09 June 2010 ~ 4 Comments

Basic Online Domaining Skills

Domaining is one of the best things about the World Wide Web. Anyone can do it. There is no ethnic tabu or gender restriction, educational bias or language barrier. The web allows individual users their own path to domaining success. The domain name game is a custom career with no checklist or required curriculum to start or actively participate in online.

And it is a myth that every domainer webmaster or site designer has to know all the code types and applications administration tasks in the beginning. the learning curve of a domainer is both a challenge and a reward. Domainers make excellent peer advisors. Learning to navigate the basic starting points of owning a domain and promoting it for resale can be the start of many lasting online relationships.

Online web travelers from all over the world use the internet every day to traffic in domain names and related products. Being able to make websites, engineer hosting account setups, and administrate open source applications are some of the skills needed for domain name careers. Hosting account ownership and registrar commerce is a must for domainers. Studying the interactions and execution of domain purchase, registration, transfer and hosting of names and websites are pivotal domaining skills.

A robust Internet connection with some tolerances for crisp security and ISP access is suggested. Facebook access and experience using Twitter is a bona fide asset to any domainer working online today. Niche skills like language or industry core competencies can lift a newby domainer into the advanced level of his group of interested name promoters and owners.

Domaining can be as multifaceted as the individual operator decides their business day online needs to be. Working offline editing HTML code or participation in domainer chat are equally valuable domain name development inputs. Photo editing, graphic design skills, and overall adherence to web standards is a valued set of skills that can become domaining sidelines for other domainer clients.

Basic computer skills and word processing facility is very much utilized in domaining and basically any online editing of text and material. Indexing a numbered list, or formatting a bullet point in the code might be needed one day and then never again. Some spreadsheet analysis may occur using traffic statistics but graphic representation of these reports is commonly available.

People generally want to know what to expect when they break into the domain name game and how the industry works. The individual domainer will produce his own agenda and set his own standards about how their day or   week or month will progress in terms of domain acquisition and resales. Redesigning or editing sites for user ease of use is a common task.

Domainers usually hire subcontractors to get little things like code editing or site patches done, as it is not a good use of their time to learn a skill from the ground up when it can be done by an online domainer professional. The skills domainers learn ramping up in the job make them feasibly able to perform these tasks for others as well. Search engine optimization and link building are almost domain industries of their own.

The schedule of a domainer can be arduous or part time. The domainer can spend all their time scanning drop list auctions, reading technology tutorials, or building social network relationships with other domainers. All can be equally valuable. The underlying trait of a successful domainer is the willingness to learn and the ability to actively participate online in business areas relating to domain name commerce.

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23 May 2010 ~ 34 Comments

Domain Market Career Positions

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Ever feel like cornering the market? Domains are like commodities on a stock exchange, except the World Wide Web is the Stock Exchange for urls and domains and the registered users don’t need a license or formal training, just the ability to purchase the domain name from a registrar. Domain marketing professionals only need an enthusiasm for doing business and promoting their chosen domain name creations or purchases.

Marketing a domain name and its putative content is the next step. Many other tools and instruments can be employed to publicize a site name online.   Just distributing a press release about data management, link distribution, content review, or  the domain name and the associated website is an aggressive step forward for many domainers.

Making a website can stall a new domain buyer for months or years. Smart domainers employ domain professionals to take care of focused domain strategic marketing points. Ongoing website maintenance can require script doctoring, hand coding, and ellipsis of new marketing layers into the first visit website experience. Manipulating web page files and using web standards is job best left to professionals for optimum results.

Many types of online domain services can be contracted for direct enhancement of the domain name profile. Just getting the word out in a chosen niche or topical list of subject related website directories can take months. orchestrating a campaign to get the real message behind a domain name idea or associated website into the public mind and target web user  demographic needs all the assistance it can get.

While the goal of every domainer is to break the bank and buy low and sell high, a few sidelines have emerged in the domaining world. These are the brokering of domains, the domain name traffic improvement niche, the link exchange market, and the articles and content devising. Making websites, adding affiliate links and ad banners, and creating logo graphics and locating custom images ot suit the site are webmaster tasks that can be outsourced.

