by: Lois S.
September 2005
You offer web hosting services. Or web design services. Or both. When your clients need domain names for their websites, do you want to send them to another site, possibly to a competitor, to register one?
Of course not. That's part of why domain name registration is a popular service to offer. Reselling domain names provides an additional service to attract and keep clients as well as another source of recurring revenue. You can offer domain name registrations on their own or bundled with other services you provide.
Features of domain name reseller programs
When you are a domain name reseller, your clients register domain names using the service accessed through your domain name reseller account. The domain name company bills you, and you bill your clients. Or possibly the domain company handles the billing.
You decide on the retail pricing, and you market your services. The wholesale prices you pay before you add your markup depend on your sales volume and on the domain name reseller program you choose.
All of the domain name reseller companies compared in this article offer a reseller API (Application Programming Interface), which enables you to use the features provided with the domain reseller program. When your clients register domain names or update records at your site, the API communicates with the domain name reseller program system. With an API at your website, you keep the appearance and branding of your site when you resell domain names.
Two of the domain name companies compared here offer website creation tools for resellers, which means that you can be in the business of reselling domain names within minutes of having your account set up.
Many domain name reseller programs require the domain name reseller to pay and regularly top up a deposit for domain names. By doing this, the domain name reseller is paying for the domains in advance while making a profit from them when they're registered.
Domain name companies compared
The starting prices listed are the highest current wholesale prices for .com domains. Some other extensions may be higher, and the prices typically decrease with volume pricing.
See the company websites for more details about what each domain name reseller program offers.
BulkRegister
BulkRegister's Domain Pilot tool allows domain name resellers to provide their clients with a unique URL and access code to make changes to the Whois data for their domains. Resellers can control which of the fields to provide their clients with access to. Registration can be automated or manual.
Resellers become BulkRegister members and are invited to take part in discussions about product ideas, upgrades, and updates. A $50 Overture advertising credit comes with the first year of membership.
- Setup fee: No
- Annual fee: $99
- Deposit required: No
- Starting wholesale pricing for .com domains: $12
- Website creation tool for resellers: No
- SSL certificate: Yes
eNom
If you resell domain names through eNom, you choose between two eNom tools:
- Automated Registration Software (API), which allows your clients to register and manage their domains through your site
- PDQ, a site that you customize and eNom manages — they handle the billing, and you earn commissions
As an eNom domain name reseller, you can also offer your clients web hosting, web monitoring, SSL certificates, and other eNom products as a reseller.
- Setup fee: No
- Annual fee: $99 if you use the PDQ website tool
- Deposit required: Starts at $199 for 199 eNom points
- Starting wholesale pricing for .com domains: $9.95
- Website creation tool for resellers: Yes
- SSL certificate: No
Tucows
A website builder, blogware, SSL certificates, and email services are among the services you can resell as well as domain names.
- Setup fee: $95
- Annual fee: No
- Deposit required: No minimum payment, but they recommend prepaying one month of credit in advance
- Starting wholesale pricing for .com domains: $9.85
- Website creation tool for resellers: No
- SSL certificate: No
Wild West Domains
Owned by The Go Daddy Group, Inc., Wild West Domains offers several reseller packages. They also offer other products to resell in addition to domain names, including hosting, website builders, email plans, SSL certificates, and merchant accounts.
- Setup fee: No
- Annual fee: Starting at $99; $249 with the API
- Deposit required: No
- Starting wholesale pricing for .com domains: $7.75
- Website creation tool for resellers: Yes
- SSL certificate: Yes
About the author:
Lois S. is a Technical Executive Writer for http://www.websitesource.com and http://www.lowpricedomains.com
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by: Matthew Noel
You probably know that a domain name is a name given to a website or email account. Because IP addresses mark individual computers, the domain name is usually much easier to remember as it can be a catchy phrase or an on target description of what the website has to offer. In this day and age, the game of domain name selection is heated and often times a demanding field.
What does an effective domain name get you, anyway?
You may ask yourself why is it so very important to have a good domain name for your website. Besides being the best way to attract your customers, it is one of the best ways to have customers remember you. The returning customer is after all the best one to have. Yet, many websites fail at this point simply because there are so many other, just as good if not better, websites out there. Having a good, on target domain name is necessary for name recognition.
