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

Morning Folks!!

Ever notice most so-called experts are clueless? Who deemed them experts when they never get things right? They may be "Professional Experts" because they are social climbers that hang with the Kool Kids. Those are folks that know very little, but they play a part and pretend to know what the hell they are talking about. Most don't have a clue. How many times do you have to be wrong before you lose your title of expert??

Experts come in every field and every walk of life. Some even in the domain business. You can probably name a few right off the tip of your tongue. The pretenders.

They say things according to what the Kool Kids like and want them to say. Puppet and Ventriloquist. Countless in domaining over the years. I call them "Intellectual Body Snatchers".

But to understand what goes on in domaining you have to be acutely and keenly aware of the motives of everyone you speak or listen to. If you don't do that as a habit, you are basically getting into the car of a man with candy when you were 3 years old. Maybe it's time to grow out of that trait or at least recognize that trait when you see it.

Advertising was "Weaponized" decades ago. The Beef industry vs. the Poultry industry. That was the first one I ever recognized and is still invisible to most humans.

Another famous one was Las Vegas Vs Orlando and Disney. Those are the top 2 destinations in the USA and each tried to hurt the other. It's been going on for decades. Billions of dollars are at stake each and every WEEK! Maybe, DAY!

The Insurance industry fights with humor. I like that! They sell sizzle with a little steak.

McDonalds advertises by inspiring as does Nike and others.

The single worst offender may be The National Weather Service. Back in the 1980's they changed their software and ever since then their predictability levels have gone down 75% or more. Want the weather, the Farmers Almanac from 200 YEARS ago has a better predictability rate. There are national motives and local ones. Misinformation moves millions of people to plan perhaps not to go to the beach cuz they say it will rain. That keeps people and MONEY in the city. That's called a MOTIVE!

There are silent wars and there are loud wars.

AT&T vs Verizon is an example of a loud war. Other companies go after each other. Hertz and Avis for example. But that was before weaponization of advertising.

But now let's get to Jobs and Progress. Progress never lost a job. It reinvented and created new and better and safer and more rewarding jobs. It has done that throughout history. It may displace some in the short term. It will enrich in the long term. It always has and always will.

The point of all this is to illustrate some of the invisible crossfire that is and has been happening all around us. You can choose to be aware of all this or not. But as a business person, as a domain investor, as someone looking to better their lives, these are important things to develop not ignore.

When you can see what can't be seen with the naked eye, you will find an opportunity. Lots of opportunities. They will cross your path all the time. It's another dimension! Oh, I forgot, they don't teach that to you in College. They can't. How can they teach what they don't know and don't see? Higher education?? Maybe not!

And that is why on the days or weeks or months that I decided to find a great domain, there is always one to be had and millions not worth looking at. But the good domain jumps off the page. They stand out from the crowd. Domain trophy hunters recognize them in an instant. Have Berkens, Shilling, Rosener and myself look at a list of 1000. Bet we would pick the same 3 domains almost every time. Allow the masses of domainers to do the same thing, they will won't pick the same ones.

The latest shiny object is marijuana domains. There will be some of value. But let's say 1 million of these names have been registered. Maybe 10 million. So many domains start with "420". Less than 100 have value and even less will be bought by end users. You better have something really good. Just cuz it starts 420BLAHBLAHBLAH.com does not give it value.

I have some of these type domains. GetStoned.com for example. Which leads me to "Prefixes" and "Verbs" and "Nouns." "GetWhatever.com" is a domain "Vein." You can put "Get" in front of so many words, goods, and services. Same with "Visit." It's a franchise within a franchise — Visitmiami.Com, VisitRome.com, etc. So I would rather see a newbie or others drill down on those that ARE still around than wasting time and money with silly and confusing new GTLD's with no circulation.

Again, this is simply history repeating itself in a different form but with far greater rewards. I have about 15 domains starting with "Get". My first one was GetLaid.com. I guess you know where my mind was at. I immediately saw the great potential online to get laid.

I completely missed the "Visit" franchise. That was a good one!! I had to settle for visit domains using .co and not .com and since there was no demand for .co, I let them all drop and, YEARS later they are still sitting there for registration.

Here is some more history in 2 unrelated fields. Pilots vs Doctors. The ONLY reason we have our health care crisis TODAY is because of WEAK DOCTORS back in the 1950's that acquiesced to the insurance industry instead of having the BACKBONE to stand up to them. Compare that to pilots. To this day a pilot can and WILL refuse to fly a plane that is either unsafe or go up in unsafe weather. The Pilot has the final call. That's a BIG and very important difference and outcome. One group had BALLSm and the other did not!

When you REALLY want to find answers, whether you like what you find or not, simply FOLLOW THE MONEY! Who gains, who loses. You will then be able to unmask motives and define the real situation, not the one painted for you and composed for you. And when/if they get angry, BINGO!!! You just hit a nerve and that means you just got SMART!

Courses are being taught in classes about domain names by people that have never been in the domain industry, and nobody here has ever heard of them. How is that possible? How can that even work? WTF are they teaching them?? Wouldn't WE like to know? And imagine if they are teaching your kid, while you are spending $250k to put them thru college to be guided by people with a lack of experience and credentials. I sure as hell would be concerned. More concerned about that than "Progress" hitting the job market.

When I was in school they were scared that all the computers would put humans out of work. Can't we agree that the "Experts" got it ass-backward? AGAIN! Computers created more jobs and opportunity in places where there was no opportunity for a million years! It provided the greatest financial boon in the history of mankind. It may be up there with Fire, the wheel, electric, the phone! The experts are IDIOTS! Kind of like consultants. They are always between jobs!

