Intranet Project Names Some Ideas

Intranet Project Names Some Ideas

by: David Viney

กWhatกs in a name? That which we call a rose

By any other word would smell as sweet.ก

In this famous quote from Act II of Romeo and Juliet, Juliet tells Romeo that a name is an artificial and meaningless convention, and the fact he is a Montague and she a Capulet (warring families) means nothing to their love.

However, there is some strong evidence from the UKกs Cranfield University and elsewhere that the name one gives a project does have a marked impact on the behaviour and motivation of the people involved. It may surprise you, but the name you give to your Intranet Project could well be the most important decision you make in the early stages of mobilisation!

The Direct Approach

There is an argument in faour of naming your Intranet Project the wait for it กIntranet Projectก! Often, socalled กsecret squirrelก names (where one has to ferret out from colleagues what Project Banana is all about) serve only to create an unnecessary air of mystique (fit only for secret M&A projects). They can also serve to be divisive, by separating กpeople in the knowก from people outside the immediate project audience.

The functional approach

A functional name focuses on what the intranet does (e.g. search, find, access). This enjoys the same benefits as the direct approach, but affords one a little more poetic license. What about names like กProject Connectก or กProject Gatewayก, which serve to signal the core กmust haveก requirements for the project?

The conceptual approach

There is a problem with the direct or functional approaches; Research from Cranfield has demonstrated that people on projects tend to be very heavily influenced in their actions by the name of the project itself. If you call your project the Intranet project, it is a working intranet (i.e. the technology) that you will get. If your ambition was something much more visionary, such as a wholly new way of working for your people, you are likely to be disappointed!

The conceptual name targets what is achieved by the functionality, rather than the functionality itself. For example, if your company name was BigCo and your purpose was seeking to get everyone in the company working together, you could call the project กProject OneBigCoก or กProject Unityก. For the aforementioned new ways of working objective, you could use กProject Future Workplaceก.

The abstract approach

The abstract approach deals with how the project makes people feel. For example, กProject Blissก (for happiness), กProject Wizardก (for magic) or กProject Pulseก (for fastpacedness). Although one world usually fails to capture all you are trying to achieve with an Intranet Portal, this approach can prove highly effective (particularly where countercultural).

If all else fails

Nothing grabbed you so far? Well there is no saving you, then! I suppose there are always the standard fallback options: names of greek or roman gods, names of planets, names of birds and names of dances. These have the added value that if you spawn followon projects in a sequence you have readymade logical followon project titles. Incidentally, กProject Mercuryก would be my recommendation for planets or gods (as Mercury was the roman god of communications).

For more ideas on project names, why not check out my presentation in the Intranet Portal Guide.

About The Author

David Viney ([email protected]) is the author of the Intranet Portal Guide; 31 pages of advice, tools and downloads covering the period before, during and after an Intranet Portal implementation.

Read the guide at http://www.viney.com/DFV/intranet_portal_guide or the Intranet Watch Blog at http://www.viney.com/intranet_watch.

This article was posted on November 08, 2004

by David Viney

The Lazy Manกs Way To Building a Massive List In M

The Lazy Manกs Way To Building a Massive List In Minimum Time

by: Dan Kelly

As you read every word of this article, youกll be stunned by how quickly and easily you can build a massive list of opt in subscribers without spending a fortune. (The idea is to make money, not spend money. Right?)

Iกll get right to the point…

It can be a real pain in the butt trying to build an optin list using the กold schoolก methods of list building that every Internet marketing guru out there is teaching these days.

They tell you… กUse pop ups and pop unders, delayed pops, and exit popsก, กPut a subscription box on every page of your websiteก, กUse PayPerClick (PPC) search engines to drive traffic to your optin pageก, etc. etc. etc.

Those methods are OK, in my opinion. If you’re using them now and they are effective for you, continue using them. If you’re not, Iกd suggest that you at least experiment with them to see if they work for your situation.

> THE BIG PROBLEM IS THIS…

The two biggest problems youกll face using the กold schoolก methods are… either it takes way too much of YOUR TIME or it costs way too much of YOUR MONEY to build a list of any respectable size.

(In the BizOp, MLM, and Internet marketing arenas, many potential joint venture partners won’t even talk to you unless your list has at least 50,000 100,000 subscribers.)

> WHATกS THE SOLUTION?