Finding Your Domain Name
Just like writing a jingle for a commercial, having an effective domain name should be something that people will remember. Catchy phrases or very targeted phrases can be the best way to get the attention of the user. More than likely, the first time they find you will be through advertisements or through a web search. But, once they are there, getting that domain name into their heads for next time is necessary.
But, its not really that easy. There is huge competition of domain names and many times you will find that the ‘good ones’ are already taken. But, when you get creative and think outside of the box you can really find the right niche and make your domain name the next one to be remembered.
There are also many information portals now devoted to the subject and we recommend reading about it at one of these. Try googling for “domain names” and you will be surprised by the abundance of information on the subject. Alternatively you may try looking on Yahoo, MSN or even a decent directory site; all are good sources of this information.
About the author:
for more information please see http://www.domain-name-shack.co.uk
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by: Lois S.
Let's say that you're creating a website for Barb's Specialty Pet Products. Should the domain name be barbsspecialtypetproducts.com?
Perhaps -- but don't stop there. Having the right domain name, or domain names, can bring more traffic to your site.
Why more than one domain name?
One domain is all you need to set up a website. But with more domains directing to your site, you can have these additional benefits:
- Bring site visitors who type variations of your domain name
- Acquire traffic that might otherwise go to your competition
- Harness the marketing power of keyword domains
Your primary domain name
If it's feasible, use your business or brand name in your primary domain. People will remember it and associate it with your business. Also consider the following factors when choosing your primary domain.
Domain name extensions
Should your primary domain end with .com, .net, or .biz, or with a country-specific extension such as .ca or .co.uk?
If your website is aimed at people in a specific country, having a country-specific domain can help:
- Site visitors will recognize right away that the business has a presence in the country of the extension. They may therefore be more comfortable buying from you.
- Some country-specific search results include sites with the relevant country-specific domain extension even if the site isn't hosted in that country.
On the other hand, if you're targeting an international audience, a country-specific domain could work against you. People from outside the country of the extension may be less inclined to buy if the business looks foreign to them.
If you want to attract both people within your country and those in other countries, have both. Each domain could direct to the same site, with each audience seeing the domain intended for them. For country-specific search results, the primary domain should be the country-specific one.
Chances are that the .com domain you want is already taken. If you use the .net or .biz version, you risk having potential site visitors go to your .com competition instead. Be sure to use the full domain name on all promotional material to reduce this risk.
Domain name length
A short domain is easier to remember, it has less risk of being mistyped, and it'll fit easily on your business cards and correspondence.
Conversely, if a short name doesn't represent your business, it's more difficult for people to remember. The short names you like may already be taken anyway.
If your business name is up to three easy-to-spell words, it'll probably work as a domain name. For a longer business name, the initials or just one or two words may be easier than remembering a combination of words.
Secondary domain names
Secondary domains directing to your site are for online use:
- For people who type your primary domain name incorrectly
- For people who search for your products or services online
Typing and spelling variations
How many ways can people spell and type your business name?
barbsspecialtypetproducts.com
barbs-specialty-pet-products.com
barbspecialtypetproducts.com
barbsspecialitypetproducts.com
barbsspecialitypetproducts.com
barbspecialtyproducts.com
barbspecialtyproduct.com
Hyphens aren't recommended for your primary domain. When people tell others about your site, they're likely to omit the hyphens. They may also forget to type them.
For secondary domains, hyphens make long domains easier to read. Each word stands out when people see your domain. However, domains such as buy-keyword-product-now.com make some people view hyphenated domains, especially those with more than one hyphen, as spam-like.
Having the words in domains separated may help some search engines recognize keywords. With Google, though, hyphens don't make any difference.
Consider all of these variations for secondary domain names:
- With and without hyphens
- Different ways of spelling some words
- Singular and plural versions of nouns
- Extensions with .com and .net as well as a country-specific extension if relevant
What people search for
If you want to find the website for Time magazine, you might do a search for it, or you might try typing in time.com. If you do the latter, you'll find yourself at the Time site.
This type of search behavior extends to generic words too. Searching for dog collars? Try dogcollar.com, for example, and you'll be redirected to dogidcollar.com. Do you want life insurance? Lifeinsurance.com redirects to nmfn.com (and so does northwesternmutualfinancialnetwork.com).
