Sweetmantra: Domain Name Strategy

Why It's a Wrap for my Movie Domain Name Website

Like many of the ventures I have launched over the years, the idea for Hollywoozy, my site where I would review movie domain names, came to me out of the blue.

At the time, I thought it would be both fun and educational to use movie domain names (the good and the bad) as a springboard to discuss what makes a good marketing domain name.

I also wanted to create an outlet to share my amusement and frustration with the idiotic domain names chosen by the marketers of movies.

I feel that I accomplished both those objectives, and the reaction to Hollywoozy has been very positive.

Since launching the site, I have had the opportunity to discuss movie domain names with studio executives, filmmakers, marketing folks, and intellectual property lawyers. In doing so, I gained a deeper understanding of why most Hollywood movies end up with less-than-ideal domain names. It was an eye-opening experience.

Here are some of the reasons why movie domains are the way they are (and won't likely change anytime soon):

1. Since the bulk of a typical Hollywood movie's marketing dollars are spent on traditional, offline media (mainly television and print), the online marketing component is given low priority, little attention, and relatively tiny budgets. Finding and obtaining the best domain name is not seen as a priority, and any money spent on purchasing the domain name(s) will come out of the already squeezed budget for the movie's Website.

2. Many movie marketers refuse to deal with domain investors who might already own the ideal domain name. It's become almost a matter of principle that Hollywood would rather pay $10 and register a brand new but inferior movie domain name than pay someone else $500 for a much better domain name. Hollywood feels it has been 'burned' too often by cybersquatters (or what Hollywood perceives as cybersquatters) and wants nothing to do with even the legitimate domain resale market.

3. Because the online marketing of a movie is treated as a low priority, there is little to no measurement done, which means there are few opportunities for the powers to be to learn how having a better domain name would impact their overall success.

4. Since the main focus of Hollywood movie marketing is to generate buzz and put bums in seats for the movie's opening weekend, most of the marketing activities are geared towards that tiny window of time. Having a better domain name is not seen as having much of an impact on this either.

5. The studios don't really care that they don't have the perfect domain name. They figure that because they will be spending millions to market whatever domain name they do have, they will still get tons of traffic to the movie's Website. And they also figure that the search engines and popular movie portals like Rotten Tomatoes and IMDb will also drive organic traffic as well.

Having learned all of this, I have decided it is pointless of me to keep making fun of Hollywood and its often silly choice of movie domain names. If anything, I've become very forgiving of Hollywood and its domain name foibles. I know the domain names are lame. You know the domain names are lame. And, yes, Hollywood knows the domain names are lame as well.

Since this situation isn't likely to ever change, and since I have a long list of ideas for other ventures I want to turn into reality, there will be no more updates to Hollywoozy.

I've had a ball creating and updating Hollywoozy, I've loved the discussions and learning and relationships that have flowed out of it, and I hope its visitors enjoyed reading it.

Cut.

Print.

That's a wrap.

My Five Most Popular Blog Articles

I'm on holiday the next little while so I thought I'd share some links to five of the all-time most popular articles I have ever written for my blog:

• 10 Twitter Tips for Professionals

• 10 Facebook Tips for Professionals

• Does Someone Want to Buy Your Domain Name?

• 12 Questions You Must Ask Before Doing SEO

• Ten Must-Have iPhone Apps for Marketers

Apparently blog posts with numbers in the title do very well. ;+)

I hope you enjoy these, and I look forward to resuming writing again later this Summer.

Want to Learn About Domain Name Investing?

You probably already know that I am fanatical about domain names.

How would you like to learn about the world of buying, selling, and monetizing premium domain names? From me. This summer.

In my role as the General Manager of YummyNames, a service of Tucows Inc., I am hiring a Domain Portfolio Assistant for an 8-week contract. This is a rare, entry-level opportunity to work with me and my team as we manage one of the largest domain name portfolios in the world.

