How would you like to get a box of fresh oranges from Florida when you purchase a domain name in the aftermarket?
Register.com just rolled out a unique domain sales venue called Orange List, and when you buy a domain name from the list, they will include a box of Florida’s finest fruit. Ā In addition, readers of my blog will also get a special discount on Orange List domain names ā simply include the phrase “I Love Oranges” when you email or call the contact information listed on the website and you will save “15%.”
I had some questions about OrangeList.com for Ross Vinograd of Register.com, and he was kind enough to reply below.
Elliot: What is the goal of Orangelist.com?
Ross Vinograd: Orangelist.com is the only domain marketplace that includes a complimentary box of oranges. Ā Our goal is to sell domains and simultaneously increase the health of the domainer community. Ā Ā It is a noble mission and we aim high.
Furthermore, this is a great opportunity to meet domain investors.
Elliot: How often will the inventory change?
Ross Vinograd: We will publish a new list of domains at the beginning of each month. Ā Ā If we ship a lot of oranges, we will list new names more frequently.
Elliot: Will there always be 20 domain names for sale, or will the site expand?
Ross Vinograd: The number of domains will be limited to approximately 20. Ā Orangelist.com is designed to showcase premium names and what better way to showcase premium domains than with premium oranges.
Elliot: What orange grove will the oranges be from?
Ross Vinograd: We’ve done our homework and have identified several groves that will allow us to ship delicious oranges year round. Ā By the way, we ship coast to coast and only to the continental U.S.
Elliot: Are you planning on doing any other fun lists in the future, like CheesecakeList.com, PineappleList.com, or maybe FerrariList.com?
Ross Vinograd: Good question and I defer to the Scientists who have overwhelmingly confirmed that the nutritional value supporting the release of Orangelist.com far outweighs the health benefits of cheesecake, pineapples, and yes, even Ferraris.
That said, keep your eyes peeled and check out our monthly inventory at:
www.OrangeList.com “Great domains, Healthy Oranges.”
There may not be a better drink in the world than a glass of orange juice from Bloods in Delray Beach, FL.
Any South Floridian worth their citrus has been there and knows what I’m talking about.
Seriously… I spend 1,000 dollars on a domain, and they send me oranges as a thank you. That is a little insulting as someone that might be starting a business. They might be more concerned about the price of, oh, let’s say, “designertoilets.com.” Really? Chalk another one of for Register.com. If they sell three names off of this, it would be surprising. You think an Internet company that has been around since 1994 would understand how viral marketing works by now. Register.com, just for the record, see here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viral_marketing
I checked my calendar to see if it was April 1.
they have lost their mind over there.
this is beyond weird, and those domain names suck.
you would think that since register.com siphons off all the “good” names from their drop feeds to snapnames, they could have listed some real premium domains on there.
It is sad that they don’t even know how to effectively skim the cream off the drop lists of their customers’ domains. They have no idea what makes a good domain.
Here is register.com’s algorithm to skim the cream: does it make more than $X in skenzo parked revenue in the past 30 days? if so, keep. they don’t know about fancy things like direct navigation traffic, keyword search volume, etc. They own a portfolio of JUNKY 100-200k domains they kept because they had expired traffic from the old web site.
this is just a bizarre form of link bait for register.com.
@newjersey
This post is not “link bait.” I think it’s a unique selling proposition – especially from a large company like Register.com.
I did not mean your post, sorry, i mean the promotion itself.
The amount of time and effort register.com wastes on this crap is absurd. Their domain manager is not even functional, their main web site changes look and feel from page to page like a child put it together, they bleed marketshare, etc.
They had to hire a fancy MBA product manager with NO domain experience to come up with this promotion?
I’m surprised they are still in business.
I know the CEO Larry the snake blames the economy for their awful performance, but if thats the case howcome the entire hosting industry is growing and godaddy reports record sales?
ORANGES!
Give me back the money I spent REGISTERing
some lemons over the years. Now, that’s a promo.
From looking at the list, the promotion really should be:
“Buy a box of oranges, pick a free domain”.