While having keyword domain names may not draw a lot of site visitors, using them is a technique to consider.
How to use more than one domain
Set up your website with your primary domain, and use that domain on your correspondence and with your customers.
Point secondary domains to your site using URL forwarding (also called domain forwarding, domain redirect, or URL redirect). To have the secondary domain appear in the browser, use domain masking. You can set up these features when you log in to your account with your domain registrar (if your registrar offers these services).
With domains that are simply variations of your primary domain, you can expect additional traffic just from having set up these domains. With domains that contain keywords, you can get more from them by using them to list your site in online directories. When these domains appear in search results, searchers will see the keywords.
The next step
Once you decide on the available domains that you want, register them immediately. They might not be available tomorrow.
If you don't already have a business name, you'll find it easier to market your business online if you choose a primary domain and a business name together. If your first choice for a business name doesn't work well with any available domains, consider a business name that you can easily market with an available domain. Once you've registered that domain name and your business name, register secondary domains and put them to use.
Is it worth registering multiple domains for one site? That depends on your site, but any variations that you don't register will be available for competitors to register and use. If a domain is valuable to a competitor, it's valuable to you.
About the author:
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About the Author: Lois S. is a Technical Executive Writer for http://www.websitesource.com,http://www.lowpricedomains.comand http://www.speedfox.comwith experience in website hosting.
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So why does Network Solutions charge $35 a year if they are the keeper of the database and their resellers charge a fraction or even nothing? Who knows and who cares! Register your domain with one of the cheaper providers and you'll be fine. A word caution - be care who you choose to host your website. Getting a free year of your domain name isn't worth it if your webhost is unreliable and your website is down more than it's up.
You pay for your domain name on a yearly basis. It's a separate charge from your webhosting bill. When you register your domain name choose the autorenewal option if it's available. This way your domain name will not expire if you forget to renew it. If your domain name expires, it's free for anyone else to register so you need to stay on top of when it's expiring. Also registering your domain name for a 3 to 5 year term will often save you money. For example, godaddy.com charges $8.95 a year for your domain name but only $7.25 a year if you register for a 5 year term.
When you register your domain you can create different contact names. The three contacts are Administrator, Technical and Billing. Most of the time the same person is all 3 contacts. If you web designer registers your domain name for you, make sure you are designated as the Administrative contact. This gives you control over the domain name and you must be notified if someone is trying to make changes to your record. If you aren't one of the contacts then someone can transfer ownership of the domain name without your permission.
To see a record of your domain name, go to www.networksolutions.com and use their WHOIS utility which is located in the bottom left corner of their home page. Simply enter your domain name and click Search. You'll see the complete record of your domain name, where it's registered and where your website is hosted. For a complete video of how to use WHOIS, visit www.valiss.com/video/whois/whois.html.
When you register your domain name you'll have to the option of making it a private registration. I highly recommend paying the additional fee to make your information private. If you leave your registration public anyone can look up your domain information which includes your home or business address and your email address. Many spammers scan public domain registration records to find valid email addresses to spam.
I always use a yahoo or hotmail email account when registering my domains. This way if spammers to find my email address, I can just get a new “throwaway” email address and I won't receive spam at my primary email address.
Always make sure your domain record remains locked. Locking your domain name is a feature implemented a few years ago. When you want to transfer your domain name to a different registrar you must unlock it. Once it's unlocked the new registrar can “pull” your domain name from your current registrar. Once the transfer is complete, the domain name will be locked to prevent anyone else from “pulling” your domain away from you.
About the author:
Ted Prodromou spent over 25 years in the computer industry working for IBM, Digital, and Cellular One. Today he's the owner of Valiss IT, a consulting firm that provides personalized web design and small business marketing solutions. Visit http://www.valiss.comfor lots of free “how to” articles about marketing your business online.
Copyright 2005 Valiss IT, Inc. All Rights Reserved
This article may be reprinted only if it remains unchanged.
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million dollars? Inspired by this, you imagine registering
a great domain name, hanging onto it for a while, and then
selling it off to become the next multi-millionaire. It
could happen, but don`t count on it!