Marketing domains to likely niche buyers and developing the name and its associated data sets for auction listing is yet another tranche of domaining employment. Some domainers may view auction listings, read about domain name auction sales, and even list their own domain names for sale without realizing the full capability of online Internet tools that can boost a domain name before auction for the maximum sale price.

The buying of a new domain upon creation from a registrar is a simple process. The name is vended to the new registrant and the associated particulars like physical street address, phone number, and email address are recorded. If there is a hosting company account available, the domain registrar record (WHOIS record) will reflect this data. Public use of registry data will result in many advertising offers and services.

Information is a primary reason to build a site. How the information is returned to the visitor is up to the site designer or webmaster. Ads can be squeezed into popup windows, incorporated into readily visible banners, or linked into the website text in various places.  Many domains have developed into websites that simply refer a visitor to domain name ownership lookup data.

Buyers are everywhere online looking for niche names. Brokering domains has become big business. Expert domain name sellers and consulting domainers can advise a domain owner if the current domain market is a good time to sell the name and what kind of money they might expect to fetch at auction. Analysis of search dynamics, site discoverability, and domain name keyword density will be bundled into that service.

The SEO specialty in domain marketing is wide open. Any proven talent for establishing or consistently improving domain name recognition, traffic volume, page rank, and search engine results altitude can engineer many eager new business relationships. The techniques can be custom for each domain marketing project or standard and applied to every name in the hopper. SEO services are a hot way to break into the domain business.

The Internet is open for business every single day. Domainers can set their own hours, train themselves and build their own flagship projects online to craft their custom domain  service client base.  Ready and willing domainer clients are standing by to hire work for their domains. Could you be the next professional working online in the domain industry?

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19 May 2010 ~ 24 Comments

When Domain Fever Strikes

The rush of getting a great domain for reg fee or selling a domain for a profitable margin can’t be duplicated. Cooking up  a great domain sale or domain acquisition creates a entrepreneurial fervor that is a completely new career in marketing, sales, and advertising. There is no drug more compelling or more rejuvenating than domaining fever. But a few caveats wouldn’t go amiss.

The domain trade blogs and domain newspapers tout the sale of big dollar domains and six figure auction sales many domainers may never see. They can dream about them, but they may never see those big ticket paydays in the domain world personally. Domain forums are places where the highs and sometimes the lows of the domain world get seen, but not everything in between.

I have known million dollar domainers and can appreciate the unseen time and effort they put into their domaining careers can be lost in the melee of a celebratory domain name sale. They have spent early dawn hours and late night sessions plugging their domain name candidates into the matrix for profit and assuming link building, SEO techniques, and domain name marketing and promotion will support the inflated resale price.

The domain sale headline of a huge price for a single domain name has a back story. Those responsible for big sales might be teams of promoters and investors acting behind the scenes. The consulting advice they receive and the strategy to sell the name go unseen, by and large. The auction may not be the first time the name was offered for sale, and many sleepless nights may have been spent agonizing over the reserve price.

Many domain name buyers and sellers aggregate multiple domain name sales across weeks, months, and years to establish a financial longevity and career perspective on the domain name career and what it means to them. These domain name entrepreneurs may spend countless hours talking to prospective buyers, campaigning at live auctions with bidders, and days and weeks of travel time attending domain name trade shows and conventions.

The big ticket domainers have some serious mileage and dues paid for those big auctions sales. And for every big ticket domain sale, you can bet the seller has a sizable portfolio of unsold names waiting at home. That domainer has spent years combing through every name drop list and every auction site spreadsheet, scrutinizing each proffered name for potential future value.

When the “ordinary” or newbie domainer gets started, their eyes should not be in the clouds. Luck and lightning may strike, but they really don’t bolster the family checkbook. Domain lightning in a bottle is a fun read but can’t be counted on. Every domain investment, large or small, should answer to measurable likelihood of gains and multiplicity of return on investment.

Domain name buying, domain name creation, and domain name acquisition is a fun and stimulating activity. Trading domain names opens up the mind to future possibilities. But the actual monetary involvement with the domain name career should be delimited to specific timetables and renewal dates that shore up the concrete edges of the domain name buy.

