Generic Domain Names Archives - Page 22 of 35

Brownie.com Should Forward to Brownies.com

Elliot Silver

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September 19, 2010

I’ll be honest with you right now. I have somewhat of an ulterior motive for writing this Sunday blog post. I want some fresh brownies… hint hint…

I like brownies. I also like generic domain names. It was nice to see a great generic domain name like Brownies.com being used by a company that makes and ships brownies. Fairytale Brownies is brownie company founded by friends, David Kravetz and Eileen Spitalny, who started it in 1992. The company has 30 year-round employees and 100 employees during the peak season.

The primary reason I found this company is that they own Brownies.com, which is where the company operates its business. In addition, and the impetus for my post, the company owns Brownie.com, but it does nothing with the domain name. There’s no 301 or 302 redirect, nor is there even a forward to Brownies.com.

If you visit Brownie.com by mistake, you may either end up on a dead page or quite possibly a ISP error page loaded with pay per click links. To make matters worse, since Fairytale Brownies is an Adwords advertiser, they could actually be paying Google to send what should already be their visitors to Brownies.com!

The company was smart enough to register both great generic domain names Brownies.com and Brownie.com to prevent another company from operating on the alternate, but they should be doing something with Brownie.com instead of having it error out.

PS: I love brownies 🙂

Confirmed: MLB Acquires Angels.com

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September 7, 2010

8

The Angels.com domain name has been purchased by Major League Baseball, and Angels.com now redirects to the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim website. The domain name was purchased at the end of August for $200,000 at a Sedo auction.

In my opinion, this was a smart acquisition for the baseball team, and it was a smart sale for the owner, who hasn’t been able to monetize the traffic that was presumably mostly looking for tickets, baseball gear, and other baseball related products. In 2007, Major League Baseball filed a UDRP for Angels.com, but they lost the decision. According to an article written by Andrew, the team was offered the opportunity to purchase the domain name back then for around $300,000.

As you can see from a prior post about sports team domain name, most professional sports teams (and leagues) understand the value of owning the team .com domain name. (Big exception: Dallas Cowboys who still down’t own Cowboys.com).

According to the most recent Whois update, the domain name is owned by MLB Advanced Media, LP, and the domain name is registered at Corporation Service Company.

Example of Smart Usage of a Generic Brand and Domain Name

Elliot Silver

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August 16, 2010

9

Walking through a farmers’ market a couple of days ago, I saw a shop with BBQ sauces, spices, supplies, and seasonings. One unique product I saw was seasoned skewers, which are grilling skewers that contain seasonings on the outside, allowing your chicken or beef to be seasoned from the inside while being grilled. Seems like an interesting concept.

I think the company did a great job choosing a name for its product. Had the company been called XYZ seasoned skewers or something brandable like Taste Skewers, I probably would have forgotten what they are called. Smartly, the company owns and brands its product as “SeasonedSkewers.com”

I think it’s smart because it’s branded as its product description. The company could have chosen a cutesy brand, but people probably would have referred to the product as seasoned skewers. Additionally, if they hadn’t called themselves the product name, it would have given a competitor an opportunity to enter the space, since the product is unique but not one of a kind.

If your company develops a new product, sometimes the smartest thing to call it is exactly what it should be called.

GetAFreelancer.com Acquired Freelancer.com Saw Spike in Traffic

Elliot Silver

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July 20, 2010

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Sometime around early October of 2009, GetAFreelancer.com acquired the better domain name Freelancer.com for an undisclosed amount, although it was reportedly a “six figure sum.” The company then moved to the easy to remember Freelancer.com domain name, and according to Compete results, traffic numbers are greatly improved, despite the fact that Freelancer.com didn’t seem to receive much traffic prior to the changeover.

According to Comptete, in the last year, GetAFreelancer.com maxed out at around 289,000 unique visits per month in July 0f 2009. As of May of 2010, Freelancer.com received 364,000+ unique visits according to the same Compete chart. While this comparison doesn’t take into consideration additional advertising that may or may not be in place, the acquisition does show the value in a generic domain name for a company like this.

