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Beware of “Free Account” Offers

Elliot Silver
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17

Yesterday afternoon, I received an email from the founder of a small domain company I’ve never heard of with a seemingly great offer – a free account at the newly established company. This domain company has what seems to be a number of interesting offerings, some of which sound like they could be useful. I am going to turn it down.

It’s hard enough to maintain any privacy when blogging, but I don’t want to give away private information about my Whois searches, drop search habits…etc. The company was started by someone I don’t know nor have heard of, and it’s a service I’ve never heard of before.

I wrote about this a while back, but think it’s important enough to reiterate. Although a free account at a website with an interesting service may sound appealing, remember that the company may either be observing your individual habits or may be looking to sell data for all users.

I still remember when someone who will remain nameless (from a large company) emailed me a couple of years ago to ask me if I intentionally let a domain name drop. The name was below average, so I knew he was watching my portfolio rather than the specific name. It made me realize that there are plenty of companies who are happy to provide tools for domain investors, and I am sure that some of them are using the data, both on a personal level and aggregated, for their own enrichment.

Seeking Advice on BumperProtectors.com

Elliot Silver
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63

I would like to get your advice on how I should proceed with the development of BumperProtectors.com. I received a couple of decent offers for the domain name when I emailed companies that sell bumper protectors as well as domain investors, but nothing was significant enough to warrant selling the domain name.

One person/company inquired about the domain name last week, and after I informed him about the previous high offer, we discussed the options to build it, as the offer was higher than he would pay. We discussed creating a line of bumper protectors in China or Hong Kong and then selling them on the website. There is no real market leader that I could see, so this would be a good opportunity. Producing a $50 product for a few dollars each would yield a strong ROI after a couple of years.

The big downside with producing lines of bumper protectors is the liability issue. For whatever reason, Americans tend to be more litigious than elsewhere, and I wouldn’t want to have the liability in the event one of my $50 bumper protectors fails to protect someone’s bumper. Further, I could foresee someone forgetting to put their bumper protector away after leaving a parking spot, and in the event it flies off of the car and damages another vehicle, I could see further liability as the producer. While the liability might seem far fetched, it’s not worth the risk for such a small revenue stream in my business.

That being said, I am thinking about building a website with an Amazon store being the revenue generator. I know Amazon notoriously pays little, but if I can get the site to rank #1 as a result of unique content I have written combined with the store, it could be a nice little passive money maker.

I’ve heard about Epik and WannaDevelop but haven’t heard much in the way of results (how much people are earning from their websites). With an exact match product .com domain name, what can be expected in the way of earnings?   I am not interested in spending a few hundred to build a website that makes no money!

Please let me know your thoughts on developing BumperProtectors.com.

**** 7/13 Update ***

After a very good face to face conference with Rob Monster, I’ve decided to award the project to Epik and will post updates once the site launches. This is the first time I am working with Epik and I am excited about it.

BlogSport.com: Is Yahoo Typosquatting Google’s Blogger Platform?

Elliot Silver
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2

Google BlogspotYou’ll Never Guess Whose Making Money on This Frequently Visited Typo URL

There are plenty of times when I “fat finger” a url and end up on a website I had no intention to visit. We all do it. Oftentimes, these typo domain names are owned by typosquatters who place pay per click links on the landing page, with the hopes of making money from this traffic.

This morning, I went to visit a popular blog hosted on Google’s Blogger platform. These websites generally are formatted with a url similar to this: blogname.BlogSpot.com. When I visited the blog this morning, the page didn’t load, so I double checked that I had the correct domain name. I didn’t. Instead I had blogname.BlogSport.com.

I did a quick Whois search to see who owns the domain name, and I was very surprised to see that Yahoo owns BlogSport.com while Google owns its flagship BlogSpot.com.

You might ask yourself how this happened. It’s somewhat interesting, so I will briefly explain. Sometime between September and October 2005, BlogSport.com was acquired by the owner of Rivals.com. In June of 2007, Rivals.com was acquired by Yahoo, and they presumably acquired all of the assets of Rivals.com, which included the BlogSport.com domain name.

Today, BlogSport.com sits idle, as Yahoo isn’t monetizing or forwarding the domain name, presumably because they know that Google might take action if they did.   According to Alexa, over 10 million people visit Google’s BlogSpot a month. There must be thousands of people who accidentally visit Blogsport.com a month, intending to visit a blog or website on the Blogger service.

So whose making money on this valuable typo domain name? Presumably the Internet service providers like Verizon and Comcast who monetize error landing pages “helping” web browsers who accidentally type-in an invalid domain name. It’s very kind of them to do this for us.