When you study history in different forms it creates a blueprint for the future. That is the remedy for chasing yesterday. Don't chase tomorrow, you can untangle things and predict tomorrow with a fair amount of certainty. Then ACT!

Rick Schwartz

Morning Folks!

I think one of the problems and one of the biggest things domainers ignore is the size of their audience. There are 7 Billion people on the planet. But who and how many folks you target is the key between success and failure and when you divide too much, you get really close to ZERO!

I talked about the .Kiwi guy. He overestimated his market. Why? Because he forgot to divide! Since more than 6.9 of the 7 billion DON'T live in his neck of the woods, he never took that into account.

So let's start dividing domain's value and I will end with an example. The 7 billion is automatically 3.5 billion because half the world has no buying power. ZILCH! It may be a lower number than that.

But let's say you focus on the USA. 350 million. 1/10 of the 3.5 billion. We get there by division. So we focus on the 350 million now. 100 million of them have no buying power. Whatever they use and consume are provided by the 250 million. So the USA is the focus even if it is for an item for the 100 million.

So, I saw this domain today on auction. LibertyLake.com. Sounds good. Looks good. Let me see if there is such a place. Yup. Liberty Lake, Washington. Population 7700. So as a Geo domain, not so good. Is it as good as SaltLake.com? Well, probably not. Salt Lake is a metro area with 1 million people. BIG difference and a big difference in value.

Now in this example, I see something also brandable. So from that lens, it has more value than from the geo lens. Liberty Lake can be used as a variety of brands. Brands are a long shot. But they can hit big. It may be a few hundred years or more waiting for the ONLY one.

The MAIN thing I look at when weighing the value of a domain is the size of the audience, the value of the product that the audience is interested in and the profitability of that good or service. That's my basic equation. There are many other factors. That is the "Top of the Pyramid". If you get the top 3 elements wrong on ANY decision in life, you will get it wrong. PERIOD!

If you sell badges and you only sell badges to a group that has 100 members, and they buy one badge when they join, you have a hobby not a business. If you sell badges that are universal and can be used by many groups and organizations and clubs and all types of audiences, you have something much different.

I meticulously go thru each and every data point. Good, bad and ugly. What I never ever do is refer to the size of the market. Real Estate is a trillion dollar industry. Who cares?? It's meaningless. It's a footnote. It does not even rise to the level of a data point. So when a domainer or any businessman LEADS with a FOOTNOTE, I automatically know they are on the wrong path. It may be something of interest, but carries no real weight unless you have this formula in place where you can syphon X% directly from the top.

The audience is the KEY data point. Size, value, qualifications, profitability, competition, sources, location, etc. Then you drill down to the next layer of questions. The ones that pertain directly to you. How much of that can YOU harness? If Real Estate is a trillion dollar industry and you harness no sales, that trillion is meaningless. It's foolish. See what I mean?? It's about what I or you can produce. When you talk about the volume of an industry, it says you are doing $0 in my book.

The great domain name gets you into the party. But not all parties are created equal. So first you have to find the right party in the right place and have the right item to provide them. But then the rest is on us. We have to sell and we have to have the skills to sell and exploit the market or the party. If you don't understand business basics and certain things there, it does not matter the size of your audience. When we suck, we lose.

I can have 100 customers go to a car dealer. One salesman will lose every single one of them. Another might close every single one of them. They both had the same opportunity and they both had the same audience. But one pissed away the gold that came and the other guy got the gold. They both did equal work. One was rewarded the other made zilch. Isn't it time to WAKE-UP??

Maybe the guy that blew thru 100 customers just asked "Are you going to buy a car from me right now for $30,000." Of course they all said no. But in a way, isn't that what a domainer does? He buys a domain and 30 seconds later he has it posted EVERYWHERE! Desperate and Foolish.

Compare that to the other salesman. He will introduce himself. He may offer some info to start a conversation. He might ask some questions. He may find out things that become helpful in making the sale. He provides a sense of security because he seems knowledgable and confident and seems in no rush. He's not pushy. Voila, he casually makes the sale. No fuss, no muss. The other guy is too busy complaining how bad business is. The other guy is just not good and belongs in another job or he is just a fool that will never learn. The definition of being stuck.

So, on one hand, it is the size of the audience and the other it is how you work that audience. How you understand and approach that audience.

And we can look at it a different way. Two used car lots right next to each other. one guy selling and the other guy struggling. This happens in every industry. It is universal.

The size and profitability of your audience is the key driver of domain value. If that good or service can then be easily sold on the Internet, it has more value. Value comes in so many different forms. That is why Estibot and Godaddy and any other outfit that uses an appraisal tool is folly. And if you are a domainer and you use those tool, you are a FOOL! If you rely on these tools in any way, shape or form, you are in the wrong business. Don't take my word, just look at your bank account.

Learn math and stop depending on 3rd parties with motives to educate you about domains. You have to have some GUT INSTINCT in anything you are going to be successful in or any career. GUT! That is not something you learn. It is something natural or acquired. They can't teach that in college. Nor can they hand you a diploma that says "Dr. of Common Sense". This stuff is so simple, no wonder geniuses can't figure it out!

Rick Schwartz

Morning Folks!!

This is not a domain post, this is a life post so, please indulge me. As a domainer and as a businessman and as a human I spend a lot of time just thinking. Thinking is my #1 job. It's something hard to control, and few see because it is invisible.

So yesterday I was thinking about all the strife in the world today. Things in jeopardy. Mostly our freedoms and safety and how we are repeating the history of what we fought 2 World Wars over. Then something came to mind and, I figured I would share it.