First of all, many of the truly great domain names are
already taken. Second, the dot com bust took some of the
wind out of inflated domain name prices. (If you sell your
domain name for millions of dollars worth of stock in a
publicly traded dot com flop, what is the name really
worth?)
The cybersquatter buys domain names totally on speculation.
Sometimes he will register names of famous brands,
companies, or individuals. Time and again, these domain
name speculators learn the hard way that they must respect
intellectual property rights. They hope that some large
corporation will pay big bucks to them for the use of the
company`s own (already trademarked) name. Instead, they
end up with threatening letters from a law firm for their
attempts at extortion.
However, you can still make money from domain names if
you are sensible in your approach. Here are some
suggestions on ways to profit.
1. Affiliate Programs: Use your domain name to promote an
appropriate affiliate program. Either redirect to the
affiliate site or write a review that links to them.
2. Informational Sites: Create content and then profit
from it by earning advertising revenue through Google
AdSense or a similar program.
3. Redirect to Your Own Site: Some reasons you might want
to do this include preventing competitors from using a
particular domain name and benefiting from searches some
users perform by domain name. (For example, if they wanted
to order flowers, they might just type "flowers.com" in
their web browser. You could get some traffic and sales
this way.)
4. Product Sites: Create your own or sell someone else`s
product appropriate to your domain name.
5. Park Your Domain Names: You might feel that your name
has real potential for resale value. There are companies
that will allow you to park your domain on their servers,
advertise that your name is for sale, and split advertising
revenue with you.
The trick is to generate traffic for your domain name. That
traffic in turn will create revenue. Then, when you go to sell
your domain name, you will have a few things going for you.
First, you will have a fully developed website. A fully
constructed building on a piece of land increases
the value of the real estate property. Similarly, the
value of your domain name is enhanced by a complete and
operating website.
Second, you have traffic. Just as a shopping mall with no
traffic results in no sales, so a website must have traffic
to generate income.
Third, you have income. An income property, such as an
apartment building, can be appraised on the basis of its
income (as well as other factors). Similarly, the gross
income, net profits and cashflow of a website have value.
For example, if someone offered you $1,000 for your
domain name and website when it was generating $10,000 per
day in profits, you would likely laugh at him.
You really can profit from your domain name investments
by adding value and properly developing your web
properties.
About the author:
J. Stephen Pope, President of Pope Consulting Inc.,
has been helping
clients to earn maximum business profits for over
twenty-five years.
For valuable Work at Home Small Business Ideas,
visit: http://www.yenommarketinginc.com/
For further information about profiting from domain names,
visit http://www.yenommarketinginc.com/domain-names.html
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Customers can access information on all your products, no more salesperson with limited knowledge trying to explain something they know little about. No more waiting in lines for help, all people have access immediately.
The domain name of the website gives great freedom to the business process. Having your own name is like having an address, then infinite emails can be added to the name so different departments within the company can be reached without having to wait at reception. For example, sales@ Mary’s Plants.com will put the shopper in direct contact with Mary’s sales section.
As a business, the domain name adds professional authenticity, as your address is not affiliated with other companies. In the area of communication, the email system opens up many avenues. Instead of having to put clients on hold because of limited personnel, innumerable emails can arrive at once, even when there’s no one in the office. Then you can pick and choose which one’s to reply to first (the most urgent), while people browsing can wait till later. First come, first serve becomes obsolete as necessary customers automatically reach the front of the line.
Getting a website and domain name is an easy, simple, cost-effective process. You can register your name through web domain registrars like DomReg-M6.Net for as low as $15.00 U.S. per year. That is definitely a very limited risk compared to opening a store, renting a location, and the thousands of dollars involved in overhead costs. How can this be true? A key to the door for anyone who wants to enter a mega-mall that is as big as the Earth. Let’s hope you’ve got something special to share and trade with the global community!
About the author:
Jesse S. Somer, M6.Net
http://www.m6.net
Mr. Somer is a human analyzing the positive aspects of the information era, and sharing the facts with the technological novice.
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Web templates are the in-thing now-a-days and most of them are selling like hot cakes resulting into huge profits for web template providers. You too can cash-in on this web template craze and make money. Discussed in this article are five effective ways of making money out of web templates.
