Tech Notes

Tech news outside the mainstream

Uncommon news and information with a technical twist and some topics that are a bit out there. Enjoy...

Digital Enlightenment - Domain Names are Assets

Digital Enlightenment If your business doesn't have a strong online presence, plan on going out of business.

Companies often allocate substantial funds to marketing campaigns in order to promote their products or services. These campaigns encompass various expenses such as TV and radio commercials, print advertisements and social banners. The objective is to enhance brand visibility and reach a wider audience, which typically necessitates a significant investment. A 30-second TV spot during prime time can cost around $110,000, excluding the additional costs for production and management. It is crucial that the target demographic does not miss these advertisements by channel surfing. Print advertisements are also expensive, with production costs and yearly commitment terms averaging around $20,000. Consider how your customers will find you and most people are less frequently viewing these mediums, everyone is online and it is the first place anyone goes to find anything. Bottom line, traditional advertising is very expensive and no where near as effective as a domain name and won't be going forward.

Any businesses that wants to survive and prosper must develop a comprehensive marketing strategy that centers around a domain name and a robust digital marketing presence. Recognize the value of domain names and the exposure they provide, opting to add different domain names for various product segments and growth. Domain names are marketing assets and they persist in value though mergers and acquisitions.

Become digitally enlightened and gain significant advertising value, extended market reach, brand recognition and authority all with the power of a domain name. There's no excuse today for being as short sighted as this management team.

Quality Domain Names Are Drying Up

Quality domain names are drying up Quality domain names are drying up, get the best domain names while you still can.

Domain names are the real estate of the internet, and they are becoming scarcer every day. With over 4.5 billion internet users and countless businesses vying for online attention, the demand for premium domain names has never been higher. If you are considering investing in a domain name, now is the time to act before they are gone.

A domain name is an essential part of any online business or brand, and it can have a significant impact on your online success. A strong domain name is memorable, brandable, and easy to find, which can help drive traffic and establish your online presence. It can also help you stand out from your competitors, build trust with your customers, and establish your brand as an authority in your industry.

However, as more and more businesses and individuals recognize the importance of domain names, the supply is dwindling. Many of the most valuable domain names have already been registered, and the ones that are still available are being snapped up quickly. Once a domain name is registered, it is not available for anyone else to use, meaning that if you don't act quickly, you could miss out on your ideal domain name.

Investing in a domain name is also a smart financial decision. Premium domain names have been known to sell for millions of dollars, and even less valuable domain names can appreciate in value over time. By investing in a domain name now, you could be setting yourself up for a significant return on investment in the future.

If you are interested in buying a domain name, it is important to act quickly. Do your research to find a domain name that aligns with your goals and brand. With the right domain, you can establish a strong online presence, build your brand, and set yourself up for long-term success. Don't wait, buy those domain names today before they are gone.

The Speed of Technology

Speed of Technology The speed of technology is taking off, try and hang on.

Technology is increasing at an exponential rate, with the pace of technological change accelerating rapidly in recent years. This is due to a variety of factors, including advancements in computer processing power, the increasing availability of data, and the development of new technologies such as artificial intelligence, machine learning, and quantum computing.

One measure of the pace of technological change is Moore's Law, which states that the number of transistors on a microchip doubles roughly every two years. This law has held true for several decades and has been a driving force behind the rapid growth of computing power.

Additionally, the rate of technological change can be seen in the development and adoption of new technologies, such as smartphones, social media, and cloud computing, which have transformed the way we live and work.

The speed of technological change is also apparent in the rate at which new technologies are being developed and brought to market. For example, the time it takes for a new technology to reach 50 million users has been decreasing steadily, from 75 years for the telephone to just 13 days for the Pokemon Go app.

Internet usage will continue to grow over the next 20 years, especially as more people around the world gain access to the internet.