"The wisdom and ignorance of humanity. Each generation passes on two things to their children. They pass on wisdom and, they pass on ignorance. Just look throughout history, and you will see it applies 100%. As children, our job is to figure out which is the wisdom and which is the ignorance. Hopefully, we pass on the wisdom because we sure as hell are going to pass them on plenty of ignorance."

Maybe this thought has been around for 1000 years. I don't know. But that's my 1 over 2. Boiled down to the simplest and lowest "Common Denominator." It's a thought born from within but not sure if it is a unique birth or it has been around for ages.

I spend a lot of time in life just thinking, researching, crunching numbers and ideas and population groups looking for and discovering common denominators. Sometimes the smallest and sometimes the largest. But I do this all day long with each and every issue or decision I face.

On the Internet, the #1 common denominator is the domain name. And when you drill down, you find out that the common denominator is a .com domain. At least in the USA and that is almost always my focus. Why? We are ferocious consumers.

Most things have a common denominator, and when you realize it, it usually comes with a fantastic and sturdy answer. It can boil down the most complex to the simplest, that is the goal of a Common Denominator. It's a crucial and vital tool. Akin to a hammer for a carpenter. I could not live life without it.

Rick Schwartz

Morning Folks!!

This post is going to change someone's life today. Maybe more than one. It's a post that will make a grown man cry when they have an aha moment.

Type-ins are the holy grail of domaining from at minimum a historical standpoint. Now PLEASE understand that does not mean a domain without type-ins have no value. What it does mean if you have a portfolio and you have NO type-ins on any domains, wtf are you doing?? If you were digging for oil and and you had 1000 wells and not a single well pumped an ounce of oil are you still an oil man?? Maybe. But a broke one for sure.

Let me give you a little history lesson. There was a substantial reason that .com became an investment and why it was so valuable and THE REASON was END USERS and TRAFFIC. PERIOD! That is what drove investment and drove value to begin with. Even domains with no traffic could evolve into ones that did. I proved that as I was buying mainstream domains. I chase tomorrow, I never chase yesterday. But when I chase tomorrow I can articulate a host of valid reasons and those reasons have a history of coming to fruition.

Now traffic today still and alway will have value. Value. Value! That's the #1 point of investing in domains. VALUE! Face value. That means if you collect dimes and you can buy a dime for 9 cents, you won't lose money. If you buy the dime for 11 cents and you think it has value the risk is too low to pass up. On the other hand if they want a $1000 for that dime, you better KNOW WTF you are doing. You better have a plan. You better know you stuff? Know why?? You may have just lost $999.90.

For me a type-ins can be as lille as 1 or 2 or 5 or 10 a day. It does not take much. But it is the #1 qualifier in VALUE. It PROVES that you are not the only idiot on the planet of 7 BILLION to think of it and type it in. Gee, that means it may mean something to someone or to many. The more the merrier.

Now of course if you have a portfolio with NO TRAFFIC you are going to jump up and down and disagree. It always happens. Go ahead. You are allowed to be wrong. Been hearing this for over 20 years. "All the good domains with traffic are gone." Well, no they are not. It's just your own bullshit that you believe and swallow and too dumb to spit out. YUM!

Type-in domains are born and they are for sale. If you would focus on tomorrow you might see type-in traffic being BORN! Don't believe it. Then you really should look for a new career.

So, now lets fast forward to GTLD's. What LAUNCHED .com domains to have GREAT value was traffic. Traffic was the earnings that PAID for buying the next domain. There was no aftermarket. GTLD's are ass backwards, they tried to create an aftermarket before there was even any value or market to begin with. And ooops, NO TRAFFIC of significance.

According to DomainNameWire.com: Paul Nicks, VP & GM for GoDaddy's Aftermarket, the world's largest registrar, had the following breakdown in domain sales for 2018. NUMBERS DON'T LIE!! PEOPLE LIE! (Especially when they are trying to sell you a bag of smoke)

"92% of sales are .com, followed by 2.6% for .org, 1.5% .net and 1.4% .co. Avg. selling price of $2,268 for .com. .Com and .Org number of sales were up YoY; .net and .co were down."

So if my math is right that adds up to 97.5%. That leaves a whopping 2.5% of sales divided among 350 some odd country codes and about 550 new GTLD's. Got that telescope out yet? Don't worry, you won't need it. The only thing you will see is INSIGNIFICANCE!! Something with no meaning.

This is on a large and grand scale. I think it also proves the point I have made for decades about .net being weak and an orphan extension and that even .org had more demand and more meaning.

Now let me be clear, I would have NEVER EVER focused on or even invested in one domain if I only focused on .org and .net. I would not be writing this blog. Nobody would have ever heard of me and chances are I would have never looked at domains as anything viable or worth my time or effort. I would have gone broke had I focused on those and many more will go broke focusing on ANYTHING other than .com UNTIL you make your first few million. And then you will learn like I did that it was a waste of time, effort and money, And their numbers are exponentially better than any new GTLD now or in the DECADES to come.

I talk from experience. I have BEEN the "Birdie in the mine." In my career I have invested over $1 Million in various extensions. 1 sale. Why? No, need, no want, no desire, no value, no market, no nothing. PRIME one word domains that if was .com would have GREAT value but because it is .net or .org or .tv or .info or .me or .mobi or .biz or .whatever, has virtually no value but MUCH MUCH worse as Godaddy has PROVEN, is there is NO DEMAND whatsoever!!! And of those, .org has the most value and recognition but very small demand.