So what was the purchase price for Freelancer.com? Although I couldn’t find a published sales price, I looked through my email archives to find an exchange I had with the former owner of the domain name. In May of 2006, when times were arguably better than what they were towards the end of 2009, the owner was asking “$100k usd.” I didn’t reply back to negotiate since it was out of my budget at that time.

Diapers.com Founder Quidsi Launches Soap.com; Similar to PetsUnited Approach

Generic Domain Names

Elliot Silver

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July 15, 2010

3

I was reading TechCrunch this morning, when I saw the article about the launch of Soap.com, a new website owned and operated by Quidsi, the company that owns and operates Diapers.com. According to the article, the company plans for Soap.com to “offer more than 40,000 products by the end of 2010 and more than 100,000 by the end of 2011.” These plans are clearly ambitious, but the company CEO has said Diapers.com revenue is over $300 million annually (video of that below), so it is very plausible this will happen.

While reading the article, I couldn’t help but think of another company that is taking a similar path with great generic domain names. PetsUnited, LLC owns and operates websites on domain names such as Dog.com, Horse.com, Fish.com, Garden.com, Bird.com, Ferret.com, and other great generic domain names (including a couple recent purchases from my company). The company was founded by Oncologist (yes, Doctor) Alex Tabibi, and in 2006, it reported $62.4 million in revenue according to an Inc. Magazine profile.

Marketers often talk about the importance of building a single brand, and in the case of Quidsi and PetsUnited, LLC, the companies are focusing on building multiple brands while using generic domain names. I will be posting an interview with Alex sometime in the near future, and hopefully he will discuss the challenges and benefits of this. Both Alex and his brother Carlo operate the company, and I am sure working with poses some unique challenges and benefits for the company as well.

Sunday Afternoon Thoughts & Update

Generic Domain Names

Elliot Silver

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June 13, 2010

4

What a weekend so far. Not such a great goal for the US in yesterday’s World Cup match against England, but we’ll take it. I feel badly for the keeper though since this will surely be a Bill Buckner-esque play that will go down in history, especially if England fails to advance. Tonight is a big Celtics game, and today is a great day to relax and enjoy the weather.

Here are a few things that may be of interest.

There was a great article about Warren Royal and his Bobbleheads.com venture in the Albany Herald, a local newspaper in Georgia. The article discusses how Warren acquired the domain name and then built the popular website.

If you have been thinking about applying for a .CO domain name via the .CO Registry’s Founders Program, now is the time to do it. Applications are due no later than June 15, 2010. I am in the process of applying for one, and if I am awarded the domain name, I will chronicle the build out process, as I am required to have the site launched by July 20, 2010. As an alternative, you can try to reserve one at a registrar like Register.com.

While thinking about the June 15th deadline, I also just remembered that 2nd quarter estimated taxes are also due on the 15th of June. If you need to pay estimated taxes, don’t forget to mail them out tomorrow (note to self).

Someone emailed me about an adult-ish website that was hosted on Blogger that got taken down. I know it’s been said before, but you really need to consider this type of thing when you use a service like Blogger or even possibly WordPress. I don’t know if the site was removed, or if the owner was able to access his articles/posts, but it’s important that you control your content rather than be reliant on another company.

Just a reminder, the cost of .com domain names will be going up very soon (July 1), so now is the time to take proper action. You can renew your domain names for several years in advance or you can transfer them as some companies like Name.com have transfer specials going on right now.

It looks like Rick Latona is moving into other areas in addition to domain names and watches. His newly re-launched RickLatona.com website has a section for diamonds, timeshares, and loans.

Francois Carrillo has started his own domain blog at DomainWare.com. His first post discusses why some Domaining.com accounts have been canceled. With all of Francois’ ventures and domain sales, this is going to be an interesting blog to read if he updates it frequently.

Generic Domain Names

Brownie.com Should Forward to Brownies.com

Confirmed: MLB Acquires Angels.com

Example of Smart Usage of a Generic Brand and Domain Name

GetAFreelancer.com Acquired Freelancer.com Saw Spike in Traffic

Diapers.com Founder Quidsi Launches Soap.com; Similar to PetsUnited Approach

Sunday Afternoon Thoughts & Update

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