Financial constraints for marketing and promotion should follow the marketing plan. A map for stages of investment of time, money, and website or link development should be assigned milestones. These chronological datelines in the life of any domain ownership should include SEO results when keywords are added in, page rank changes (if any), and potential bidders or buyers for that name.

These types of notes and metrics can keep a distance between the emotional relationship many domainers have with their online real estate and the dollars and cents realities of ongoing maintenance, hosting, and renewal that come with domain name management. Any model of prurient investment urges reconsideration of ongoing effort, time and resources toward lesser probability return entities.

The wise domainer will streamline their efforts towards the domains that really count, and survive the ups and downs of the domain market with equanimity. The trade papers and the domain blogs can promote the big ticket domain sale until the (Tu)cows come home, but the sensible domainer will keep numbers, analysis and cool headed thinking on their side.

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05 May 2010 ~ 25 Comments

Domain Lookup Tips

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Domainers need to know how to execute a few basic operations. How do you get started in domaining? Here are the facts. A domain name career can be as broad or as narrowly defined in terms of skills and operations as the individual chooses. One of the first skills a domainer often learns is the domain registration lookup. Domain lookup information is critical to domainer decision making.

This can be done at an online registrar or hosting company which maintains a free search tool online at their site. Registrar companies are entitled to claim expired domains and have regulated policies about how to gather information from buyers and display it online. Domain name registration data can inform a potential buyer or investor regarding who has owned the name before them, or who owns similar domain names.

Privacy options are available when buying a domain name to keep the companies from disclosing name address and contact information like email addresses and telephone numbers to strangers online. No laws exist for usage of domain name data and personal privacy. Drawbacks to providing personal contact data in the domain registration for public WHOIS lookup abound. Email campaigns of spam and snailmail increases of junk mail are often associated with domain name purchases.

Performing domain lookup searches and name registration data queries is one of the primary skills of the domain game. It may be a long time before a new domainer even wants to buy a domain name. A web domain may be purchased but undeveloped.  the domain name may be parked for revenue upon traffic visitor participation. The privacy option may terminate the searcher’s ability to find out who owns it and where they live.

Domain lookup searches allow a new domain namer to see what kinds of data is revealed when they register a name. New domainers may not fully make the connection the first few times they buy a domain name what happens to the registration data and how public it is. These lookup searches are called domain checks. they show if a domain is registered, for how long, and who to. Contact can be made to offer a purchase price for the domain name directly.

Many new domainers fall into the enticing trap of cheap domain names. But no law of averages determines the resale value of any domain name. However cheap the domain name, the risk is assumed by the buyer or creator of the domain name. This can be seen when cognate domain lookups yield the same registrar owner. Bulk registrations happen when registering domainers get discounts on numerous domain purchases.

Bulk registrations can expire at the same time, filling drop list auctions with unwanted cognate names. Domain checkers can relate the date the domain was purchased. this can be very relevant when disputes arise between domain name owners. WHOIS registration records of domain ownership become the basis of dispute settlement criteria. Options at domain registration include assigning WHOIS data to a privacy record or company name.

Domain hosting is a valuable feature because it simplifies domain name ownership responsibilities to one website and one secure login. Domain hosting may add fee services like parked pages or other features that come with the domain purchase. Forwarding, masking, or cash parking for a fee occur. The domain host or registrar may discount or offer a limit to parked or hosted domains within an account determined tolerance.

An online banking account or credit card may be required to complete the sale. A domain reseller may be able to execute a transaction in a currency a new domainer does not use or make a bid when the membership requirements for proxy bidding  demand a history of reliable domain transactions. Some registrars require a registration and membership for domain auction bidding.

Domain name lookups and domain registration checks are advised before initiating personal domain transfers or private auction domain transactions. Domain lookup searches can verify a domain name belongs to the offering entity. Domain name length of ownership, country of ownership, and proxy contact information is available for every single domain name registered.

