wish to win a FREE year of DomainTools’ Professional membership. In your email, you MUST include two things: 1) Your full name and 2) A quote about the value YOU see in using DomainTools that can be shared. Santa will draw THREE lucky names to be announced on January 4th, 2013 via Santa’s favorite DomainTools social media channels.

I am sure there are terms and conditions, and you can find that on DomainTools’ website.

Go Daddy Policy Change May Help DomainTools

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I read about a policy change at Go Daddy’s TDNAM auction house that was implemented as result of domain investors circumventing the system to acquire domain names that had been previously auctioned. The company described the problem in this way:

Domain investors often watch Go Daddy Auctions ® for expired domain names of value. When they find domain names they want, they use the public Whois records to harass the current registrant into redeeming the domain name and selling it directly to the investor. Based on customer complaints, many investors participate in this practice, and some even hire outsourced teams.

Although I think losing out on sales was more of a problem rather than Go Daddy’s concern about domain investors harassing their customers, I think this “fix” will probably bring additional business DomainTools rather than solving any problem. The Whois History tool is a powerful tool that can essentially circumvent privacy and allow people to see the prior Whois information, enabling them to contact domain registrants as they have been doing.

With that said, I don’t see why Go Daddy doesn’t have the same sort of system employed by other registrars that prevent customers from re-registering domain names after the grace period. I suppose it would be a potential customer service issue if a registrar is auctioning its clients domain names rather than using a partner like Net Sol does with NameJet).

In my opinion, the solution won’t really work for Go Daddy because anyone who is buying names like this will sign up for a DomainTools account and continue as usual (if they don’t already have one). I think the way to stop the problem is to change the timing of the auctions.

DomainTools Seeking Director of Marketing

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In a tweet posted this afternoon, DomainTools announced that the company is seeking to hire a new Director of Marketing. The in-house position will be based out of the company’s Seattle, Washington office.

From what I understand, the roll previously fell under Susan Prosser’s job description, but Susan is now more focused on Industry & Partner Relations as Vice President of the company.

Here are the desired skills and experience for the qualified applicant:

  • Provide leadership, training, and management for a superior Marketing organization.
  • Drive market research and competitive intelligence.
  • Work with Product Management to define and execute go-to-market strategies.
  • Enforce brand consistency across our websites, marketing collateral, PR, etc.
  • Manage by data and metrics; lean towards the science of marketing as much as the art.
  • Test new channels for membership acquisition such as affiliate, SEM and display.
  • Love to come to work every day, and make sure your team feels the same way.

The full job description is posted on the company’s LinkedIn page, and if you are interested in applying for the position, you can do so directly on the LinkedIn page. You can also learn more about DomainTools and its parent company on the Thought Convergence website.

DomainTools Offering Free Trial

 

I saw this Twitter post from DomainTools this morning offering a free three-day DomainTools trial, and I think it’s a great chance for people to check out how many tools they can benefit from.

Every day without fail, I use DomainTools Whois lookup Tool, Whois History Tool, Whois Monitor Tool, and probably a couple of additional tools I can’t think of off the top of my head. I also receive Registrant Alert emails virtually every morning, and I use that to see what domain names are being looked up.

In my opinion, when buying a domain name in private in the aftermarket, you need to use DomainTools Whois History tool to make sure the deal is legit and the owner is really the owner. It’s one of the most critical tools I use to do due diligence, and the other is just my gut feel.

There are plenty of other tools and services that I use, but frankly, I really don’t think my business could operate without a DomainTools membership. I can’t think of any other tools or services I can say that about.

If you don’t have a DomainTools account and you want to be serious about investing in domain names, you need to have one. I recommend using the free trial when you know you’ll have three days to really use all of the tools and see how beneficial it is.

Although DT is an advertiser, I wasn’t asked to post this nor am I using any tracking or affiliate link.

Screenshots.com Archived SOPA & PIPA Protests in Visual Gallery

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Yesterday was a historical day for the Internet. Many of the largest websites we visit (Google, Wikipedia, Craigslist…etc) had some sort of visual protest of two Congressional bills that are currently under consideration in the House of Representatives (SOPA) and the Senate (PIPA).

