The Rick Schwartz Domain Name and Traffic Blog: RicksBlog.com – Home of The Domain King®

Morning Folks!!

We all know how it was, but how should it have been? Let's walk with me in the perfect setting. In the setting of goals and not all the petty nonsense we have wasted 20 years with. We did have a dot com crash or two along the way.

Why?

Because the IT guys (techies) were in control of things that they had no business being in control of because the business owner was completely ignorant to anything online. So owners depended on the IT for every decision including sales and marketing. Please!! Not the fault of the IT guy. But it lands on him anyways!

So the IT guy has his blinders on and sees the world in one dimension. Why? Because IT guys are paid to think that way. That does not translate well when you have to interact with others. Some 'Nerds' don't interact well. Big news to ya??

But let's look at the way it should have been and how it will evolve and then you will see what I see. Maybe. Then you can see why standing back for 20 years was REQUIRED. If it were up to me we would have been to this point in about 20 months not 20 years.

Back to the subject.....

Let's have a rectangular table with 8 seats. Let's figure who to put in those 8 seats to make a complete business.

1. You have the domain name at one end of that table. Sorry, all starts there no matter what your IT guy told you 20 years ago. He was wrong and you asked a nerd to make a marketing decision for you. Think that is smart Mr. Business Owner? See you have to take some of the responsibility because it was your decision to listen to him and not learn for yourself.

Guess what....20 years later and you have been FORCED to learn or risk going out of business. So you have a choice, you can keep listening to your IT folks, take control yourself or find out who really has the CORE answers you need.

2. You have the business owner sitting on the other end of that table. This time take your seat and don't give it away to your IT guy because he will be sitting right next to you anyways.

3. Your IT guy. Yes, I want your nerd at the table. He belongs there. He in a very important piece of the seating. But until now Mr. Business Owner, you have allowed him to occupy all 8 seats. Not Good!! But we are going to get past that TODAY! Hold his hand if you must.

4. Sales and Marketing. They need to be on the other side of the Business Owner. They keep the money flowing if they do their job right and you suffer big time if they do not.

5. Content and Graphics. Sometimes the IT guys are good at this too. Usually not. So you need a creative department that us actually creative.

6. SEO....NOW is the time for the SEO guy to come to the table. When everything is setup, THAT is when he becomes important in the equation.

7. This is when Mr. Business Owner steps up to the plate and lets go of the hand of the IT guy and takes back control of his company and his destiny. I don't know who # 7 is, but I can tell you Mr. Business owner will figure out who it will be to help him once he understands his company again.

8. A guy like me that tells you what you don't want to hear cuz it's no skin off my nose. So Mr. Business owner, you have a choice. Leap or keep holding the hand of the guy that can't lead you where you want to go. He may be a great guy and I am sure he is, but he has no business occupying all 8 seats and so it takes a guy like me to grab you by the neck and force you to look at your business and take back control of it. YOU made the business what it is, are you sure you just want to throw that away?

My point is we all wasted so many years getting to the point we are at now. The starting point. Many now armed with knowledge. I wish it did not take this long. But I always knew it would and eventually we would get to this point. The point where something like this post actually makes sense to the end user because it is exactly what they did. I have traveled with them in their shoes and as each reads this they will be blown away by just how spot on it is. They will relate and they will see things much differently than before they read this post.

Or they will just shrug their shoulders and carry on whatever. They used to be excellent, but progress and the lack of will to keep up with their peers made them mediocre and that's just something all sides have to accept. One day some lead gen site will come along and eat their lunch and they'll never know what happened.

Rick Schwartz

“This Jerk Owns
The Perfect Domain Name For My Business and Isn’t Doing Anything With It!”

BY Danny Welsh
JointVentures.com
Danny Welsh here. I have a confession to make. You see...I don’t know whether
our 120 or so domain owner clients other than Rick himself with
JointVentures.com this year realize it or not yet, but I don’t consider myself
a “domainer”. I have never claimed to be
a guru of domaining and probably my personal portfolio will take many years and
maybe decades to equal that assembled in ONE YEAR many times now owned by the
top 500 domain asset owners who read this blog regularly-- if it everdoes-- unless they
agree to sell me their best properties at 1998’s prices and simply retire into
the sunset.