You will learn a ton, work on some important projects, and make some great connections. And you'll do it from our bright and funky Liberty Village office in Toronto. This is an awesome opportunity for someone who wants to get some hands-on experience in the rapidly-evolving world of 'Internet Real Estate'.

To find out more about this contract position and how to apply for it, visit the following link:

http://snipurl.com/kvr4h

Thanks, and good luck!

Discover "Minivertising" at 2009 CMA National Convention

Forget about thinking big. You need to think small!

That's the rallying cry for a presentation I am giving at the Canadian Marketing Association's National Convention in Toronto on April 28, 2009.

The Canadian Marketing Association (CMA) has invited me to present my newest talk, "Minivertising", at Canada's largest marketing conference. This national convention is held each spring in a different city and welcomes thousands of attendees.

Here are the details:

"Minivertising" – The Big Future in Targeting a Tiny Niche
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
10:30 - 11:30 AM
Register for the conference

Forget about thinking big. You need to think small! Until recently, it was expensive if not impossible to market to a highly segmented target audience. Not any longer. Discover how marketers and entrepreneurs can use social media and emerging Web tools for affordable and effective mini-targeting. No matter what the size of your company is, you can learn how to become a dominant player in a profitable niche.

If you’re a marketer, you will learn how to use the principles of minivertising to generate interest for your client’s products and services, no matter how constrained their budgets are. If you are an entrepreneur or business executive, you’ll discover affordable and measurable ways to attract highly motivated customers to you, almost overnight.

For more information and to register, visit the CMA National Convention Website.

I hope to see you there.

P.S. Here is a link to the list of Minivertising Resources.

Why Settle for a Lousy Domain Name?

At long last, I can finally reveal one of the cool initiatives I have been working on at Tucows over the last little while:

On October 29, we officially launched YummyNames, our new service that offers marketers the ability to purchase or lease premium domain names from the Tucows Domain Portfolio. As our tagline says...

"Why settle for a lousy domain name?"

That same day, I got new business cards, since I am now the General Manager of YummyNames. Woohoo!

The Tucows marketing team did an amazing job supporting the launch, so I'm going to explain what YummyNames is all about by sharing some of the material they created:

• You can read the news release that Tucows issued.
• You can have a look around www.yummynames.com, which was designed by the talented team over at Mouth Media. (They also worked with us to develop the overall YummyNames brand identity.) There’s lots of information on who we are and what we do.

The overwhelmingly positive response we've received so far from the marketing and advertising community proves that there's a need for a marketer-friendly premium domain name service, and I am delighted to be heading up this new service.

We've got lots of work ahead of us, but we're off to a great start! I hope that you agree.

I've Been Waiting for this Week for Months, and Here's Why...

This is going to be a big week for me, and you can be part of it.

For starters, I'm really looking forward to this week's 2008 Digital Marketing Conference (October 29-30 in Toronto) from two perspectives: one as a member of the Organizing Committee, the other as a representative from Tucows.

Wearing my Committee member hat, I'm thrilled to see all the pieces and people finally coming together for what I believe will be our best Conference to date. (In case you missed it, here are my Seven Killer Reasons to Attend the 2008 Digital Marketing Conference.) I'm also really looking forward to learning, networking, and catching up with other digital marketers from across the country. I'll also be leading an Experience Exchange Roundtable discussion on Domain Name Strategy, so that should be fun.

With my Tucows hat on, I'm super excited that we're sponsoring the Networking Reception on Wednesday, right after the Roundtables. I'm sworn to secrecy, but what I can tell you is that I'll be unveiling 'something' we've been working on for months, plus Tucows will be giving away a one-of-kind door prize worth $2,000. On top of all that, reception attendees will be getting a special gift that I think is pretty darn cool.

If you haven't already registered for this year's Digital Marketing Conference, please don't wait any longer. The Digital Marketing Conference always sells out. Head on over to http://www.the-cma.org/digital for more details and to register.

Have a great week, and I hope to see you at the Conference and the Networking Reception.

The Sweetman is Back

You know you haven't blogged in a while when even your parents start noticing the long gap between posts. Sheesh!

