Good Afternoon Folks!!
I am pleased to report that after months of looking(as I described in this blog post last week),negotiating and figuring out who would be a great guest speaker that is plugged in but not too close to the industry and can give us some insight from a slightly different perspective. Also, I did not even know about the Internet until I traveled internationally and started seeing CNN.COM every few minutes.
Nobody could argue that CNN has been plugged in from day one. The purchase of iReport.com meant a lot more than $750,000 for me personally. It was a sale that could be pointed to for many years to come by every domainer and every time a domainer watched CNN and saw iReport.com it would give them the fuel to keep going.
So I am happy to report thatRICK SANCHEZ, 3PM Anchor for CNN will be the guest speaker for TRAFFIC's 17th show and 5th Anniversary. He joins a great group of guest speakers over the years and I am sure he will be able to share things with you that will benefit your business and your future.
I am also happy to report that the fee we are paying Rick Sanchez is going to charity. Rick will have his honorarium go to a charity of his choice. I think that is pretty cool and I also think it shows a genuine desire to meet with our industry.
Have a GREAT Day!
Rick Schwartz
Javier Zaffaroni
Interesting choice.
Troy
Why him?
How can someone not in the industry give insight? Your blog, and many others, spends a lot of time discussing how much people from outside the”industry” don’t”get it”. Why have one be a key note?
I would like to hear your answer, not start a fight=)
owen frager
Terrific!
==> Rick Schwartz had a vision- Rick Sanchez is seeing it through and will tell you all about it at Traffic http://fragerfactor.blogspot.com/2009/10/newscaster-social-media-innovator-rick.html
Mark Fulton
Nice! Maybe Mr. Sanchez will share a little insight into his TRAFFIC attendance and what he sees happening in the domain industry with his 100,000+ followers on Twitter: http://twitter.com/ricksanchezcnn
Rob Sequin
Works for me!
“Additionally, Sanchez has reported live from Havana, Cuba, numerous times.”
From Wikipedia:
“Rick Sanchez (born Ricardo Sánchez on July 3, 1958 in Guanabacoa, Cuba.”
Oddly enough, I bought Guanabacoa.com last month after many years of trying.
What a great coincidence.
REALLY looking forward to the event now.
Thanks Rick!
Bill
Umm ok….
From Forbes to the guy that writes stories on him in 3 years.
Rick, your a fat cat now. It’s time to move over, and let the young bucks with a plan run the show.
Have a REALLY GREAT DAY, anyway.
Ah shoot;
I guess Barry Manilow or any of the Osmonds were all tied up, or just a touch over our “keynote” budget.
BullS
That the main reason I don’t attend any of the domain shows…same people and same ideas.
Have a REALLY GREAT DAY, anyway.
I don’t like having my name lopped off:
The Manilow option was mine- Cheers!
Roy Flanders
Randy
Will he break continually for commercials like on CNN?
The only thing I can contribute to his willingness to speak is he is still D list everywhere else. He’s free to speak about an industry he is clueless about, must be in high demand lol
Michael
Rick Sanchez? You have to be kidding. He was a channel 7 news anchor for years in Miami. He is hilarious, but what he know about domains I have no idea.
Mel St. John/CNN
No BS- the reason you don’t attend shows is because you don’t have a dime to your name because you are not successful but full of BS yourself.
And if anyone doesn’t think a pioneer of social media and citizen reporting in mainstream media , making use of a domain that set records for price at $750K (about a thousand times what forum know it alls or bots would estimate)- won’t electrify you with knowledge of getting traffic and generating ad revenue, you are not smart enough to be in this business.
owen frager
I see it differently. Twitter aliases and domain names are inextricably linked. When CNN pays $125K for a Twitter handle and Drew Carey is bidding up to $1 mm, Rick might have some valuable insight and perspective. Besides if I was attending the conference and owned a top GEO name like PalmSprings.com, and Time Warner was a key prospect to buy my portfolio, I wouldn’t mind the chance to get an in with someone who has the ear of the boss.
ref:
http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/04/15/confirmed-cnn-acquires-cnnbrk-twitter-account/
http://scitech.blogs.cnn.com/2009/10/05/drew-carey-may-bid-100k-on-drew-twitter-name/
Hellooooo!
OMG.
Cindy Brady would have more to offer. As a matter of fact, Rick, how about bringing a fictional character to do a keynote!
Downhill dude, downhill.
Bill
Hey”Mel St. John/CNN” you think Rick Sanchez had ANYTHING at all to do with he sale of iReport.com???
Are you guys retarded? Honestly. At this point from reading these comments if I were Rick I’d stop selling domains and start selling air in a bottle cause you fools sounds like youd line up to be buying.
And if you’re buying then that’s a line I don’t want to be standing in.
Jim Holleran
The key to this it’s not what Rick Sanchez has to say at the conference but what he has to say about the industry after the conference that can make this big.
Thanks, Jim
David J Castello
Not so fast, guys. Rick Sanchez is not a bad choice. In fact, in many ways he’s a great choice that could turn out to be a brilliant one.
Sanchez is the first national news anchor credited with combining traditional network news with social media using MySpace, Twitter and Facebook. And what does that mean to domainers? Potentially plenty. For one, like us, he’s part visionary and risk taker in a facet of the Internet. And the one missing link in our facet of the Internet (besides Madison Avenue) is recognition by the mainstream media. To 99% of the media we are still cybersquatters.
Rick Sanchez understood the power of the Internet from a perspective in advance of his peers. He is now going to be exposed to another part of the Internet whose significant investment power and potential still receive very little recognition from the media. He’s a professional speaker and is going to have to do his homework before he gets up behind that podium. I have no doubt he is going to be quite surprised by what he learns and what he sees at TRAFFIC.
The bottom line is that our industry will continue to remain the financial world’s best kept secret until the mainstream media wakes up and begins to recognize who we are and what we have achieved. And it only takes one educated national news anchor to flip the switch.
AlanR
Rick picking Rick Sanchez as a speaker is a great choice! For the naysayers out there, Rick has the ability to see the future long before most due and that’s why he is so far ahead of most in this new world we now live in. So if you can’t see the wisdom behind Rick’s next move, then that will be another mistake on your part that will keep you where you are at while Rick and his followers just keep moving on down the road to more success.
It’s funny how the losers in life always criticize the people who are successful in life. It’s obviously jealousy due to their lack of success so they have to lash out at the successful people. The jealous don’t know the difference between good or bad advice but due to personality issues, they tend to always be drawn to bad advice. So in order to feel big due to their short comings in life, they try to make others feel small. It’s a good thing that Rick and most others ignore the advice of the losers because if they didn’t, then they most likely would end up joining their low ranks too. In the last 10 years, many people have either become millionaires or became very successful taking Rick’s advice so I wonder how many of Rick’s naysayers can claim the same thing? Of course, you don’t need to be a rocket scientist to figure that one out if you have any common sense.
owen frager
If you own a domain you potentially OWN a CNN. Someone like Sanchez could partner and work for you. many of the GEOS are already hiring newscasters.
The world is changing. Open your mind and don’t think about domains as PPC pages, but as true media with endless possibilities.
Bill
I have many guys”like” Sanchez which so work for me. That’s the point right there son.