Fat chance of that, right? Look how far I got trying to buy
just ONE from Rick Schwartz? LOL

So if you are driven and love your business category and
making sales and have .com on the brain for growing your company when your idea
CATEGORY.com domain name is taken…then…once you realize “the 500” own most of
the eRealEstate on the planet, in your business category and most others…you
can be bitter, whine and try to avoid the problem.

Or you can
improvise, adapt and overcome that problem.

--- > I say of the top domain investors in the world that
bet on this “domain name” asset class in 1993 for $100 and a bit of luck mixed
with foresight and an idea…if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em.

--- > I say of the very best domain names in the world
available for a business to make sales with in 2013…if you can’t buy ‘em,
borrow ‘em.

Many domain investors laugh when they
hear how much
money 2 years ago I wanted to pay Rick Schwartz to buy one
of his best generic .com domain names that was “unused” as I saw it.

$2000 to buy the generic .com domain I wanted seemed fair
to me.

Just like the $xx,xxx UNSOLICITED offers daily for years
sitting in Rick Schwartz’s email inbox that never get responded to think their
offer is “fair” for a domain name that is “unused”.

I was wrong, and so were they.

But we entrepreneurs
looking to do bigger business online are increasingly figuring it out and
coming round to admire the guy for his vision and balls to bet on a future
people thought would never happen 20 years ago… enough to call him CRAZY for
risking $100 for an intangible idea that he wouldn’t part with for $1,000,000
20 years later when folks try everything they can to track him down and offer
$100,000 without any attempt for him to even ADVERTISE IT FOR SALE.

$2000 to buy the generic .com domain I wanted seemed fair
to me. That was before I had a clue
that domain name I wanted for one of my own end user businesses might just be worth more than what I offered
him to buy it PER MONTH when used properly to propel profits

$2000 to buy the generic .com domain I wanted seemed fair
to me. That was before I realized
the very same asset could be used by my small business and worth even more than
that when paired with medium or larger one with more resources to MULTIPLY each
of the benefits that come along with pairing a BUSINESS with a great .com
domain.

$2000 to buy the generic .com domain I wanted seemed fair
to me. That was before I realized
that at that time 2 years ago, the damn domain name that had a PRICE of $100 in
1993 in 2010 may very well have had a greater VALUE to the actual
brick-and-mortar established businesses hoping to BUY IT than the businesses
themselves.

$2000 to buy the generic .com domain I wanted seemed fair
to me. That was before I fully
understood the difference between any old domain name for any given business
and THE domain name for any given business CATEGORY.

Here we are 2 years later, and damned if a real estate guy
hasn’t been converted that virtual domain names “eRealEstate” holds more value
and potential for income growth in my lifetime than it’s physical real life
counterpart.

In 20 years from conception of idea to a new asset class the
likes of which the world has never seen…and is still simply not yet prepared to
deal with except a few smart companies
that “get it”.

DAMN.

How has the world moved so quickly?!

Danny Welsh
JointVentures.com

Morning Folks!!

Can you sell? Turn a domain sale into an annual raise!

We all missed the boat on Rings.com but you can have 5% of Rings.com for LIFE if you put the right deal together and it is getting easier by the day. So pay attention and stay tuned!

Can you sell? Do you believe in the power and ultimate value
of the best domain names? Are you ready to put in some sweat equity and make
something great happen in your life? If you can sell the value proposition of
domain names, why be a flipper?

You can make every sale provide an annual raise for you and
your family when you work with JointVentures.com in our sub-broker leasing sales
program.

What sales pro doesn't want to work towards giving
himself/herself a raise each day when he goes to work? Is that a great day at the
office on the day when your efforts today produce not just a check but an
annual raise?

You may or may not know…but I traveled the United States
selling furniture for many years, criss-crossing a path of millions upon millions
of miles (and have the hotel keys to prove it). So I learned a few things about
sales selling commodity products, and if you want you can read all about that: HERE.