Well, I am back.

For those of you who noticed, and especially for those of you who care, my little blogging 'sabbatical' was the result of a whole bunch of things (mainly good but a few bad) going on in my life that took priority over blogging.

For the record, I am healthy, happy, gainfully employed, and have not been abducted by aliens or angry domainers (yet).

Some of the personal and professional highlights for me over the last month include:

• traveling to San Francisco and Vancouver
• overseeing the sale of a single domain name for $200,000 (a four-letter .com)
• getting an iPhone G3, truly an amazing device
• debuting my new keynote presentation, "Minivertising - The Big Future in Targeting a Tiny Niche"
• celebrating the one-year anniversary of working at Tucows
• getting lots of positive feedback on my movie domain name review site, Hollywoozy
• spending time with friends and loved ones

Before this starts to sound like an icky family holiday letter, I would just like to thank the many people who made it clear to me that they missed my Sweetmantra blog posts and were wondering if everything was OK.

Yup, all is well. And now back to our regularly scheduled programming...

"Minivertising" - Join me in Vancouver to Learn About this New Marketing Strategy

Forget about thinking big. You need to think small!

That's the rallying cry for a keynote address I am delivering in Vancouver on September 11, 2008.

British Columbia Association of Integrated Marketers (BC AIM) has invited me to present my newest talk, "Minivertising", at a Marketing Luncheon at the Four Seasons Hotel.

Here are the details:

"Minivertising" – The Big Future in Targeting a Tiny Niche
Presented by BC AIM
Thursday, September 11, 2008
11:30 AM - 2 PM
Four Seasons Hotel, 791 Georgia Street West, Vancouver, BC
Register for this Event

Forget about thinking big. You need to think small! Until recently, it was expensive if not impossible to market to a highly segmented target audience. Not any longer. Discover how marketers and entrepreneurs can use social media and emerging Web tools for affordable and effective Mini-targeting. No matter the size of your company, you can learn how to become a dominant player in a profitable niche.

If you’re a marketer, you’ll learn how to use the principles of Minivertising to generate interest for your client’s products and services, no matter how constrained their budgets are.

If you’re an entrepreneur or business executive, you’ll discover affordable and measurable ways to attract highly motivated customers to you, almost overnight.

For more information and to register, visit the BC AIM Website.

I hope to see you there.

Hollywoozy - Helping Hollywood Master Its Domain

It's a little-known fact that I used to be a movie critic in the early 80's. You see, I've had a lifelong obsession with movies. In fact, I studied filmmaking in university, worked in the feature film industry for many years, and still watch several movies every week.

As many readers of my blog know, I also have a thing for domain names, so I guess it was inevitable that I would find a way to combine two of my favourite obsessions.

Today, I am thrilled to unveil my latest creation, Hollywoozy (www.hollywoozy.com), the first Website devoted to reviewing movie domain names. That's right, I'm critiquing the domain names used to market movies.

I don't know about you, but over the last five years I started to notice that just about every movie trailer (another obsession of mine, by the way) ended with the display of the official movie Website's address. Many times, the domain name that would be featured in the trailer and other marketing collateral for the movie was laughably bad, at least to my marketer's eye. At first, I found this amusing. Then it became something of a game for me and my wife, as we would patiently wait for the end of the trailer to see how good, or bad, the URL would be.

I soon discovered that I wasn't the only one puzzled by the domain name choices the movie marketers made. A number of my Internet marketing colleagues were equally amused by what appeared to be Hollywood's inability to grasp the importance of having a good domain name when trying to market a multi-million dollar movie. After all, the producers and studios decide years in advance what the title of the movie will be, so there's no excuse for not researching (and securing) the availability of the appropriate movie domain name ahead of time. Yes, even if that - heaven forbid - means buying the domain name from someone who already owns it. If you're spending tens of millions of dollars marketing a movie, spending $10,000 to get the best domain name for the movie is well worth it.