And most of GTLD demand is domainer to domainer which renders it completely meaningless and worthless. A simple game of musical chairs and so-called "Domain Investors" will be left holding the bag.

It also shows that as I write about each extension Godaddy registrations are very thin. It's very telling when you have many millions of GTLD domains registered and the world's largest is way down on the list of almost every "High Flyer". I have written extensively about it and it certainly catches my attention as a VERY IMPORTANT fact. It tells a story. A BIG story for anyone willing to read the tea leaves and understand. It demonstrates just how HOLLOW and FAKE the GTLD registration market is. It also shows which extensions MIGHT have a fighting chance. But if you don't STUDY the numbers and you still invest in GTLD's, then it's all on you.

The chances of selling anything other than .com is just stacked against you. It's astounding anyone, let alone so-called domain investors, can't do simple math. And when they do, they see they can get 1% to 10% of the .com value, with an audience that is looking for a .com by nearly a 100-1 ratio. Can you folks do math????????????? Do you know what the chances are of selling a GTLD for even what it costs you let alone making a profit??

If I owned a car dealership and one guy did 97.5% of the business and i had 900 other dealers next to me splitting up 2.5%, and then added to that my cars are 99% less profitable, I would rethink wtf I was doing or at least MOVE!

Point is about YOUR TIME. It's about YOUR EFFORT. It's about how much TIME and MONEY are you willing to waste?? And it gets worse. Even if you found an end user starting with a new GTLD, they will eventually upgrade once they wise up. This is now a trend. Many are doing this from .net and .org or multi words to less or one words. When others see this HUGE TREND, it will say to them to BYPASS the other crap right from the get-go. Your best chance at success is their ignorance. Good luck with that as a long term strategy! PITFALLS, 100's of them, will destroy nearly every single end user into submission.

The path is simple. Take a risk, but take a smart risk. As I mentioned last week, ImpeachTrump.com sold for $3500. I f*cked up by missing it. Point is ANYONE reading this could have grabbed that and had something that would fit MY EQUATION of NEED, WANT, DESIRE, VALUE, AUDIENCE and TYPE-IN traffic! That was a domain that can and will be flipped. That's how you START in domaining. You buy a GEM first and then parlay it! So why are so many wasting their time and money on what does not work? Will never work, has been proven not to work? But at the same time ignore what does?? Beats me! Especially since there are PLENTY of .com domains of great value for BARGAIN prices.

Rick Schwartz

UPDATE:
Paul Nicks slide shows the lower entries (after the 97.5%)
.io 0.4 %
.ca 0.2%
.us 0.2%
.co.uk 0.1%

Conclusion: Not only are GTLD's No where to be found, they have proven themselves meaningless. Numbers don't like, REGISTRIES and DOMAINERS DO!

Morning Folks!!

I have never done this before and I never give anything away for free. But today is different and I want to give something FREE to everyone.

Headlines are key but they are also usually misleading. Our friend Owen Frager is a master of getting folks to click. So is the media. A completely misleading headline that grabs the reader to do one thing. Click. Hopefully READ! It works!

Hook, line and sinker or (stinker). Isn't that what advertising is about? So you give something away for free and at the same time create a sense of Urgency! Well done!! Click!

Of course I don't think I can use this headline every day. It may not be as effective tomorrow or the next day or next week. But I do give something away free with every post I make. Hopefully give something of great value. You are the judge. But you don't have to be the jury.

You can't sensationalize everything and expect to have credibility. However it did work well for decades for the National Enquirer. Mainstream simply copied what works. Guess what? It works!!

Now so that my readers don't get annoyed with me for this misleading headline I must give something of value, hopefully GREAT value to compensate for that. So here it is:

Before I was investing in domains I was investing in advertising for the products I was importing from Asia. I was forced to do that when I broke my back and could no longer travel to do trade shows. I was bedridden in my mid 30's back in the late 1980's for nearly 5 years. I lost everything (which was not much) because I was paying for shows 1-2 years in advance and I physically could not get there. I lost all those deposits and went broke. So I had to make a living from bed and I did. I learned about advertising in trade publications. Then in the mid 1990's, advertising my Adult Vanity 800 numbers. I learned a lot about advertising. Was in over 100 publications and could never find enough. Here are just a few things I learned along the way. I prefer industrial or business to business advertising and business. to begin with. I try not to deal with actual consumers or target them in any way.