And eventually I made so much money selling furniture to
furniture stores that the guys who owned the business wanted to screw me out of
earning more. In the information services economy we're in today, YOU choose
the price of your value offered to the world.
You get to choose the product you sell, if you’re a great sales person.
More than ever the choice is yours.

A talented sales guy
can ply his trade dealing used jets from a big government to a small one and
make millions, or sell printer cartridges on telemarketing cold calls and earn
chump change. It is NOT skill that determines income for most players of
any game. It's the LEVEL OF GAME you play. Of the two smoothest and most
persuasive sales people Danny Welsh told me he’s ever met one makes $17/hour
plus commission and earns less than $65,000 per year. The other makes $600,000
per month.

If I had to guess I’d say the biggest difference between the
two of those guys is the 6 inches between their ears. That and a set of balls
(sorry, ladies).

Selling the asset class of domain names in the coming years
will be no different. The guarantee of daily dollars flipping a domain name you
just registered or whatever…and you keep 100% of the profit…or the promise of a
possibility for lifetime millions getting in on the BIG deals doing the same
mechanics and you earn a fair % playing in a bigger game with bigger deals.

YOU have the choice to decide, domain flippers.

As a domain name evangelist and talented salesperson…when
you KNOW we have assembled some of very best and most valuable domain name
properties on the planet, which future would you choose if the power to choose
your own destiny was in your own hands?

I assure you, if you love domain names as much as me and Danny
do, and like Danny missed the boat on early hand registrations in .com, and
like me enjoy the art of negotiation and sales ...your destiny finally IS in
your own hands.

Right here. Right now. For a handful more days, what we are
looking for in the remaining spots of our JointVentures.com inaugural
commissioned sales staff is very narrow so it may or may not be a good fit for
you. But it costs you nothing to throw your hat in the ring!

And get in a bigger game, with bigger stakes, less hassles,
and rewards of a lifetime.

Rick Schwartz and Danny Welsh are looking for a small and
elite group of KAMIKAZES that can present the value proposition of leasing a
Rings.com or HelicopterCharter.com quality domain name for typically $xxx-$xxxx
(with a few higher $xx,xxx) per month to the companies that would prefer to buy
the category-defining domain name of their desire outright— if they could,
anyway. Unless the company we market to and negotiate with makes an offer we
can't refuse, these assets owned or represented by our company are NOT for sale
in 2013-2015 for any cash-only sale.

Typical leases are 3 years or more, with a buyout option.
None of our deals are or will be less than $100,000 on a sale or lease-to-own
buyout. Ever.

5% across the board commissions.

Can you make the domain name value pitch to those who have
contacted us (warm leads) and to the companies that should be interested in any
given domain property based on researching their size, ambitions, and
product/service mix (cold leads)?

It's NOT hard to determine which companies in the world
SHOULD be interested in Rings.com if the deal was right for them. The real
missing element in the operation we’ve conceived and are building from the
ground up is a small group of movers and shakers that can make deals happen and
explain the value proposition from a human touch standpoint that a website
cannot do effectively alone…follow up and turn contacts into cash— without handholding.

Do you think you would be a valuable addition to our team?

We won't give a salesperson a salary, but we can make the
income potential staggering for someone who is self-propelled and sees the
value in aligning themselves with a company that can provide the very best
UNIQUE domain properties to sell/lease
available.

If you’re interested
to join up with Rick Schwartz and Danny Welsh as our inaugural
JointVentures.com ninja sales team then it’s time to step up and say so.

Send in your video application via posted link in the comments to the
“Armchair Quarterbacks Need Not Apply: JointVentures.com Sales Team Now
Recruiting Future MVPs” announcement post here: LINK

Have a GREAT day!

'www.LEFT.RIGHT left, right, left, right,
left.'

Here’s another of Danny’s pre-written posts. I think it’s
going to make him a few enemies. Oh well, probably about time he got some
thicker skin. He’s really just too damn nice. ;-)

Brutal…but nice.

Rick Schwartz

By Danny Welsh
JointVentures.com
What happens when 1800 extensions spawn
100,000 marketing campaigns using a cutesy www.whatever.whocares that we all
know will leak traffic to www.whatever.com?

