Apparently, there has been considerable confusion with respect to the Affordable Care Act, which is widely known as “Obamacare.” It seems that there have been a whole bunch of issues with federal and state government websites where people would learn about the law as well as sign up for the necessary coverage.
With people from around the country forced to visit different (and unfamiliar) websites to purchase insurance coverage, there is most likely considerable confusion even finding the correct website. On MyNorthwest.com this morning, there is an Associated Press article about a Washington state-based insurance agent who may be benefitting from some of this confusion.
Here’s an excerpt from the article:
“When insurance broker Jeff Lindstrom started buying insurance-related Internet domain names a few years ago, he thought he was being creative and a smart businessman.
Lindstrom bought 40-50 domain names and hit the jackpot with one choice: washingtonhealthplanfinder.org. No, that’s not the state’s new health insurance marketplace. That’s Lindstrom’s insurance brokerage site.”
Although the article only mentioned this one insurance agent, I am sure there are many domain name owners who are benefitting from the confusion. I would imagine there are people who are accidentally typing-in the wrong domain name – either the wrong extension or incorrect keywords. Some may be landing on domain names that are parked and others may be landing on affiliate websites or similar types of sites. Whatever the case, this is probably generating considerable revenue for domain owners.
For the last few years, insurance domain names sold very well publicly and privately (see NameBio for more details). Although many of these are unrelated auto insurance domain names, there are many related to the health field. My guess is domain investors who own great descriptive domain names are making decent revenue based on typo traffic.
If you own insurance related domain names, you are welcome to share your experience to let people know how these domain names are performing.
Hello Elliot,
Hope you are well.
Good luck with this new format and domain. Always enjoy reading your blog. tell your little brother, UP THE ARSENAL!
Regards,
Anthony
Not too many I suspect are getting huge traffic unless the site is built out.
The only type-in traffic site that is truly benefiting imo is healthcare.com vs. healthcare.gov
Certain ones that are not generic such as the ‘wa health plan finder’ are benefiting but that is not type in that is because of its rank. In addition the site was up over a year prior to the state’s site.
Other sites such as newhampshirehealthexchange.com which are generic in nature are being hit with “misleading” the public in believing it is the official government site, despite multiple disclosures and going above and beyond the norm. The govt has not yet released guidelines on web-based entities as to what disclosures need be stated or where to be placed or what font size etc. Replicating practices of Medicare.com for those monetizing on their own may be a useful guide to avoid issues.
I would suggest keeping any site with BLATANT disclosures above the fold, new logos, no copied logos of state flags or govt agencies etc., If you dont know the industry you may be bringing yourself problems, licensed or not.
Hi!
Dear Sirs,
I´m writting here to see if you can help me in any way. I´ll keep it brief. ç
I owned a .com domain, it was registered to me but the e-mail contact was the one of my webdesigner. My webdesigner shut down so his domain and e-mail adress ceased to exist, even though it was still as contact for my domain. Three months ago someone created the domain and e-mail adress of my webdesigner and using it got all the passwords and codes to transfer the domain to another registrar and registered it under another name, so I lost control of my own domain (my e-mails etc..).
I´ve tried getting in touch with ICANN but they say unless it´s a UDRP they can´t do anything about it, there´s no policy that covers cases like this. I can´t use a UDRP because the domain is not a brandname or a name registered to me. My old registrar after checking whois history for my domain and that of my webdesigner saw there was something wrong and tried to help me getting in touch with the new registrar (Moniker), but they won´t accept anything that is not a UDRP.
Apart from legal help, is there anyway I can get the domain back?
Thank you in advance for your help.