Very simple…

Instead of waiting for customers to come to you (which you have to do even with PPC search engines)…

You can BUY subscribers.

Thatกs right! There are companies out there that will sell you the names and email addresses of people that have REQUESTED information about business opportunities.

> WARNING: NOT ALL LEAD SOURCES ARE CREATED EQUAL

There are 8 things you want to look for from any lead/subscriber source.

Here they are:

100% OptIn: You want to buy the contact information of people that have actively requested more information. There are various methods of capturing contact information. Some leads sources sell you names that came from CDROM that has 12 million names on it. Some lead sources precheck the subscription box, so many of their leads didn’t know that they were going to be sent any information from you. You want to make sure that all the names you buy have explicitly requested the information that you are going to send them.

Targeted: You want Business Opportunity Seekers ONLY! What good is it if the names you buy really just wanted to be on someoneกs joke list or recipe newsletter? Iกll tell you… Absolutely NOTHING! Actually, less than nothing if you get a lot of SPAM complaints and your ISP bans you from sending emails or your email addresses ends up on blacklists all throughout the Internet.

Only กFreshก Leads: Plain and simple… The older the list, the less responsive it will be to your offer. As time goes by, people become less and less interested in what they requested information on. The more time between their initial request and your first contact, the easier it is for them to forget that they even requested information. My personal recommendation is that you never buy leads that are over 30 days old, unless you can get them at a steep discount.

Quick Turnaround: You don’t want to wait months for your leads source to fulfill your order. Many smaller sites aren’t able to keep up with the demand for leads so you could be waiting months if your order is large. You want a source that can fulfill large orders in a timely basis. Time really is money… especially when someone has yours, and you’re left waiting months for your list.

Accessible & Effective Support: You want to be able to ask a question any time, day or night, and get a fast, courteous, and most importantly, effective solution to your concern. With some companies, you send them an email and it takes them days to get back to you, if they reply at all. And, speaking bluntly, many of them use incompetent people for their support because they’re only after a quick buck. Their motto, กGrab the money and run… They should be able to figure it out.ก

CANSPAM Compliant: If you buy a list that has been harvested from websites, forums, newsgroups or any number of other places, you could get in serious trouble just for sending them your email. Itกs just not worth it! Please, only send your information and promotional material to people that want to hear from you.

Exclusivity: You don’t want to compete for your leads attention any more than you have to. Spam filter, blacklist, and unexplainable Internet กglitchesก cause email marketers enough grief. You want to know that your list is not going to be resold to a dozen or a hundred different marketers. My personal recommendation is that you NEVER purchase a lead that is sold to more than 5 marketers. The quality of response will be horrible if you’re competing with that many people for your prospectsก limited time and attention.

Alternate Means Of Communication: If you can get them, you also want their home address and home telephone number. If you’re really serious about promoting your opportunity, you should be communicating with your prospects with more than just email. Postcards and short phone calls/message have be proven to increase response to almost any offer especially offers where people are naturally skeptical at the outset.

BTW, some websites (I won’t name any names.) make it sound like they’re doing you a favor by กgiving you their name at no additional costก. Give me a break! Names are MANDITORY!

ACTION STEP: Now that you have the criteria, you should evaluate your current lead sources and check out a few new ones.

About The Author

Dan Kelly is the CEO and webmaster of BizOpListbuilder.com

กHelping entrepreneurs build and profit from their single greatest marketing asset their list.ก

To see how inexpensive it can be to get your very own list and to check out all 8 bonuses you get buy ordering today visit http://www.BizOpListbuilder.com/ today. Youกll be glad you did!

I look forward to helping you build and profit from your very own optin list.

[email protected]

This article was posted on March 23

by Dan Kelly

How To Really Profit from Domain Names

How To Really Profit from Domain Names

by: J. Stephen Pope

Have you heard about domain names that sold for over a 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 multimillionaire. 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 กflowers.comก 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.

For further information about profiting from domain names, visit http://www.yenommarketinginc.com/domainnames.html

About The Author

J. Stephen Pope, President of Pope Consulting Inc., http://www.popeconsultinginc.com/ has been helping clients to earn maximum business profits for over twentyfive years.

For valuable Work at Home Small Business Ideas, visit: http://www.yenommarketinginc.com/

This article was posted on February 28

by J. Stephen Pope

Making Money from Parked Domains

Making Money from Parked Domains

by: Derek Vaughan

Let me tell you a true story. A friend of my who likes to collect domain names was describing a few that he had acquired. While he has a wide range of domains in various categories, these particular domains were all related to web hosting.