1. NEVER run an ad ONE time. It's a waste. It won't work and with lead times of 2-3 months, if it did work, it might be too late to take advantage. (Only exception is a Superbowl ad that gets free play)
2. Run an ad for a minimum of 3x with the goal to stay in for a year or more even if you are losing money. Just breaking even is SUCCESS!!
3. Use BOLD and CAPS where you can. It helps it to jump off the page.
4. Better to advertise in monthly publications than weekly or daily. The shelf life on a monthly could be years. The shelf life on a daily is a day. The shelf life on a weekly is a week or two.
5. 4 color is expensive, 2 color works almost as well For a fraction of the cost.
6. Try to use the same basic ad everywhere to create a brand
7. Small ads work well. A small ad running for a year that costs $1000 will out perform a full color page ad running one time that costs $10,000. Go figure.
8. Advertise in classified section using a display ad. Cheap and effective.
9. Start small and grow your ads. That shows success and demand. I started with one Inch ads. Doubled to 2 inches. Then 3 inches. But never went larger than 1/4 page.
10. Make sure you are in a good position. Ads can only be on the right page. Left page ads don't do as well.
11. Trade publications are golden. Read by many and a shelf life of many years. Same with adult magazines. Shelf life is a VERY long time!
12. Consumer advertising is much different. You need more pizzaz.
13. Possibly the single most important question to ask. Is the magazine paid or is it sent out for free? Paid trade publications generally would outperform free publications 3-1 or more.
14. Track each and every initial phone call. The most important info I could extract from a new caller was where they heard about us. I would not even talk to them without that info. It was that important. How else could I prove which magazine worked and how much bang for the buck I could get?
15. Grow your ads in the publications that do well. But there is a limit. You may find that the 2 inch ad outperforms everything else. Why? Who cares. I follow the numbers and repeat, repeat, repeat. Human nature is an interesting thing to study.
16. The most effective and money making ad I ran was 1 or 2 inches and cost me $8.88/month and would bring me in thousands a month in NEW business.
17. Brand your FULL Name and Logo and brand it BOLDLY! Never EVER abbreviate your own name. That's for others to do and for you to adopt.
18. Make long term deals to lower your ad rates
19. Make your own ads and save 15% by being an in-house agency.
20. Critically look at your ads when published or before and keep improving it. Even small ads can take years to perfect. You mold it and polish it until it is all it can be.
21. Copy elements of other ads in different publications run by large companies inserting your own info. Pay attention to color, placement and what part of the ad is designed to catch your attention.
22. 21 applies to brochures, handouts and all the rest. Copy the best. They spent a LOT to figure out what works. What colors are best etc.
23. Advertising online is much different but the goal is the same.
24. Advertising on TV is much different but the goal is the same
25. Advertising on Radio is much different but the goal is the same.

Add your own advice. There is so many variables and ways to advertise. Some sell the sizzle, some sell the steak. Both work!

And the #1 advertising channel is?? The most effective. The most economical. The HOLY GRAIL. WORD OF MOUTH!! Still is and always will be! Just because you are online does not change that FACT! Those that argue with that are simply fools and let me prove it.

I never heard of eBay via Google. I never heard of Amazon via Google. I never even heard about GOOGLE thru Google!! So if Google is your answer to word of mouth, you are wrong. I never found a domainer or domains site via Google. I never found Moniker or Godaddy or Directnic via Google. I did find all of them via word of mouth even tho I was on the Internet. So if everything you believe starts and ends with Google, you are lacking common sense and don't have a handle on reality.

Go look at the top 20 services or sites you use and tell me how many you found via Google???? I REST MY CASE!! Google is simply a BONUS!! Relevance is your key to Google. All the tricks in the world won't win over relevance for the longterm. DOLLARS are your key to Google.

And of course the headline is key. But in sales, you CAN'T be misleading. So you have to be clever and funny and hopefully folks appreciate it.

Cal Worthington used to ride a tiger in his automobile commercials in Southern California for decades. "Go see Cal, Go See Cal, Go See Cal" was his jingle.

Crazy Eddie in New York had a style until he was busted back in the 1980's.

GEICO, Affleck, State Farm, Progressive, Liberty are ALL about their commercials. Their humor. Hopefully if you laugh you will like them and buy their product. Insurance stinks and is boring, but they made it fun! Good Job!! They sell sizzle with a little steak.

The difference between a successful company and product may come down to one thing, your advertising. That and SALES are what CREATES the brand to begin with. Circulation creates the brand. Other people repeating your name makes the brand. Quality makes the brand. Usefulness makes the brand. The brand is something that is a residue of what you do or what you make. The brand is built day by day. with blood sweat and tears. The brand may take years to build but can be destroyed with one bad decision.

GTLD's have little circulation and it is splintered and there is no rhyme, reason or brand. Compare that to .com. The MOST SUCCESSFUL FRANCHISE IN HISTORY!! Why? Not because I said so, but because the Fortune 1000 said so. The Fortune 10,000 said so. There has never been anything in HISTORY with more advertising and it accumulates with every passing day. Recognize and embrace that FACT that has yet to be discovered by the masses or the media or even the advertising industry itself. Do you have to wait for THEM to tell YOU what should be OBVIOUS????? If you do, that's the definition of chasing yesterday. Your job is to figure out tomorrow before others do! That's BUSINESS!!!! That's OPPORTUNITY! That's the way it really works.

We can be fish and swallow a headline hook, line and stinker or we can study what works and what fails. And WHY! Studying other people's mistakes and successes are a lot cheaper than wasting your own valuable time and dollars!

That was ail FREE and the only thing misleading was "Today Only" cuz you can come back tomorrow and read it again. And possibly the"supply" which could be defined as unlimited.

Rick Schwartz

Morning Folks!!

A Renaissance in the generic sense is simply a re-birth a renewal, a new age of something that has been around but has been rediscovered in a new or possibly much more valuable light. At least that is the specific definition I will use for this post. Domain names are on the eve of such a Renaissance. I started seeing this phenomenon early in 2018 but clearly late last year and have posted about it in the past several months. But now it is vivid like a rainbow!

Maybe you have not paid attention or maybe you just have not realized it but there was a huge difference between Christmas Season 2018 and the start of 2019 that is completely opposite of just 1 year ago. I focus on things that change or evolve so I can recalibrate my opinion or approach if need be.

One year ago nearly all commercials on TV were trying to drive traffic to their Facebook, Twitter and Instagram pages. It was plain stupid! But they did it anyways. Sending their OWN customers to a 3rd party! DUMB!

Fast forward to now and you will see virtually NO commercials on TV promoting their social media site. I watch interviews on TV now, no more social media, they have a website.

This is 3rd post I have made about the rise and fall of social media and the dangers as well as the opportunity. Some may have laughed at me a year ago when I left Twitter. But I was just way ahead of the masses. Folks are leaving in droves and Facebook is in even worse shape!

