Behind The Record Purchase Of CreditCard.Net.Au – [Audio]

The recent purchase of creditcard.net.au heralds a new era for .au domain names.

Earlier today I sat down with James Wester, CEO of Pacific Octane and recorded this interview.

The Biggest Announcement I’ve Made In 2010

I can’t guarantee I will ever do this again, so this may be your ‘now or never’ chance to get in. Applications close Friday Oct 29 at 5pm PDT.

Here is the link I mentioned in the video: > http://www.MentoringBySimon.com/

auDA Caves In And Releases Secret Ballot Numbers

Over the past few days I’ve been receiving a lot of phone calls and email messages from auDA members who are angry and frustrated with what happened at the 2010 AGM.

I’d like to set the record straight.

I attend the auDA AGM as a demand class member, but more importantly, representing the interests of small business and professional domain name investors. As a small business owner myself, its something I feel very strongly about.

After the votes were cast into a box, a number of people went off to another room to count them. There was no truly independent 3rd party to review this process. There was no independent scrutineers – we were just told of the result.

Having spoken to many small business owners and domain investors I had a good idea of how many votes I had. What has shocked me, and has shocked the entire industry is that auDA refused to disclose the voting numbers because they claim it was a “secret ballot”.

Later that afternoon I posted the results on this very blog. What I didn’t know was that the auDA board was meeting behind closed doors and discussing this issue.

What has since transpired is that auDA has emailed its members and disclosed the numbers. This has never happened before and I’m told that it’s a direct result of my candidacy.

Here are the numbers:

Richard Bone – 2 votes
Kevin Fleming – 2 votes
Kim Heitman – 34 votes
Simon Johnson – 21 votes
Erhan Karabardak – 23 votes
Cheryl Langdon-Orr – 32 votes
Kelvin Markham – 2 votes

What is not clear is if these numbers include any votes that auDA may have deemed “invalid”. For example, people filling in the form incorrectly. Votes are sent in via fax to Maddocks (auDA’s lawyers). Who knows if your vote was counted or not!

At the end of the day, this is a huge win for our campaign for transparency. In the 10 years auDA has been going, its never disclosed this information… until now.

Don’t Be Fooled By Dodgy Domain Flipping Courses & Software

Every week for the past month I have received emails and phone calls from people asking me to promote their domaining products. In every single case, I have said NO !!!

This morning something happened that tipped me over the edge! I received another email about a new course on “domain flipping” with outrageous claims. As such, I felt obligated to write this post and give everyone a heads up.

Here are just a few examples, so consider yourself warned.

1. Domain Flipping Course

This course claims that it made it’s owner $10,577.55 per WEEK. Oh please….give me a break!!! If you see banners with “Make Money Flipping Domains” being advertised on various blogs – it’s probably this course.

2. Domain Availability Checking Software

Earlier this year a couple of guys announced some new “domain software” and gave it away for free. It claims to check if domains are available (nothing new here). It’s something that registrars do for free, but these guys have been pushing it as something special.

The concern I have is that the data could be used for frontrunning and to record what keywords you are searching for. Newcomers to domaining – be very careful what you use to register domains with – you might find that if you come back later, someone else has already registered the domain you were after!

3. Web-based domain software.

This software also claims to check domain auctions for “aged domains”. It’s being peddled by a bunch of marketers with no experience in domain investment. When it was released I had a brief look at it; it just didn’t work.

These snakeoil salesman have since updated their software to show a small number of domain names from various auctions – sound familiar?

One of their users contacted me recently asking about domain auctions and when I showed them the REAL, full list (from the auction company) – they were completely blown away.

4. Domaining Markets  (Free PDF)

Yet another free PDF with all sorts of claims about how to make money with domains. In order to get this, you need to sign up and give them your name and email address (which is then used to market directly to you and upsell you their dodgy domaining software).

A Serious Threat

These people are a serious threat to the integrity and stability of our industry.

1. They burn newcomers.

These snake oil salesman sink their claws into newcomers (to the industry) and leave them disenfranchised and believing they can’t make $$$ from domaining. This means they don’t register domains, they don’t bid, they don’t park, they don’t develop – they are gone and don’t come back.

2. They have no regard for copyright and reproduce our work as their own.

I’ve seen first hand, content being ripped off and presented as their own work. Some people say “go after them” others say “it will catch up with them in the end”. What do you think?

3. They “teach” their followers strategies that just don’t work.

These scammers are ignorant and their so called “secret tactics” just don’t work. If I had $1 for every person that said “I saw X speak at a conference and he says I should buy an aged domain. It’s just like how wine ages. What do you think?”

4. They cause many reputational risks to our industry

Think of the last time you tried something and it didn’t work out. If asked, you will probably share your experience with others. What we are starting to see are things like:

“Oh I tried that domaining thing once – I got a free PDF, bought some software and attended some GURU’s webinar, but I didn’t make a cent!”

Unfortunately, it’s a minority that ruin it for the rest of us. It’s the same thing with cybersquatters and people who register domains containing trademarked words/phrases. When they get found out, they attract the media spotlight and all of a sudden, the industry is tarnished with the same brush.

What Is Their Motive?