Some of the domain names were similar to existing web hosting company names (or derivatives of web hosting company names). Others simply had ‘hosting’, ‘host’, or a related term in the domain itself.

So my friend and I were talking and he said something like, “Yeah, it’s a shame – if only I had the time to develop some content for some of these domains then I might make some money form them”. It turns out that he had no content on any of the domains – just parked pages, or no content at all. When I investigated the domains, it turned out that there was a small but steady traffic stream that visited these domains. Some simply typed in the domain, others apparently found the domain through a search engine that had categorized the parked page.

So I suggested the following to him – why not use a service that will take the domain as is – with no content whatsoever – and suggest search options that generate revenue for each click? He took my advice, grudgingly I might add, and guess what? He made $50 the first month from just a few of his domains.

He was so excited that he asked what he might do to further increase his revenues from his domain names. I suggested that he use his parking pages (these can be customized with some hosts) to test banners from affiliate programs with the highest paying hosting companies. He placed only three banners at the top of his pages – with a brief description of the company’s product offerings taken straight from their web sites. This also proved to be a great success – and his revenue stream increased.

My friend has since invested some time and energy in monetizing his other domains. He has either pointed the domains to a pay per click search engine, or listed affiliate links on almost every domain. This has turned a lackluster domain speculation business into a profit generating pay per click and affiliate business that requires almost no effort to maintain. Needless to say, my friend has taken my out to lunch a couple of times since then.

If you have parked domains and what to try getting paid for search results on those pages, check out this service offered by Sedo (there are others out there as well):

http://www.sedo.com/services/parking.php3

Good luck in transforming your parked domains into cold, hard cash!

About The Author

Derek Vaughan has been actively marketing on the Internet since 1995. Mr. Vaughan has marketed products at the Walt Disney Company as the online marketing manager of ecommerce for ESPN.com. Mr. Vaughan is also the founder of Cheap Hosting Directory a web hosting review site. Mr. Vaughan holds degrees from both the Indiana University and Purdue University. He has also received a Master of Business Administration degree from the Owen School at Vanderbilt University. Cheap Hosting Directory http://www.cheaphostingdirectory.com is a part of TechPad Agencyกs network of web hosting portals.

This article was posted on September 08, 2004

by Derek Vaughan

Choosing a Domain Name

Choosing a Domain Name

by: Garland Coulson

Your web site address, or domain name, is an important part of your Internet branding and Internet marketing strategy. But most people give the choice of a domain name little thought, and just register their company name or the closest domain name they can get to their company name.
By doing this, they are missing some great Internet marketing opportunities.
Let’s look at some of the choices you need to make and ways to make your domain name market harder for you.
Company Name vs. What People Search For
Let’s look at a hypothetical business called Susan’s Creations that makes gift baskets. (My apologies to any businesses that may actually have this name.)
In this example, Susan registers ขsusanscreations.comข as her domain name, .com being the most common suffix for domain names.
This domain name has the benefit of being easy to remember and would work well for people who already know about Susan’s company and are searching for it by name.
But what if this is a new company and Susan’s Creations is unknown? People will most likely search for ขgift basketsข, not for a company they’ve never heard of.
Many search engines will rank a web site higher if they have the key word people are searching for right in the domain name. So, in this case, a domain name like giftbaskets.com would rank higher when people search for ขgift basketsข than a domain name like susanscreations.com.
For a company like Nike, nike.com would work better than runningshoes.com because Nike has spent millions of dollars and many years building up the brand name, Nike.
But for entrepreneurs, focusing on what you are selling instead of your company name might improve your chances of success. So in this case, Susan should probably look at a domain name like ขgiftbaskets.com.ข
Unfortunately, many common product names with the .com extension are already taken. So let’s look at some alternatives.
Geographic Considerations
Are you serving the world, your country, or your local town?
If your customers are country or town specific, you can use your domain name to help you be found easier when customers are looking for local products and services.
The most common domain names are as follows.