Some 'brands' extensions, some 'geo'
extensions, some 'generic' extensions...each will have DIFFERENT
consequences, but all will leak for a LONG time.

If you know that, what must happen down the line? Can you
profit from it? Sure, many newbie domainers will. Stay away from trademarks and
make some money down the road maybe. For guys that hand regged dot com's 20
years ago I personally just don't see it as a smart use of time or resources
UNLESS:

1. They own the registry-- so they sell volume. Hey, Rick's
on record saying 'anything can be sold' and I agree.

2. They own
www.RIGHT.com matching for all www.LEFT.RIGHT's that get registered-- so they
profit from the leak.

All I'm saying is
Rick has given this more thought than any thought leader I personally know. And
I see human nature being the BIGGEST factor.

Drive.BMW is an example of a .brand extension, right? Those
marketing campaigns will send some traffic to DriveBMW.com-- for many years--
every time it's used in mass advertising. Don't be surprised when it also sends
traffic to Drive.COM

So if the big branded company marketing a domain name in the
next 3 years like 'www.LEFT.RIGHT' does their due diligence they will
own FIRST:

www.LEFTRIGHT.com

www.LEFT.com

In the case of the brands like BMW turning their company
name into a .brand TLD, they'd of course for the most part already own
www.RIGHT.com.

Except let's not forget about the Nissan.com's of the world.
:)

Ladies and gentlemen… it ain't gonna
be pretty.

Whoever owns UDRPLawyer.com and DNAttorney.com and so many
more descriptive domains for an emerging service sector better be prepared for
the onslaught of interest in needing to hire anyone who can help, and who will
companies turn to but those that have credibility within the world they purport
to have (i.e. the operators of generic legal domains pertaining to domaining
law).

Whoever has experience and a track record doing domain name
law from both sides of the table better be prepared for the onslaught of
clients you can grab in an exploding sector of law. Because you’ll be among the biggest winners in a field full of
losers as everybody gets on the 1-800--WHOCANISUE.com merry go round of real
life business in the 21^st century when 1800 .crap extensions try to
create a second miracle and fail.

Who will be safe from lawsuits with a precedent of decisions
where the domain owner WON against all frivolous complaints and has a generic
investing intent to point to? Who will make more money than every before? Who
will be labeled a visionary when it all shakes out and who will be labeled a
cybersquatter?

These things are all human nature. Sure, many folks are bitter that the
“500” own the very best .com domain names in the world. Hell, I was one of
them. But everybody likes an underdog story, and it’s all in who the
storyteller is and how the story is presented.

Victors write history.

Domains that look like these types -- GENERIC.com,
SOCIAL.com, PRODUCT.com, SERVICE.com, NOUN.com, VERB.com, GERUND.com,
ADJECTIVE.com, COUNTRY.com, GEOBIGNICHE.com and a few others will STAND OUT
increasingly as time rolls on.

And the guys and gals who saw the value of Hotels.com or
*any* CATEGORY.com value domain names before the masses…before the advertising
agencies…before the media…before the academics…before the ‘psychics…and before
every single “hotel” or “category” company on that planet themselves…

Will be in a position to tell the
story of struggle, frustration, patience, income, increased valuation, public
acceptance and increasingly triumph after triumph in what guys like me will
point to and say this is one of the greatest “underdog” stories ever told in
the history of capitalism.

Trademark UDRP's that increase in the next few years BECAUSE
of 1800 “.brand” and similar new domain extensions are going to hurt ONLY .com
domainers that have made money on leaks from big companies for years. Expect
the rush of .whatever to bring a huge # of '.com' decisions where the
company claimant WINS. DriveBMW.com is irrelevant to this discussion. All
trademarks are. The smart investors in domains don't buy trademarked domains
and most never have.

Every lawsuit and trademark UDRP is going to HURT ONLY .com
domainers that have made money on leaks from big companies for years. We call
those folks cybersquatters.