While all of this was rattling around in my head, I was also itching to find a way to return somehow to my film roots. At first I thought I'd start reviewing movies again, perhaps for a publication or Website, but then I realized that the Internet is awash with movie review Websites and blogs, and besides, I had already been there, done that.

Then it hit me ... what about a Website where I reviewed movie domain names? And that's how Hollywoozy was born, although it took me months to come up with the right name for the thing. Naming, yet another one of my obsessions!

Unlike my other online ventures (see sidebar), Hollywoozy is a little less serious, although at its core it is meant to be educational. Hollywoozy also gives me a chance to roll up my sleeves and try my hand at some new (and not so new) Internet marketing techniques. In the coming months, I will be sharing excerpts from my Hollywoozy "Marketing Diary" with you so that you can learn about the techniques I am using to promote the Website and, perhaps more importantly, find out what works and what doesn't.

Before I wrap up, I'd like to thank the gang at Mouth Media for creating the official Hollywoozy logo. They helped turn my crazy idea into a reality.

I hope you enjoy it!

I'm No Longer Podcasting. Here's Why...

Last week I announced that I would no longer be recording new episodes of my Internet marketing podcast, Marketing Martini.

My podcast?

I realize that some of my loyal blog readers may not have even known I had a podcast since it was a pilot project that I never heavily promoted. (In case you are curious, you can check out the archive of Marketing Martini episodes.)

I thought it would therefore be a good idea to clarify why I made my decision to stop podcasting.

The one thing I want to make perfectly clear is that I am still a big believer in the power and potential of podcasting as a medium in general. What I am no longer interested in, however, is producing my own podcast.

Here's the scoop:

When I launched my Marketing Martini podcast in January 2007, I had a number of goals.

First and foremost, I wanted to better understand the medium of podcasting, and the only way I could do that was to get my hands dirty and produce my own podcast. I certainly ended up learning more than I ever wanted to know about the technical nitty gritty of producing a podcast, and this knowledge proved very helpful to me when I was working at 'The Big Ad Agency'. In fact, I was able to directly apply that knowledge during the production of the podcast the agency produced for General Motors of Canada, "Aesthetic Intent". I was, and still am, very proud of how that turned out.

Second, I wanted to experiment with communicating my knowledge of Internet Marketing through a new medium, which is somewhat ironic since I started my career working in radio over 25 years ago. I discovered that I enjoyed using the spoken word (again) and had fun exploring some of the potential of the medium.

There were also a few other more private goals I had in mind when I launched the Marketing Martini podcast. I should add, however, than none of these goals had anything to do with generating revenue from my podcast; that was never one of my goals.

So why am I hanging up my podcaster's mike?

Quite simply, I achieved the goals I had set out for myself, even my private ones.

Once I realized this, I took a hard look at the time I was spending to produce my podcast. It soon became apparent that (for me, at least) this was a pretty time-consuming endeavor (compared to, for instance, blogging), and was - quite frankly - getting in the way of me pursuing other things, including writing for this blog.

I didn't want to find myself resenting doing my podcast because it was stopping me from launching other projects, so that's why I decided to stop podcasting.

I'd like to thank my listeners - who, interestingly, hail from all around the world - for their loyalty, support and encouragement. Nothing gave me more pleasure than hearing from a listener in a far off place.

Thanks to Mitch Joel and Michael Seaton for inspiring me to begin podcasting in the first place. Keep on podcasting, guys!

And very special thanks to podcasting expert Leesa Barnes who provided some invaluable advice and support during the initial setup of my podcast. I truly couldn't have launched Marketing Martini without her input.

I am already hard at work on my next project, which I will be launching soon, and you, loyal blog reader, will be among the first to hear about it. All I will reveal at this point in time is that it has something to do with domain names. Stay tuned...

P.S. Here are some links to some excellent podcasts that inspired me to become a podcaster:

• Diary of a Shameless Self-Promoter
• Inside PR
• Managing the Gray
• Six Pixels of Separation
• The Client Side Podcast
• Trafcom News Podcast

Enjoy!