.com global commercial
.org – global for organizations
.net – global for networks
.biz – global for business

Each country also has it’s own geographic domain name suffix. Here are a few examples:

Canada .ca
United States .us
Great Britain .uk
Australia .au
Germany .de

So if you are a Canadian company with primarily Canadian clients, it would make sense to register a .ca name so that people know you are Canadian. This will also help you rank higher in the search engines when people are looking for country specific searches. So Susan might want to register giftbaskets.ca instead of giftbaskets.com.
For common names such as gift baskets, you’ll probably find the .com name already gone and even the country name may be gone as well. You might be able to still use the phrase you need and target your geographic area even better by trying domain names such as:

canadiangiftbaskets.ca
canadagiftbaskets.ca
vancouvergiftbaskets.ca
torontogiftbaskets.ca

By using the city, you will improve your ranking when people search for a phrase which includes the city such as ขVancouver gift baskets.ข Most people looking for local help will include the local city or town in the search.
Finding an alternate name
You can find out what alternate key words people are looking for in the search engines by using a service such as WordTracker. WordTracker will help you find alternative, hightraffic key words that you can then incorporate into your domain name.
Other considerations
1. Ease of use: Is the domain name short enough to remember or to be given over the phone? If Susan chooses a domain name like ขsusanscreationsgiftbaskets.com,ข you can see how people would find it difficult to remember or write down.
2. Hyphens: Some people register domain names with hyphens in them because the name they wanted is already registered, for example ขgiftbaskets.com.ข This can be effective, but too many hyphens make it hard to remember and you run the risk of people just typing in the name without hyphens and being directed to a competitor.
3. Vanity domain names: It might be a good idea to register your own personal name. I registered garlandcoulson.com so that it wouldn’t be gone when I was ready to do something with it.
Where to register your domain name
Our recommended company for registering domain names is Dotster Dotster will allow you to register .com domain names for $14.95 US per year and .ca domain names for about $20.00 US per year.
At these kinds of costs, you can afford to purchase a number of domain names to ensure they won’t be gone when you are ready to launch additional Internet ventures.
A great domain name could be the start of a great Internet business!

Permission to publish this article on your own web site or in your newsletter is granted as long as the complete article is used and the final paragraph and link to our site is intact. Our affiliates have permission to change the final web site link to their affiliate link.

About The Author

Garland Coulson, ขThe EBusiness Tutorข is an acclaimed speaker, author and coach in the field of Internet marketing for small business and home business. For more information, visit The EBusiness Tutor web site at www.ebusinesstutor.com or call tollfree in North America at 18664130951.

[email protected]

This article was posted on July 08, 2004

by Garland Coulson

Tips For Evocative, Distinctive Company Names

Tips For Evocative, Distinctive Company Names

by: Marcia Yudkin

As the sponsor of a NameThisCompany Contest, I’ve been watching suggestions come in by the dozens every day. Unfortunately, the great majority of names submitted so far do not pass ขgo.ข A good company name is not only catchy and evocative, but also pronounceable, spellable and not likely to backfire because of unsavory associations.

Since the contest offers a prize of $100 for the best business name submitted, along with the chance to become a professional ขnamer,ข getting paid to think up new product names, new company names, tag lines and ad slogans, I would guess that the same flaws occur when company owners or managers sit down to think up a new name for their own business.

So here’s a quick quiz to sensitize you to important factors in potential company names. To which of the following names would you give a thumbs up and which a thumbs down – and why?

1. Zyklon Bikes

2. Quirinus Quarterly (political magazine)

3. The Energy Spot (web site selling healthy snacks and diet plans)

4. Elkins Enterprises (mail order company)

Answers: All the above names deserve thumbs down. Here’s why.

1. ขZyklonข sounds fast and energetic. However, it’s also the name of the gas used by Nazis to kill millions during World War Two. A British company that announced this name for running shoes earned terrible PR.

2. Quirinus was a Roman god of military and political affairs, so the meaning of this name fits. But even most Ph.D.s and history buffs would not be able to spell or pronounce the name with confidence.

3. Start the name of an ecommerce company with ขtheข and customers won’t easily remember whether or not ขtheข is part of the domain name. ขTheข followed by the letter ขeข is even more problematic for spelling a web address. People will hesitate to type ขtheenergyspot.com.ข

4. Like ขQuirinus Quarterly,ข ขElkins Enterprisesข has alliteration in its favor. But so many dubiously honest and struggling but honest businesses have used ขEnterprisesข that it sounds suspicious to many people as a business name component.