It was really neat seeing many of these large websites showing their opposition to these two bills, while encouraging customers and clients to contact elected officials to let them know how they feel about these bills. As an American, freedom of speech is a right we are given, and being able to publicly protest legislation is important to this democracy.

In the past, we only had newspapers and other print publications to save and reference historical dates and events. There is now an alternative to the old way: Screenshots.com.

Screenshots.com  was launched by DomainTools  in December of 2011, and it archived the home pages of many websites that protested SOPA and PIPA. If you visit, you can see a visual gallery of the SOPA / PIPA protest. The protest is fresh in my mind now and is discussed in a variety of publications both online and offline, but it will be forever recorded visually on Screenshots.com.

Personally, I think it would be great if individuals could create accounts on Screenshots.com and archive articles and websites that are important to them. This could be good for many reasons both good (perhaps a mention in a  prestigious  publication)  and bad  (perhaps archiving stolen content or libel).

DomainTools Launches Screenshots.com

In early February, Ron Jackson reported that Screenshots.com had sold for $32,500. The third largest deal of the week was completed by Eric Rice, and the buyer was DomainTools (as Mike Berkens noted a while back). The company has been offering historical screenshots of websites via its Whois lookup page. For instance, you can see the old format here.

A press release went out this morning announcing that DomainTools is now using Screenshots.com to display historic website screenshots.  The new website is free to use for any visitor, and anyone can view or download the screenshots. You do not need a DomainTools account to use Screenshots.com.

This is a standalone website, and like other DomainTools’ websites, it provides much more information than just screenshots. For instance, when you search a website, Screenshots.com lists the # of domain names owned by the registrant of that domain name as well as the # of domain names on the same nameservers. It’s a handy new site, and I can imagine a whole host of uses for it.

Press release below:

DomainTools, the recognized leader in domain name research and monitoring, today launched Screenshots.com, a website that allows users to view screenshots of what a website looks like now and throughout its history. Screenshots.com provides a web archive of images and data sets that can be used for discovering and evaluating the history of website homepages.  Users can track, and more fully understand, how a website’s homepage content has changed in its lifetime.

DomainTools has rebuilt the thumbnail engine that for years has provided a visual context to the powerful domain name detail information available at DomainTools.com. By launching on the premium domain name Screenshots.com, DomainTools is able to feature this important content in a more functional way for users that are specifically interested in home page archives.

Screenshots.com was created with key features in mind to help users better research competitive websites, easily scroll through a website’s image history, and discover details about the website.  Visitors can quickly uncover the year the domain was first registered, find similar type websites and learn how a website looked over time.  The site includes the ability for users to request an updated screenshot at any time.  The Featured Screenshot section on the home page scans news feeds for domain name references and showcases them on a rotating basis.

The DomainTools thumbnail image capture system, the back-end service for Screenshots.com, was originally developed in 2004. The current version now checks up to 1,000,000 websites a day and, unlike other screenshot services, captures critical external resources like ads and images. With Screenshots.com, what you see is exactly what a visitor would have seen when they visited the site.  Domain investors, trademark attorneys and brand agents alike have relied upon DomainTools’ screenshot history tool to make more informed business decisions and to investigate and defend potential trademark-infringing domain names.

For nearly 10 years, DomainTools has provided users with the most comprehensive data about domain names, and the launch of Screenshots.com helps extend that mission.  Together with DomainTools.com, DailyChanges.com, ReverseWhois.com, and Reversemx.com, individuals, small business owners, and many large enterprises use DomainTools’ breadth of tools to do everything from finding a good domain for a new business to verifying DNS and WHOIS information on corporate portfolios of thousands of domains.

About DomainTools

DomainTools is the recognized leader in domain name research and monitoring. Like the white pages of the Internet, DomainTools provides a directory that serves a comprehensive snapshot of past and present domain name registration and ownership records in addition to powerful research tools that help to uncover and discover everything there is to know about a domain name. DomainTools is a Top 200 site in the Alexa rankings. DomainTools is based in Seattle, Washington.

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