Author Archive

.XXX Failed Sunrise Domains Will Be Made Available Feb. 14

logo for the .XXX domain extension The ICM Registry, operator of the .XXX domain extension, has let us know that on February 14th, 2012, all failed Sunrise A and B applications will start to become available for registration starting at 16:00 UTC.

If you have customers who applied for domains during either Sunrise A or B that failed validation, you might wish to let them know in case they are still interested in obtaining any of those domain(s) for registration.

These domains would simple show as available after 16:00 UTC, and will be available for registration on a first-come, first-serve basis like any other unregistered .XXX domain is now.

ICM Registry says they will not provide a list of the names that are being made available.

Hosting Trends for 2012 – Free Webinar!

NOTE: If you missed the live webinar, we now have a recording available for viewing at any time. Click here to view.

Staying on top of where the hosting industry is headed is key in ensuring that you are able to react quickly and be successful.

Arming you with great information about the current state of the industry and where it’s going int he future is all part of what we do. If you’ve attended events like HostingCon, WorldHostingDays or Parallels Summit, you’ll know that we often offer sessions designed to share that knowledge we’ve gained with you.

Free Exclusive Webinar!

Coming up on February 2, 2012, we’re hosting a free webinar that we know you won’t want to miss.

We’ve arranged for Phil Shih, founder and managing director of Structure Research to provide a one-hour session titled, “A Look Ahead – Trends in Hosting for 2012.”

Phil Shih, Founder and Managing Director, Structure Research

Phil is a well-known speaker in the hosting industry. He has in-depth knowledge of where things are, and where they are headed based on his over ten years of looking at the hosting space. Phil was a long-time senior staff writer for The WHIR, and an analyst for Tier1 Research.

This webinar is just a start – we’re very excited to announce that we’ve partnered with Phil to bring you exclusive content like this throughout the year.

More to Come

As mentioned, the webinar is just the first of a number of many initiatives we have planned, some with Phil and some with other great partners – watch for blog posts and more great webinars coming up to help you stay current.

From day one, back in 1999, we’re always been very much focused on making sure that you have the products and services you need to succeed. That means having things like a huge range of ccTLDs and gTLDs, or partnering with multiple trust providers so you can always offer the right SSL or trust product for every customer.

Further extending and broadening that focus to include information and intelligence is just one more thing that makes us the best choice for companies looking for a wholesale Internet services partner.

Watch On Demand

Click here to view the recording. Like all of our webinars, it’s free.

Help and Advice on Implementing New ccTLDs from OpenSRS

Last week we hosted a webinar for Resellers to get you up to speed on the expansion of our ccTLD lineup that we did in December.

Broadcasting live from the OpenSRS Webinar Broadcast Studios (aka Meeting Room 2)

If you missed the news about that launch, you can check out this post from Adam Eisner – we added dozens and dozens of new ccTLDs to the list of extensions you can sell through your OpenSRS reseller account.

Why ccTLDs? Which Ones Should I Offer? What are the Key Differences?

In the webinar, Adam talked about how we ended up adding all these new cTLDs, including some very open and transparent discussion about why we chose the ones we did.

He also provided some great advice on how you should approach bringing new ccTLDs to your customer base – that included thinking about your location, and the markets you serve.

Plus, he took a few minutes to fully explain some of the differences between these new ccTLDs and the rest of the TLDs we offer.

The webinar runs about 30 minutes with some questions and answers. As with all of our webinars, we recorded it (video and audio) so you can watch it when it’s convenient for you. You can access the recording here.

Another Great Webinar in February!

While we’re talking about webinars, we do have another one already lined up and on the schedule for the first week of February. We’re super excited to have Phil Shih from Structure Research in to provide a look at the hosting industry in 2012. This is exclusive to OpenSRS and promises to be an excellent session.

Find out more about that here, and of course, registration is free.

Being Your Customers’ Trusted Provider

Your customers choose you for a variety of reasons – maybe it’s a higher level of customer support, or specific high quality services you offer. Maybe it’s because they know and trust you, or because you are a part of their local community.

There is a real opportunity to be the trusted provider for your customers – and the provider they trust for everything they need, whether that’s domain registrations, hosting, email or whatever else you might offer them.

Do your customers know that you want all of their business, and do you go out of your way to help them move it to you?

Don’t Forget About Domain Transfers

One of the realities of getting started as an OpenSRS Reseller is that a lot of people already have a domain name. That reality makes your life easier because you don’t need to explain to them that having a domain name for their business is important.

Your customers and potential customers already know the value of a good domain and that opens the door for you to start selling things like a mobile website, hosting, web design, email and trust services to them.

But make sure you don’t overlook that domain when you bring the customer on board. Help the customer transfer their domains to you in any way you can so that you are able to offer a complete, end-to-end set of services.

Pro tip: Our retail division actually offers a concierge service that takes care of transfers for their customers. It’s something the customer is often happy to pay for, and it ensures that the transfer is taken care of successfully. Consider offering transfer concierge services to existing customers to get them to move their existing domains to you.

Helpful Resources

We provide a bunch of step-by-step guides that you can use to help those customers get their domains transferred to you. Transfers can sometimes be tricky and it’s important that you help the customer through the process so they don’t get frustrated and give up. You can grab the guides here.

Our Marketing Resource Center is full of helpful resources for domains, trust, email and publishing there for your use. Check it out.

Having the right information is a great help in making sure you get all the business that your customers want to entrust you with.

Thanks to Flickr user TerryJohnston for the photo, released under a Creative Commons license.

Take Advantage of .ME’s Momentum

.ME is on a roll lately. More and more .ME domains are being registered and used around the Internet, including some very high profile and very visible sites.

There are now more than 550,000 .ME domains registered, and hundreds of .ME domains are found on the Alexa Top 100,000 Sites list. With stats like that, it’s clear that even the most casual of web surfers will run into a .ME domain in their travels around the net.

How .ME Domains are Being Used

The .ME domain extension is a TLD with some obvious and compelling use cases. Here’s just a few examples in different verticals:

.ME for vanity shorteners: WordPress.com has WP.ME for blog posts, Time Magazine is using TI.ME, and Facebook is using FB.ME (and there are many more examples).
Personal profile services: .ME is an obvious choice for a site that provides a personal landing page. You might have seen About.ME, and Flavors.ME which both offer customized personal homepages at .ME domains. Users of either service can also purchase their own .ME domain for an even more personalized experience.
New web services: There are more .ME domains available than in other extensions, so .ME is getting a lot of love with new web services. You might have seen formspring.ME, join.ME, connect.ME and jetpack.ME among others.
Blogs and personal websites: .ME has always been a great choice for a personal site. More and more high profile bloggers and celebrities are choosing .ME domains. Omis.ME, Zee.ME, thecranberries.me and dannybrown.ME are some great examples.

The long and short of it is this: if you aren’t offering .ME domains to your customers, then you aren’t providing them with a great option that will help them find their perfect domain name. Without that perfect domain name, they won’t be looking for additional services like hosting, SSL and email.

On Sale Now!

More information and marketing help to get you started is available here. And remember that we have a great $7.99 promotion on .ME domains that runs through the end of the year.