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26 April 2010 ~ 21 Comments

The Domainer’s Daily Agenda

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Think you’ve got what it takes to be a domain name professional? A domainer starts the day early, or “urly” as the case may be. Yet the true domainer’s day is packed with conflicting needs and time traps. Evaluating media, reading blogs, writing content and designing sites is absorbing. The time seems infinite, yet by the end of the day, it’s all gone. It happens in the blink of an eye, every day.

The domainer day must be navigated with key efficiency for multiple tasks. Managing business plans for websites, building site plans, choosing domain name, and checking auction sites takes time. Domain site bookmarks and favorites are natural time savers. Anything that shortens a task completion cycle, like a domain auction service, data reporting tool, domain forum, or tips update form a domain industry source is valuable.

Domainers must always be referencing their chosen domain news platform, or reviewing their hosting functionality and related discounts and offers. Domains come up for sale every day. Keeping competitive while managing existing domains is tricky. Budgets and timelines are the religion of true domainers. Rapid execution of these domaining tasks  is key across many different domain name sale, promotion, marketing, and development objectives. The reward is the profit.

Here is a sample agenda schedule in the day of a domainer:

6:00 a.m. Conference call between domain name investment partners.

6:30 a.m. Check email and review pertinent notifications and messages.

7:00 a.m. Login blog #1 and administrate comments & build new blog entry.

7:45 a.m. Check domain forum #1. Read messages and respond.

8:00 a.m. Review daily Pool auction and aftermarket drop listings.

8: 45 Log best picks from drop and deletions lists. Make min and max offers.

9:00 a.m. Peruse Droplist keyword lists and budget 2nd and 3rd offer ceilings.

9:30 a.m. Take call from domainer contact with bulk portfolio sale.

10 a.m. Register for a new topical forum for new domain name. Post 10 threads and then establish link to url of domain name in signature.

10:30 a.m. Check domain auctions and drop list bids between forum posts.

11:00 a.m. Make 3 blog entries with url link and domain name trackbacks.

12 noon. Munch lunch while listening to domain radio shows. Watch domain SEO information videos from live streaming or attempt some halfhearted cardio exercises and stretching hardworking neck and back muscles.

1 p.m. Open domain portfolio report and check date files for tickler spreadsheet with passwords and user names and visit 5 domain keyword related forums and make three posts in each one. Mark date of visit and adjust spreadsheet to next “tickler” sites for the next online development domain link promotion session. Print out report for domain portfolio notebook update.

2 p.m. Brainstorm new domains to buy, forming potential domain names from keywords and terms from clipped media reports. Use the Network Solutions WHOIS,  Godaddy, and other resources to verify if domains already exist and how much they might cost. Scan for current Godaddy coupon codes and determine if a bulk buy is in order.

3 p.m. Collect text files of custom content ordered form members of online domain forums. Evaluate keywords in Textalyser, and verify originality using Copyscape.

4 p.m. Make custom logo for new domain minisite using Cooltext. Experiment with textures, colors, fonts and sizing.

5 p.m. Submit Google and Adsense data for a new domain. Compose the minisite file with text content files collected and test the new site appearance in your resident browser or HTML viewer.

6 p.m. Proof marketing email for key domain site and send to broadcast list from registrations at the site. Submit new articles and graphics to the open source application and jot in a notebook the most viewed recent articles.

7 p.m. Review domain expiration report in domain portfolio software. Submit two domain names “for sale” threads for BIN auctions in two domain forum auction categories.

8 p.m. Sign up for streaming video webinar from trusted consultant in the domain world. Download videos from archive to review offline. Log into domain forums and change signature link to newest domain venture.

9 p.m. Review email bids and counter offer for bid domains. make payments to content authors, domain owners, and graphic artists for custom logos and themes for new partnership site. Browse SEO blog for reminder tips.

9:30 Stream favorite TV show on one LCD screen while adding keywords and doing text searches on the other. Use commercials for ad hoc keyword and meta tag addition in window with open source application site login in the article editor administration interface.

10 p.m. Review Alexa ranking for each domain in the portfolio spreadsheets. . Perform domain name and website analysis & compose review charts. Determine priority tasks for the next day.

[Rinse, lather & repeat.]

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