Five effective ways to make money out of web templates
1.) Creating turnkey pages from web templates
Turnkey websites are the hottest resource on the internet. If you are a web designer, web hosting company or simply own a website you can make good money by creating turnkey websites from readymade web templates.
What are turn key websites?
Turnkey websites are completely functional websites having relevant content, domain names and hosting. Depending on the type, turnkey websites can have shopping carts, interactive scripts, graphics forms, forums, live chats etc. All that a buyer needs to do is buy the website and he is ready to do business.
What you need to do?
In order to set up a turn key website business, you need to do the following;
1) Purchase professional looking web templates with resell rights or join a template membership program
2.) Modify the web templates by adding relevant content, links, images and graphics
3.) Purchase domain names and hosting accounts
4) Host the completed web templates as websites
5) Advertise/promote your websites for sale/rent by SEO and Email marketing
What will be your ROI?
You ROI Will surely be very high. This is because of the fact that the retail value of turnkey websites is around $200 - $500 per website and can also go higher based on the website quality. You can also go for renting your websites instead of selling them. As you will be purchasing web-templates for a cheaper cost your ROI will be higher. The best way to go about it is by joining membership programs that will give you access to a host of http://www.buytemplates.netweb templates at a low one time cost. Also make sure to host your sites with hosting service providers who offer unlimited domain name hosting. One good example of a turnkey website service is ready-set-web.com.
2.) Joining an affiliate program
Affiliate programs are quite popular over the net. If you have a well ranking website with a good traffic margin then you can very well join an affiliate program offered by many if not all web template providers. All that you need to do is promote their templates and you can make easy money in the form of commissions.
What you need to do?
In order to join an affiliate program you need to register yourself for the program. As soon as the registration process is over you will receive a link or banner advert that you can place on your website at strategic places. In case your website visitor clicks the banner and makes the purchase you get a part of the commission. Commissions can range from 2% to 10% of the actual sales proceeds. Most companies use tracking software programs or individual services like clicksgalore, commission junction etc. for tracking sales.
Some good web template providers who offer affiliate programs are buytemplates.net, templatehunter.com, templatemagic.net and webzonetemplates.com Before joining an affiliate program make sure that the template provider offers allied/complimentary services like web hosting, search engine optimization, content insertion, domain name registration, template customization etc. In fact the more the complimentary services offered the better will be your returns.
3.) Reselling/redistributing web templates
If you own a website that attracts good traffic or is likely to attract traffic in the future, you can go for purchasing templates as a bulk and reselling them. To get redistribution rights all that you need to do is purchase reseller templates that many web template providers offer today. Some good web template vendors who offer reseller templates are http://www.buytemplates.net , http://www.templatemagic.net and freewebsitetemplates.com. Purchasing reseller templates on your own and reselling them can fetch you more returns than by joining an affiliate program.
What you need to do?
All that you need to do is purchase web templates that come with resell rights. You can then modify the templates and sell them to potential customers with non-exclusive rights. You certainly need not be a html pro to start this business; instead you can partner with template providers who offer related services like template customization, hosting, SEO etc. and earn good commissions by referring your customers to them.
4.) Joining Referral based programs
Referral programs are very unlike affiliate programs in the sense that they do not involve you to place links or banner ads on your site. This is basically a word of mouth program and requires you to promote products by word-of-mouth. In case a customer referred by you joins a membership program or buys a web template and refers your name in the referral section, you get a commission. But such referral programs are offered by very few template vendors today.
5.) Web designing with web templates
If you are a professional web designer you can earn higher returns by making use of web templates. Firstly you can satisfy your clients with the speed at which you complete the work and at the same time get more ROI as the readymade website templates are way cheap. All that you need to do is buy exclusive templates and resell them after making modifications. One way to go about it is by joining membership programs offered by web template providers. This will give you access to a host of web templates at a one time cost. Most web designers can almost double their profits, take care of multiple projects and also retain customers by making use of this technique. Also web designers can attract new customers by lowering their service charges.
So what if you can’t make web templates on your own, you can still cash in on web templates by making use of these sales techniques.
About the author:
About the Author
http://www.icongalore.comis a quality web portal that offers high quality professional XP icons. Their high quality www.icongalore.comapplication icons come at extremely affordable prices and can be used for web designing, software applications and print media.
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