According to data from the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), the number of internet users worldwide reached 4.9 billion in 2021, up from 3.4 billion in 2016. This represents a growth rate of more than 7% per year. If this trend continues, we can expect the number of internet users to reach 7.5 billion by 2030 and 9.7 billion by 2040.

The growth in internet usage is being driven by a number of factors, including the increasing availability and affordability of internet access, the proliferation of smartphones and other mobile devices, and the growing importance of digital technologies in daily life.

In addition to the overall number of internet users, other trends to watch in the coming years include the continued growth of e-commerce and online services, the increasing use of artificial intelligence and automation, and the expansion of the Internet of Things (IoT) and other connected technologies.

Domain Name Values Are Rising

Domain Name values are rising Domain name values are rising for several key reasons:

First, they provide unprecedented advertising abilities and can reach out to new clients and interact with them 24X7 where no other media can't even compete.

Secondly, absolute creditability.  People judge your domain name, your url, your address, this is how they find you and get to know you.  How well your site looks and works is also a factor, I hope that is obvious.  Don't lose the fish at the dock.  But, if your domain name is off center, or has extra words, hyphens, number, all these make it weaker and harder to do business with your organization.  Look at how you view and surf, how fast are you gone and less likely to put a credit card up when these two key points are off?  77 percent are gone in less than half a second.

Domain names are like real estate, they're virtual real estate, but the difference is domain names rarely and infrequently come back on the market.  Once sold, they are gone.  If they do come up for sale, it's usually in the aftermath of a merger and for 100X what it last sold for.  Like real estate, inventory is low and depleting.  The pool of good names is drying up at an accelerating rate.

Get the .com extension or you'll be giving business to it.  Maybe a .org depending on what your business is, and a .us maybe a good thing 10 years from now, but get the best .com names while you can.  For the all the reasons above, and most prominently, domain names are the most powerful advertising mechanism in place for the next 20 years.

Prices are going up.  Open to offers, take a look here.

Business Development - Advertising

Integrated Marketing - Business Development - Advertising The key method of developing your business is advertising. Call it integrated marketing with all the other forms of getting your message out, but it still boils down to advertising, which is making it public and memorable.

You may advertise in a trade magazine or on a billboard, but your website is the only form of advertising that's constantly available to your audience. Your domain name is the focal point for all of these marketing components, at the corner stone, and the foundation from where you build your brand upon.

Get a dot com name. Other extensions may gain popularity in 20 years, but for the foreseeable future your marketing efforts will end up in the junk folder. Even in tech where .io and .ai have some traction with start ups, it translates into they're in beta, not ready for primetime. As a decision maker can you back your choice of doing business with an organization that's not really established?

Read my last post about Branding for Authority and Affinity for more information. Here are some premium domain names that I have for sale.

Domain Names Matter - Branding for Affinity

The importance of domain name branding There's a lot to branding your business in sync with your domain name and I'm just going to discuss a few key points that begin with the letter A.

Authority and Affinity

Being a brand authority now of days is having a powerful domain name.  Powerful domain names are valuable because they are memorable and reflect your business as a leader in your industry.  Like it or not we live in the age of information overload, and that's a good thing.  As a kid I would ride my bike back and forth to the library trying to juggle a stack of books, knowledge and products from all over the world are now at anyone's finger tips from just about anywhere.  How does a customer find, return to, or recommend your business in a sea of 1.7 billion websites all competing for the first page of Google?  This is why your domain name matters.

Affinity is the sense of the natural path to your business, a relationship to or the path of the least resistance.  If a customer has to remember your domain name or apply a silly extension, not only are they going to have a hard time getting back to you, it's even more difficult for them to refer your company to their contacts.  Word of mouth is still a powerful tool in growing your business.

Here's a few great articles on the subject of branding and why your domain name matters: Spend Less on SEO, More on a Memorable Brand by Jamie Zoch and The True Cost of Your Domain Name by Chris Zuiker.