Although our namethiscompany contest has a deadline of August 31, after that date there will always be another contest at that URL. People from any country and of any age are eligible to enter as many times as they like. Nonwinners who submit captivating names will be considered for a post as a professional namer, as will the contest winner.

Happy naming!

About The Author

Marcia Yudkin is the author of 6 Steps to Free Publicity and 10 other books hailed for outstanding creativity. Read about her new discount naming company, Named At Last, which brainstorms company names, new product names, tag lines and more for entrepreneurs on a budget, at http://www.NamedAtLast.com . The contest URL: http://www.NamedAtLast.com/contest.htm

[email protected]

This article was posted on September 05

by Marcia Yudkin

Free eBook: Business Domain Names

Free eBook: Business Domain Names

by: Steve Baba

Since every website needs a name, Dr. Steve Baba has written a free ebook that will help you obtain a brandable, memorable domain name at a reasonable cost, which will contribute to your brand equity and profits. The ebook, downloadable from Seemly.com, explains how to select and buy an elite domain name. You will be able to obtain a better name than your competitors have.

There are at least 10,000 words in a dictionary that would make great domain names plus at least 10,000 proper names and 10,000 great short coinedwords. With a supply of 30,000 great names and millions of good names, obtaining a good name is easy.

There is no need to pay more than a few thousand dollars for a great oneword domain name, and many good domain names are available for free. This book provides you with the information needed to beat domain name speculators at their games.

Both naming methodology to identify great domain names and negotiating/purchasing methods to obtain great domain names at low prices are covered. After a couple of introductory sections, the book starts with domain naming goals or the criteria for choosing a great domain name: image, memorability, trademarklegal, and price. Then quality domain naming strategies are discussed. Inferior domain naming styles, which you want to avoid, are then discussed.

The second half of this book explains how to buy a great domain name. Auctions, expired domains, speculators, and other sources are discussed. Finally, many other topics are expanded on.

Steve Baba has a Ph.D. in Economics and ebusiness experience. The ebook on domain names is available at www.seemly.com, for free. No registration is required. The ebook is a PDF file of approximately 250K. The free ebook is advertising supported. The following paragraphs are book excerpts. Generic names, arbitrary dictionary words, coined or madeup words, modified generic names (generic plus) and unrelated twoword names are quality domain naming strategies. But, each quality strategy has strengths and weaknesses. There is no such thing as a perfect name.

Generic names are highly controversial and expensive. Examples of generic names are Hotels.com, Shoes.com and Furniture.com. The generic name strategy was always controversial and peaked during the dotcom bubble.

The generic naming strategy is virtually never used offline, but a very few small stores do business under generic names such as the ขMattress Storeข in Annapolis, Maryland. Offline, anyone can use the same generic name and open a store name ขMattress Store.ข Online, ownership of the domain name MattressStore.com can only prevent competitors from using the same exact domain name.

Since, generic names cannot be trademarked, competitors can use Hotels.NET, Rooms.com, Hotelrooms.com, Motels.com, Hotel.com (singular), Inns.com Hotels.us, and so on. Often, there are a half dozen simple generic names for each industry not to mention generic names with a prefix (e, i) or suffix such as eHotels.com.

Since competitors can use similar generic names, developing a distinct, memorable brand is difficult. Memorability or the need to spend less on advertising is often an argument for high domain name prices – but this argument is only half true. At the same time, with only a few firstrate generic names in each industry, the generic domain names may be unavailable or overpriced, and are rarely bargainpriced. A generic name also hampers brand extension beyond the generic category – Hotels.com selling plane tickets?

Another quality strategy is unrelated, arbitrary dictionary words. Examples of unrelated dictionary word names include Amazon.com Yahoo.com, Google.com, Target and Staples. Both the words yahoo and google are in the Oxford dictionary, but were rarely used prior to becoming famous brands.

Compared to generic names, it was not immediately obvious what business Amazon, Yahoo or Google was in. On the other hand, Yahoo can legally prevent competitors from using similar names such as FreeHoo via trademark laws.

SearchEngine.com would be the generic name for Google. ขFastข and ขAll The Webข are used as trademarks by another search engine. But ขfastข and ขall the webข are not unrelated or arbitrary. Other search engines can also claim to be fast, speedy, quick, the entire web, or something similar.

The key to having the most trademark protection is to choose an unrelated, arbitrary word. Descriptive words, such as fast, are unlikely to earn much trademark protection. Instead of fast, it may be possible to use a suggestive name such as jet, rocket, or race.