I like this organeg but is not in my country so we make goatlistdomain.kz Free Goat to you for buy of domain names. ORange is for the mens who like the gaymans
Register.com is one of those domain registrars that I hate more and more…
Why? Because they are cherry picking and keeping all the good expired / soon to drop names for themselves and auctioning them off everywhere they can.
NameJet runs their inventory with special auctions… Same deal with SnapNames.
Now they got their own site to offload peddle most of their crap, and I am sure some suckers will pay up.
Please no more interviews from this people…. :/
This is beyond bizarre. I’m still waiting for the punchline, because there’s no way that this is a real marketing strategy.
“The only domain purchase that includes a box of oranges”
As if I’m supposed to expect those things to go together? And Elliot – for a guy with an NYU MBA, I’m shocked to hear you defend this as a unique selling point. It’s not, because the attached “benefit” is a commodity.
Head & Shoulders has a USP — it gets rid of dandruff. If you want that tangible benefit, you have to buy the product.
A price match guarantee used to be a USP and in some industries still is. If you want the lowest price without shopping around, you buy here.
I want that specific benefit, and the only way to get it is to purchase this product or to buy it at this location.
If I want to get some oranges, I need to buy a crappy overpriced domain name? No. I can just go down to the supermarket. The “benefit” isn’t intrinsic to the product being sold, and it doesn’t have enough value to overcome the fact that oranges are a commodity. There’s no added motivation created to buy.
I’m just amazed at how terrible an idea this is. Someone at Register.com doesn’t deserve his job.
It’s okay, adds a personal touch.
@ Eppie
One purpose of marketing is to get awareness of a product or service. I bet Register.com did that successfully. I also bet if you, me or anyone else commenting here put a bunch of names for sale on any venue, and you, me or anyone else could offer commentary on names owned by others, there would be a lot of criticism š Care to share some of your names for people to comment on? š
For the record, I don’t have my MBA from NYU. I have my Master’s of Science in Direct and Interactive Marketing from NYU. Since I graduated in 2003, they changed the name of the program when they combined it with another marketing program.
BTW, just my opinion, but more importantly than the oranges, I think it’s a unique idea to get people to look. I don’t think they expect people to buy a domain name simply to get a box of fresh oranges. I think they hope people will have a laugh at the concept and take a look at the offering.
@ Elliot,
I agree that marketing is supposed to raise awareness, and if the names on the list were a lot better, it might be a cute gimmick… honestly, I’d still think it was ridiculous.
You know what the real USP was to me on this? The thing that actually got me to look? Knowing the list was only 20 names. So many sites are flooded with crap that it’s too much of an effort to sift through it looking for the rare gem. A site that only offers the best 20 domains they can find at a time would have a much better value proposition to me, the potential domain buyer.
As for my own domains, I’ve purchased more crap than I care to admit… I’ve gotten rid of most of them, but I sadly haven’t been able to drop them all from my inventory. Then again, I’m not putting up a site trying to sell my junk with some attached giveaway gimmick.
If you looked because of the oranges, I guess it worked a little. I’d be surprised to learn it draws much more traffic than if they just announced a limited 20 per day / week / whatever listing from a special reserve of names. If the site has REAL value, people will be interested in it.
“If you looked because of the oranges, I guess it worked a little. Iād be surprised to learn it draws much more traffic than if they just announced a limited 20 per day / week / whatever listing from a special reserve of names. If the site has REAL value, people will be interested in it.”
If Register.com decided to sell 20 names on site a week without this twist, it wouldn’t have even been interesting enough for me to write about. It was because of the uniqueness of the offer that I opted to blog about it. I get a whole lot of press releases announcing sales and I thought this one was interesting š
“and what better way to showcase premium domains than with premium oranges.”
The better way would be to put up some premium domains.
As Mike points out Register.com has horded all the premiums. They should give a box of orange peels w/purchase because these domains are the equivalent.
I’m more tempted by Borat’s “buy domains and get a goat” offer.