One point I would add to both of these articles is that not acquiring your matching domain name is leaving the door open for your competition to purchase it.  Some companies have spent millions just to keep their competition from having them.

What's working with COVID? Online Businesses!

Built for SuccessMany online businesses have been thriving throughout the pandemic, some have had an unprecedented 2nd quarter.  How? The answer is simple, they have mastered the art of the UX (user experience).  Evaluate your sites whole UX and ask these 10 questions about your site from Medium.com.  I'd add credibility to that list and that begins with your domain name.  The article is from 2018 and is every bit as relevant then as it is today. 

For the DNN platform there's an upgrade for the developer's UX too with Vanjaro.com from Mandeeps.com.  When you design all day, what you experience matters.  The new UX is comparable to Wix, SquareSpace, and Weebly.  Featuring a Drag & Drop Live Editor, Responsive Editing, Automatic Revision History, Workflow Management, and in context, user aware, centralized site administration and it's open source.  Vanjaro.com is compatible with custom DNN Modules, (including XMod Pro) and hundreds of existing solutions on the DNN Store.

The experience is the journey.  Make it better and make more sales.

My COVID-19 Policy - Work Harder

Giant Chickens in April

By now you have probably gotten an email from every company that you have ever visited on their COVID policy.  No need to rehash washing your hands and social distancing here.  The point that I want to stress is that we are all in this together, locally and globally, and it's going to take all of us to beat this thing.

I work for the government in my day job, maintaining transmitters along the coast of South Carolina.  The government is just people.  Some very hard working people that perform jobs that in the private sector usually pays much more for the same work.  But, boil it all down, and it's just people helping people.

In times of crisis's past, like the hurricanes we've had, we didn't get extra pay or bonuses, just a good feeling at the end of the day that we made a difference.  Getting through this is going to be difficult, but not something we can't do.

There are always two options you have in any situation.  One is to do nothing.  With COVID doing nothing is actually a good thing.  Stay at home and you're not part of the problem.  The second option is to try harder.  I have to credit my father with that one.  He was part of what they now call the greatest generation, but the greatest generation is really yet to come.  We are all products of these generations, we are the hybrids.  Let's try a little harder and figure this out.  Figure out what you can do to help.

Sure it's scary, we see exactly how fragile our world is.  And, the big brains say it's going to get worse before it gets better, but we will get through it and come out stronger. Helping others is really the name of the game.

Check on your neighbors, have empathy and employ compassion.  We are all going through a lot.  I want to be able to reflect back at the End of the Plague party and know I had a hand in making the world a better place.  I may not invent a miracle vaccine, but I help keep emergency communications online over here, inspire hope and I lend a helping hand.  I am very grateful for the medical, fast food, grocery workers and everyone involved in all these chains that keeping us moving forward.

Do your part and work harder. Patience, courtesy and humor go along way, act like you've been somewhere.  Maybe this will spark a spiritual revolution when we finally realize that we are all the same, and that we are all connected.

Domain Name News

Domaining - buying and selling domain name newsWant to keep keep up with all that is happening in the domain space?  Domaining.com

 

2020 is off to a quick start and for those that are not active in the industry daily, it can be more than difficult to keep up with all that's going on.  NamesCon is taking place in Austin, TX now, Rev.com just sold for 400k, Add.com sold for 800k this week, keep up with the status of the .Org Registry sale and get insight from the movers and shakers.

Domaining.com for the important news and domain industry headlines.

Does your domain matching your brand?

TLD InvestorsThis article is by Kasssey Lee on TLDInvestors.com originally from GrandSeeds.com

 

Your domain is the address of your store in the digital world. If consumers remember what you sell and where to buy it, that’s powerful marketing. Your brand helps them remember what you sell, and your domain helps them remember where to buy it. Therefore, you want your domain to be easily remembered. The easiest way to remember your domain is to make it match your brand.

It's never too late to get the matching domain name, it just gets more expensive.