Social media is dangerous! Not the first time I am saying this. I came one click away last night from even deleting my Linkedin page. I have even thought about removing this blog. These things may become liabilities. Opinions are looked at as facts and then something for you to be held accountable for. That's total nonsense! But it's still effective!

http://www.ricksblog.com/2018/11/social-media-is-no-longer-social-its-dangerous/#.XEw-ri2ZNp8

http://www.ricksblog.com/2019/01/social-media-will-do-for-domains-what-domainers-failed-to-do-for-domains/#.XEw-1y2ZNp8

What you say on Social Media can and WILL be used against you! That is the big lesson among so many others and we never even mentioned privacy! It does not matter how old. It does not matter how small. It can and WILL be used against you.

The ONLY autonomy we have on the Internet is your own domain name and now the masses are realizing that and that is a huge deal for truly great domain names.

Going forward many domains I have don't have the value they once had. Things change. It's a Renaissance. Many domains are perishable. They missed the big window of opportunity. Domains on the market right now that had great value and now, sorry, they don't. Examples would be Smartphones.com or CellPhones.com. They both missed the window of great opportunity. What is the attraction today? What is the interest today? There are many domains that I see that at one time I would have died for and now does not even move the needle for me.

Domains and domaining evolve. But the evolution of domaining just got the biggest kickstart I have ever seen. Akin to a blood transfusion or a couple of heart paddles. It's a REALLY big deal!

I can still find a quality .com domain for any end user for $10 in 10 minutes. So what that does is, it marginalizes the prices of marginal domain names that were low to begin with. But at the same time it raises the prices of truly great domain names. We could see a frenzy. Imagine domain names as hot as bitcoins were in 2017. I see companies upgrading their domains now as a common occurrence that will become more and more common. Location, Location, Location.

You will see personal domains and you will see Brandable and one word meaningful domains rule the day. Slogans will do well. Even if several words. But the big bucks are in short and Brandable .com domains and exact match 1 and 2 word domains. A Brandable to me has to be pronounceable. Basically inventing a new word that you can say and is easy to spell.

And there are "Franchise Domains". These domains have common prefixes and suffixes. Makes you part of something larger even if not related. You can come into domaining TODAY and focus on these and make money! But PATIENCE PLEASE!!! Play the game the right way! And of course a "Franchise Domain" can only be .com. The next best extension, whatever it is, can only garner 1%-2% of the .com value. So why are so many wasting time on third rate domains to begin with? Stop playing in the sandbox and step on up your game to the major leagues. I think this is the only business I have ever seen where folks CHOOSE to play in the minors.

And of course GTLD's will continue to die on the vine. It seems like this is becoming a common occurrence. Something I have predicted for YEARS! How many will die THIS YEAR???

If you took out all the GTLD domains that sold for a penny or were free or were stuffed into accounts, you would have many many millions less registrations and they will eventually drop anyways. Worthless is worthless. The numbers, which suck anyways, are PHONY!! Drill down and you will see what GTLD guys are feeding you is a BAG OF SH*T! They are fighting for their very survival. That means they will say and do anything. They will cut deals that paint a phony picture of success. Don't fall for it! Desperation is something nobody should fall for. Not your problem DUDE, unless you make it one.

Some Registries (not many) make money, domainers don't. Almost every sale I see is a direct registry sale or an authorized reseller like Sedo selling the registries premium names. Where are the domainers in that equation??????

I won't tell you the extension, you can do your own homework and figure it out yourself. But the fastest growing GTLD in the past few weeks/months has one issue for ME that makes it a PHONY! What is it? Not a single registration from Godaddy.!!! Not a ONE!! I Pay particular attention to which registrars have the most domains registered by certain extensions. I BELIEVE they are HOLLOW and PHONY! I am a numbers guy. I can see what's natural and what is artificial. I don't know the exact promotion nor do I have to. I just know it is artificial and unsustainable. Domainers are being played like FOOLS!

I own the .com version of many GTLD combos. I hope many startups start their new business on those GTLD's. Does not make them smart, they are not, but if they wise-up they will eventually LEARN about all the pitfalls and leaks. They will eventually learn how much that costs them in loss of sales that they will have to deal with. Smart guys will be FORCED to abandon. The dumb will just go out of business if they ignore and don't address. NO COMPANY can afford to lose sales. But there are some geniuses out there that don't think sales are important. :-)

GTLD Registries and registrars don't care about the success or lack of it with those that buy domains. They don't care about the pitfalls the end user will eventually face nor do they alert them. There is no disclaimer or warning label. They just want to sell domains. And that's ok. That's their job. My job is to expose the weaknesses that they won't.

I just have to laugh. Usually a product or service has a couple or three points of concern or weakness. Usually ones that are identified and can be controlled. They don't usually go out of their way to remain blind to them. On the other hand, it has taken me 6 YEARS and I still have yet to uncover all the points of concern and weaknesses of GTLD's. I just have to LAUGH!

Think of 2019 and 2020 as 2 years that .com domains will become inflated as prices rise. They may even skyrocket. What is happening to Social Media, Google and Free Speech will do 10x more for domains and domainers than anything domainers can do or have done for themselves. Your only job is to buy GREAT domains and match them up with the proper entity.

I blew a great one the other day. ImpeachTrump.com sold for about $3500 on Flippa. All I know is I see domains every week that sell cheap that have great value plus a DEMAND, but folks keep buying total crap looking for the second coming. Need, Want, Desire, Value.