Expect the rush of
www.whatever.brand extensions being marketed to bring a huge # of
'whateverbrand.com' or 'brandwhatever.com' decisions where
the company claimant WINS.

DriveBMW.com is irrelevant to this discussion except as a
specific TYPE of extension (i.e. .brand) where if you think it through you can
PREDICT what is likely to happen and how they'll leak.

Many .brand companies
that have trademarks and mass market whatever.brand domain names are going to
leak to .com's that are registered by cybersquatters and never should have been
allowed to be registered in the first place.

Yeah, I said it. If you registered something like
DriveBMW.com it’s theft unless your business idea is different from the company
that matches whatever the “brand” is, and their products and services.

How many used Lamborghinis does the manufacturer sell?
Probably zero. Manufacturers can’t control the after-market sales of their
products in a resale market. So “UsedBrand.com” is going to be pretty safe
(Rick…you can remove the last two paragraphs if you disagree…leave this note in
here if you want…my research indicates these are true statements but you may
want to amend with your superior insider knowledge)

The smart investors in domains don't buy trademarked domains and
most never have.

So what happens when the media covers a growing trend over
the small cybersquatter that owns ABCBrand.com being sued and LOSING? Let them
compare that to the domain investor that time and again WINS with PRODUCT.COM
or SERVICE.COM when a greedy company tries to steal it. Give the media time and
they'll figure out the difference between generic investor VISIONARY and a cybersquatting
thief eating their fill on scraps that fall from the rightful table of a big
company.

Follow the line of thought from beginning to end game…

If you expect that these things WILL happen…and they will…

What does that do
then to the value of every PRODUCT.com? To the value of every SERVICE.com? To
the value of every CATEGORY.com? To the value of every SOCIALGROUP.com?

Think it through. Think it all the way thru the roof. See if
you come to the same conclusions Rick and I have for what's going to happen in
the next 36 months.

I say if already successful “.com” domainer folks want to
dabble in “.whatever”, well…whatever.

( ASIDE: notice how
even the guys selling it can't help but use that 'catchy' phrase
'.whatever' which they really shouldn't because it's pretty
derogatory and positioning is the name of the game!)

(ASIDE #2: I’m not
and very likely never will but if *I* were building a company selling
“.whatever” domains I'd do it from www.leftright.com and I'd set up shop at
www.left.right). I'd educate the end user about what an extension IS (because
trust me, they don’t know…the average guy knows .com and that is IT…in his mind
“www.” and “.com” ARE the same as that thing called the ‘Internet’).

So if you want to speculatively invest and buy .whatever
domains, go for it. I don’t have time for it. It'll take the few of them that
catch on less time than it took for .com to catch on because the few of 1800
new extensions that end up surviving can leverage .com's wind for 20
years...but it's still gonna be an uphill battle! Good luck.

Maybe you as a domainer hand register a PRODUCT.whatever in
2013 and your children's children will get a chance to do with those what guys
like Rick and others in the 500 can do RIGHT NOW with .com's from registrations
20 years ago. Hey, somebody's gotta win the lottery, right? But that’s a
game for a new wave of domainers. I simply cannot see one of the top .com
domain name owners in the world caring and it’s odd to me that any would try
with the exception of only a handful that are rich enough to simply hedge their
bets.

Set all the trademarks aside and .com's that are generic will go up
in value.

Faster and faster.

The next 3 years will witness the
telling of one of the greatest underdog stories in the history of business…I
wasn’t there for the beginning of the journey with the 500, but I’m here now to
tell the story.

And tell it I will. And when I tell you that the world of
business will march to the beat of the 500’s drummers before the fat lady
sings...It’s true.

The 1800www.Left.Right Domain Name Imitations coming to market
can “Left, right, left, right, left, right” and try to create a new drum
cadence in the market all they want.

For anyone seeking a GREAT domain name to give their
business a chance to Succeed.com, who opens their eyes and ears and does their
due diligence…it will become
increasingly clear in the next few years that there is only ONE “Right” choice “Left” standing for any SERIOUS
BUSINESS that has SERIOUS AMBITION to make a name for itself globally online.

Long live “.com”!

Danny Welsh
JointVentures.com