Sunday Update: World Cup Final Edition

Elliot Silver
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14

I bet that there are plenty of people who read my blog that are very excited for today’s World Cup Final featuring the Netherlands and Spain. Since I am a betting person, I will put it out there that I think Holland is going to win the game. Without a doubt, this is going to be a fun game to watch.

On to a few updates:

  • The New York City DomainFest auction list was released this past week, and there are some fantastic names up for sale. Of course the prices are very high for the best names, but I am sure Oversee and Moniker reps are working on connecting with potential bidders. Some of the better names are Artists.com, Rate.com, Quotes.com, Stocks.com, StockQuotes.com, Cable.com, Reggae.com, and Patents.com. Full list can be seen here.
  • I decided that I am going to the DomainFest conference. If anyone would like to meet up, let me know. We may be organizing a pre-conference event, and I will keep you posted.
  • I received an email from Register.com announcing a Verisign contest with the winner getting $10,000. According to the email, “simply submit a 2-minute video or short essay (300 words or less) telling us how .com has affected your life. If your entry is one of the winning stories, you’ll win one of 10 iPads, $2,500, $5,000, or $10,000. The deadline is August 31, 2010—don’t wait to tell your story!” To enter and for more details, visit HowDoYou.com.
  • There’s a new pet store in my neighborhood called Unleashed, which is a PetCo company. I spoke with the GM yesterday, and she offered me a table out front next Saturday to hand out DogWalker.com magnets (at no cost). For those of you developing websites, these are opportunities that you should look for – low/no cost promotional activities. All you need to do is ask.
  • Some sad news to report… According to an article a couple of days ago in UK’s Daily Mail, a 30 year old nanny died from sexual arousal while watching pornography. Wonder if she got her “toy” on Vibrator.com or SexToys.com.
  • Big thanks to Arbel Arif for his Lebron James contest. I won a 2003 Topps Lebron James graded 10 rookie card for correctly guessing he’d sign with Miami.

Premium WordPress Plugins & Code Snipets

Elliot Silver
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2

I use WordPress on a number of my websites because it’s an easy platform to manage. There are thousands of programmers and designers who use WordPress, and likewise, there are thousands of great plugins (both free and inexpensive) that can help a developer customize a website. IMO, it makes web development less expensive and less time consuming than a custom content management system.

I was having a chat with my web developer last night, and he recommended that I check out Code Canyon to see the WordPress plugins that are sold on site. I had heard of the site before because of its affiliation with ThemeForest.net, but I hadn’t really visited or looked around. Not only is The Events Calendar plugin I use on Lowell.com and Newburyport.com for sale on the site (I had discussed it before), but there are plenty of other great scripts and plugins as well.

Frequently, Mike has to make modifications to free plugins to better suit my needs, but sometimes enhanced plugins, that do what I want out of the box, are available on Code Canyon for a few dollars, which is obviously better than paying an hourly rate for customization. As much as Mike doesn’t mind getting paid extra to do extra work, he has (more than) enough on his plate right now to keep him very busy!

Code Canyon has everything from enhanced contact forms, to jquery code, to advertising platforms, and everything else in between. Yes, some of the links contain affiliate code, but Code Canyon is something my developer uses and a site I will continue to monitor to find great WordPress plugins.

Usually, I come up with ideas for my websites based on things I’ve seen elsewhere, and I leave it to Mike to find the plugin or script to make it work. Now, I will look at the plugin options first and ask him to implement them on site. It’s a good way to save time and money.

New Charge for Posting Comments

Elliot Silver
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35

After careful consideration, I’ve decided to implement a small charge for posting comments on my blog. Each comment you post will cost $.05 USD. If you post more than 25 comments per month, the cost will be lowered to $.04 USD/each, and people who post 100 or more comments a month will only be charged $.025 USD/comment. You may also pre-purchase 1,000 comments for just $0.01 USD/each.

In addition, comments that are mean spirited, that question the validity of my article, or those that insult others will be charged double. Similarly, comments that are positive, ass-kissing, or otherwise complementary will be half price. I am the sole judge on the categorization of said comments.

It takes quite a bit of my time to approve and moderate comments, and this is the most fair way to address the situation. The comment charges will be kept accurate via IP address, and payment can be submitted at the end of the month via Paypal. Charge disputes may be addressed directly with me.

Finally, if you haven’t guessed already, I am just kidding around. Hope you’re having a good summer so far. Happy Friday.

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