A domain can be a soapbox or it can be the biggest company on earth. It can be invented. It can be re-invented. It can be anything you want it to be. Domains with power have value far beyond what folks understand today as we enter this Renaissance. But WE understand.

WE understand that a Sear's store has one value but Sears.com has more value with less overhead and wider audience when utilized correctly. A Sear's store may be a liability. A Sear's store costs TENS of millions to build and even more to furnish and staff.

I REFUSE to let go of my comparisons and comps. That means I REFUSE to see value the way the masses do. I see value the way the FUTURE will see value! We are so far away from peak value. But it ONLY applies to great domain names. It does not apply to marginable domains. Step up your game folks!! The canyon is going to widen and widen pretty quickly. Don't be on the wrong side.

And as someone posted right here just a few weeks ago, "A good domain is easy to remember. A GREAT domain name is hard to forget."

Rick Schwartz

Morning Folks!!

You get to a destination one step at a time. Your history of blogging comes one blog post at a time. It's the accumulation of both that adds up to something or brings you to a planned or unplanned destination.

Below are my original thoughts before I ever made my first blog post. If nothing else, I think you can agree, I have been true to my word. Like I wrote the words right now! That gives me great pleasure. Time is my best ally and always has been.

I want to take a moment to thank all my sponsors for the last 11+ years. Oh, never mind. I have never had a sponsor. I don't answer to anyone. I believe what I believe just like I assume my readers do. I just choose to share because mine are strong, long, deep and proven. Let the chips fall where they may. My reaction, my opinion, my beliefs will be the same, friend or foe. I search for answers and there are no property lines when it comes to thought. I never have to bend an answer to satisfy someone in the industry. Numbers and facts are the only ones I answer to. I filter out the noise.

So here is to another year of sponsor-less posting and free thinking. Whatever pressure I get, whatever blowback I get, it all happens after the answer not before. After the post, not before. And my only answer to that," It is what it is."

1450 Posts, 22,500 comments. Averaging more than 15 comments per post. Going on 12 years. Adding to those posts of 1996-2007 where I shared much of what I was discovering in REAL TIME and even then most just dismissed it and worse. I tried.

And as I read this, I may have not satisfied everyone, some you can never satisfy, but I was true to my word and I sure as hell satisfied myself. I lived up to the standard I set and that has more value to me than anything. Thanks for being part of it!

Rick Schwartz

Morning Folks!!

I wake up EVERY day and "Recalibrate". That's my #1 job and that is where opportunity is. As individual entreprenuers our greatest strength is our agility. Our ability to act quickly and desicively. But that only works if you are open to new information. New information is ANYTHING that changes whatsoever. The smallest thing.

Indecision is paralyzing however companies like Sears define it! You need to be nimble in business. You can't operate at government speed. You have to act like the speed of light.

Slow to react does not work in a 24/7 environment running at the speed of the Daytona 500. The point is opportunity resides in the split seconds in between. Maybe that's too fast for your eye. Well, train your eye to look quicker. Others have and they reap then rewards others complain about not getting.

But that does not mean you change with the wind or chase shiny objects. You still need to be consistent. You have to be deliberative. You have to lay in wait. You have to wait for things to unfold and not force it. You don't hunt by chasing your prey, you hunt by waiting for your prey!

You become a marksman by practicing and shooting at targets. Then moving targets etc. Your mind has to go target shooting in much the same way. It has to be trained to see quick, act quick, don't overreact. Be precise. Aim. Be patient for the right moment and the right prey.

Point is failure in domains may have little to do with domains and more about your approach and thought process. It may be from a lack of understanding how business operates or how the masses act, react or are passive. Understanding advertising and the successes and failures of the past.

Money won't be handed to you on a silver platter. On the other hand their are platters of money and opportunity that may be crossing your path and you just don't see it. You just don't recognize it and therefore you can't act on it. Or you see it and you don't act on it. Or you don't have the money to act on it. We have ALL been there. It's the path. But a path is just that , a PATH to another place. Why do so many get STUCK on the path and are unwilling to progress? Again, we have all been stuck, it just depends how long. Some get stuck for a lifetime. Others for a moment.

Rick Schwartz

Morning Folks!!

The single biggest mistake domainers seem to make is over estimating the size of a market and the percentage of that market they can attract. Case in point in just a moment.

What REALLLLLY blows me away and also bothers me personally is so many are trying to copy what I did and my success. And as the one they are trying to copy, I am waving my hands, jumping up and down for YEARS and all I am saying is FELLAS, this is the wrong way to copy my success. GTLD's have NOTHING in common with what I did 23 YEARS ago. NOT EVEN CLOSE! So please give it up! I don't want to be connected in any way, shape or form. 

There is nothing similar. This is so much different. There is virtually nothing the same. There is nothing to copy. It's a different game, at a different time with different everything. There is a path to domaining success and NOTHING could be farther from it than GTLD's! PERIOD!! How CLEAR can I be!? How clear can 6 YEARS of evidence be? The registries made money. SOME. Domainers LOST MONEY. ALL!

Yes, a stopped clock is right twice a day everyday for eternity. That does not mean it works. That does not mean it has value. Broken clocks don't have high demand. If you don't understand the example about the clock, STOP until you do.

The guy that has .Kiwi is a very nice guy. But he got it wrong. At TRAFFIC he presented on stage and estimated 7 million registrations. I knew that was fantasy. I said so at the time and have said that many times since. There would simply be no demand. And guess what? There is NO DEMAND!