The primary motive of these leaches is NOT to help people, it’s to take THEIR money! Why? Because these people simply don’t know HOW to make money with domaining. Their business model is about slapping together another $97 “how to make money course” in the hopes of taking advantage of newbies.

Who Are They?

Oxygen thieves. I’m not about to name them all here because they would love the attention. If you are domain blogger, don’t give them the publicity.

Let’s be honest, these people would be laughed at, before they even got to the DOOR of a domaining conference. Most appear out of nowhere, but some of them are on the outer rim / fringe of the Internet marketing world.

Don’t get me wrong – we all have to start somewhere; but to use an analogy, these are people who have read a John Grisham book and now they are teaching people how to be lawyers.

In any (regulated) industry, these activities would be illegal. In Australia it could be classed as misleading and deceptive conduct. I’m not going to stand here and put up with it and neither should you.

So when you get another email, facebook, twitter post from someone touting the next best thing – delete it.

Result of 2010 auDA Board Election

First of all I want to say a BIG thank you to all the people that voted this year. Unfortunately I did not get elected to the board. The election was won by Kim H and Cheryl L who were the incumbent Directors.

For the record, I asked to see the votes at the AGM and was told (no) it was a “secret ballot”. As such, I dont know if I lost by 1 vote or 10 votes. This is obviously not acceptable and I’ll be pursuing this with auDA.

In any case, today marks the first day of my 2011 campaign as I’m going to run again! This result has made me even more determined and I’m going to do everything possible to ensure that the auDA board (and its policies) are representative of both small business and domain investors.

The industry needs someone to “keep fighting for what is right” and I’m going to continue this until such time as things change.

I have a feeling that 2011 is going to be our year and I look forward to your continued support!

Best Kept Domaining Secret – Revealed In 48 Hours [Video]

On Thursday October 14 at 5pm PDT, I’m going to make one of the biggest announcements this year. Stay tuned.

Here is the link I mentioned in the video: > http://www.facebook.com/domainer/

Introducing Episode 3 Of Our Domaining TV Show [Video]

Many domain investors are discovering ccTLD’s and are using them as a diversification strategy against the staple diet of com/net/org.

With that in mind, I recently sat down with George Pongas formerly from Dark Blue Sea (some may know them also as Fabulous) and had a chat about all things .au.

iTunes users – click here to subscribe to the video podcast and keep up to date with the latest episodes.

For everyone else (using a browser), you can check it out on our TV show website.

Simon Johnson Launches Personal Blog – But Its Not .com

After more than 20 years online, I’ve decided to launch my personal blog and “get back on the bike”.

What Does This Mean For DomainerIncome ?

Our domain investment blog on DomainerIncome, will continue to cover some of the really innovative (and very cool stuff) we are doing in this sector. We have a very active development cycle and are working on some category killer services and applications right now – so stay tuned.

Our TV show at DomainerIncome.TV will focus more on the domaining industry, with high quality, indepth coverage that you just can’t get anywhere else.

SimonJohnson.CO

A couple of people have already asked the question, “Why .CO” ? The answer is simply because .com was unavailable. While I do own a number of domains with my name in them, there is an Aussie gourmet food company (with the same name) that owns the .com; in fact many people incorrectly assume that I own the company! Unfortunately, not – I can’t sell you organic italian pasta sauce, sundried tomatoes or olive oil (even though my name is on all of them).

From an IM point of view, its going to be interesting to see how the .co ranks against the other “simon johnson’s”…. and you thought one was enough!

My personal blog at http://www.simonjohnson.co already contains a number of somewhat embarrassing snapshots from sites and posts I made in the early 1990′s. Head on over and check them out!

What You Dont Know About The Digital.com Auction At DOMAINfest

Many people will not truly understand the significance of this auction, so I’m going to spell it out.

1. The domain name digital.com has significant historical value. Actually, significant is probably an understatement. Why? The domain digital.com represents Digital Equipment Corporation.

Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) produced many of the old mainframe/micro computers of the 60′s, 70′s and 80′s. In fact, I learned to program in COBOL on a VAX and was using them before this domain was created!

Many DEC computers like the PDP-11 were the early building blocks of the Internet,

Much of DEC was sold to Compaq and then later HP in 2002. This includes their two most valuable domains, digital.com and dec.com (only digital.com is for sale @ Domainfest).

2. Digital.com was created on July 22, 1993, making it 17 years old.

If you ever wanted a REALLY old domain or a piece of Internet history, then this is it!

3.One of the first search engines, AltaVista (launched on 15 December 1995) started its life at http://altavista.digital.com.

Honestly, I just cant put a value on this domain. There is simply no precedent for it. digital.com has historical significance, brandability and a cult following of early Internet pioneers.

Congratulations to Oversee (and all the people that made this happen) on this exclusive deal with HP.

Competitive Intelligence For Domainers

If you’re a domainer who prefers to build out your domains, you’ll find this list of free web analytics tools extremely useful.

Basically, it’s a list of 16 free tools you can use to evaluate your competitors’ websites, including their traffic, keyword strategy, backlinks and more.

In fact I recommend you bookmark the article: http://www.kikabink.com/news/top-16-free-web-analytics-tools-for-researching-competitors-traffic-backlinks-keywords-and-more/