Below you will see the domainer genius that took a week of his life and registered 200,000 .Kiwi domains back in September 2016 and 2 years later dropped nearly every one of them. Probably the rest will be dropping this year. What a colossal waste of time, money and effort! The definition of a failure on every front. This is just an easy illustration. It was repeated hundreds of times with different extensions and different domainers. WAKE UP!!

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15,000 left in the zone file. Of those 12,000 are parked. You are looking at a dead extension walking. That's with 15,000, 400 gtld's have LESS with 300 of those with under 10,000. These are not viable extensions and when we talk INVESTING......are you kidding??

Let me repeat! What REALLLLLY blows me away and also bothers me personally is so many are trying to copy what I did and my success. And as the one they are trying to copy, I am waving my hands, jumping up and down for YEARS and all I am saying is FELLAS, this is the wrong way to copy my success.

My success starts and ends with .COM! And one day domainers will wake up and realize that their success starts and ends with .com too!

Rick Schwartz

Morning Folks!

The top 10 new GTLD's control 55% of all the registrations. Leaving the other 45% to split among more than 500 others. Do you realize how bad that is? Honestly, do you?? It gets worse when you consider how useless these top 10 extensions are. And they are all bleeding unless they have a penny promotion or some such thing.

#1 .Top.....Should be on Bottom. Godaddy has ZERO .Top regs.

#2 .xyz.....From nearly 7 Million registrations by way of Stuffing Netsol accounts and penny sales. Google could not save. Now down to 2 million.

#3 .loan.....Out of nearly 2.2 Million registrations, Godaddy has a total of 848. And with their ONE REGISTRATION yesterday, Godaddy was tied for most productive beating out 78 other registrars including 12 that had domains drop (489 was top drop) and all the others with zero.

#4 .Club.....What can you say? These guys work the hardest and smartest and still can't make a dent. Zone file shows 1.163 Million. Seems they have been around 1 million for years now.

#5 .online.....Showed some interest and early hope but appears to be diminishing. Godaddy is the #1 registrar, but lost 894 just yesterday. It rounds out the top 5 as the only ones with 1 Million or more regs.

6 .site.....Steady growth but Godaddy only has 5% of all registrations.

7 .VIP.....Flatlining and going nowhere but down.

8 .shop.....Tailing off after peaking in early November.

9 .ltd.....Peaked at 730k registrations. Down to 468k now. Nearly 80% parked. Meaningless!

10 .work.....Pretty steady growth. May have peaked. Godaddy is #2 registrar but with only 6.3% of the registrations.

More and more of the biggest GTLD proponents are finally admitting their disappointment in GTLD's. There is no denying the failure at this point 6 years into it. Epic failure. Deserved failure because it was done for all the wrong reasons. It was based on a LIE!

As I predicted here and only here, so many new GTLD's would "DIE ON THE VINE"! You ain't seen nothin' yet! Are you keeping track?? While a handful have fallen in 2018, HUNDREDS more will follow. MANY in 2019. It's physically impossible not to and even the ones that don't die on the vine won't make it viable. You have 400 extensions with less than 20,000 registrations and they are losing more than they are gaining day after day. How long does that last before the numbers destroy you?

Yesterday only 22 of the top 100 gained registrations. 2 of the top 10. So, 78 of the 100 lost and their number was HUGE in comparison!!! 70% drops, 30% regs. Yesterday about 30,000 new registrations and a whopping 99,000 deletes.

The next 100 had 72 losing and 28 gaining. However the GRAND TOTAL of gains was 221. That's 221 spread over 100 extensions!! 2.1 per day average! But the drops are at 2300. 10x more!!! Losing 2.3 a day! . About 47,000 drops and about 27,000 registration. Many are going BYE BYE!

It gets even worse! I am going to PROVE that at least 350 extensions and probably more will either DIE ON THE VINE or be taken over by another registry. Other registries are not buying them because they are good, they buy because of their own problems. Trying to save face themselves. NUMBERS DON'T LIE!! PEOPLE LIE! Consolidation is coming. Massive consolidation. Will end up with a handful of companies controlling all the GTLD's as many run for the hills. GAME OVER!!

Of the next 100 there were 35 that had gains. Those 35 had a total of 270 between them. However they also had 975 drops. They are all going BYE BYE!

The next 100 had 27 gaining and 73 losing. The gains had a total of 119 registrations vs 900 drops. They are all going BYE BYE!

The next 100 had 19 gains and 81 losing. The total gain was 62 TOTAL registrations spread over 100 extensions and the drops were 328. They are all going BYE BYE!

This discussion is not even about the extensions themselves. We are just talking NUMBERS and GRAVITY!!! The merits of each is the next layer and believe me, that won't help save them. That will just guarantee their demise before we even talk about the HUNDREDS of other pitfalls. If a domainer does not see the pitfalls, they ain't looking very hard or very seriously.

I started writing about this "Stampede" a very long time ago. 5 years ago as a matter of fact this month. If they read that and then read "The Rick Schwartz Equation" (also from 2014) they will see just who got what right and how wrong the NOISE was! How about my 20th Anniversary post devoted to GTLD's? Dare they read and compare?? Or will those folks keep whistling part the graveyard?

How many bought into this bag of crap. They all got fooled and scammed! Swallowed their crap, Hook, Line and stinker. And I don't feel sorry for the gullible. Tho I feel bad that they wasted their families money chasing nonsense. Chasing yesterday. Trying to repeat something that was not only not possibly repeatable, they changed the entire recipe and expected the same result. That's INSANE!

The LONG DREADED GTLD DETOUR IS NEARLY OVER AND DEAD! HOPE THOSE EXTENSIONS ALL ROT IN HELL!!

Rick Schwartz