With 10,000 good, short, easytospell dictionary words, it is always possible to find one for a few thousand dollars. Shorter four or five character dictionary words are more expensive. Three character dictionary words are extremely expensive.

Coined or fanciful words are words such as Exxon or Kodak that had no prior use. In theory, coined words are the best from a trademarklegal point of view, since no one has used the word before. Ideally, a coined word is totally new and unrelated to any other word.

But, memorability requires a short name, which has led to a number of similar coined names such as Duron, Enron, and Micron, which diminishes the legal advantage, since confusion is possible. LexIs sued LexUs.

While the legal protection is not perfect, the legal protection is considered the strongest of any category. But from a marketing point of view since no one has used the word, coined words may be as difficult to remember as nonsense syllables.

With a supply of thousands if not tens of thousands of short, coined words, it is always possible to find one for a few thousand dollars or less – often free.

Because of the lack of trademark protection for generic names, the lack of distinctiveness, and the cost of many generic domain names, many businesses have used a ขgeneric plusข or ขmodified genericข naming strategy.

A prefix, suffix or second word can be added to the generic name. Examples of this are Carmax, CarMart, eCars, CarDepot, CarOne and CarLand.

This works if the generic word, such as car, is short. Longer generic names, such as CarpetCleaningMax.com, can be too long. But many of the longer generic words have common abbreviations. For example, computer is often abbreviated ขcompข as in CompUSA. Software is often shortened to ขsoftข or ขwareข in names. Tech is a common abbreviation for technology, overused in names.

These names range from virtually generic, eCars.cars, to nearly coined, QuanCars.com, with descriptive, suggestive and arbitrary secondwords inbetween. Since the generic word lacks any trademark protection, the trademark strength depends on the trademark strength of the ขplusข part of the name.

The generic plus strategy is often an attempt to have the benefits from both a generic and a distinctive name, but may have the problems of both if one is not careful. At worst, it could infringe on someoneกs trademark based on the second word such as CarsRus or CarBay. The generic part of the word is usually trademark safe.

Another strategy is to use two unrelated words in a name. Examples of two unrelated words are RedEnvelope.com and BlueTooth.com. The two unrelated words strategy differs from the genericplus strategy in that neither word is related to the generic product. Technically red is related to envelope by being an adjective, but neither word is closely related to the product or service being sold.

The main advantage to this method, two unrelated words, is that it’s cheap and often free. With 30,000 single words, there are 900 million combinations of two single words (30,000 x 30,000).

The main disadvantage is that two unrelated words are twice as difficult to remember as one. Two words that are commonly related to each other such as ขhappy birthdayข or ขhot wireข are easier to remember, but rare and may be as expensive as single words.

From a trademark viewpoint, it could be twice as risky. It could infringe on someoneกs trademark based on either the first or second word. If you are RedDog.com selling computers, either Red Computers or Dog Computers could consider trademark action against you.

The entire book can be read at www.seemly.com.

About The Author

Steve Baba has a Ph.D. in Economics and ebusiness experience. The ebook on domain names is available at www.seemly.com, for free.

[email protected]

This article was posted on January 21, 2004

by Steve Baba

Know How DNS Works

Know How DNS Works

by: Pawan Bangar

Domain name Servers (DNS) are an important but invisible part of the internet, and form one of the largest databases on it. Each machine on an internet is assigned a unique address, called an IP address, which is 32 bit number and is expressed as 4 octets. The method user to represent these IP addresses is known as dotted decimal Notationก. A typical address looks like this: 199.249.150.4

It is very difficult to keep in mind the IP addresses of all the websites we visit daily, because itกs not easy to remember strings of numbers. However, we do remember words. This is where domain names come into the picture. If you want to connect to a particular site, you need to know its IP address but do need to know its URL. The DNS gets the mappings of the IP addresses and the corresponding names.

Names and numbers

DNS converts the machine names (such as www.xyz.com) to IP addresses (such as 199.249.150.9). Basically, it translates from a name to an address and from an address to a name.

The mapping from the IP address to the machine name is called reverse mapping .when you type http://www.xyz.com into your browser, the browser first needs to get the IP address of www.xyz.com. The machine uses a directory service to look up IP addresses and this service is called DNS. When you type www.xyz.com your machines firsts contacts a DNS server, asking it to find the IP address for www.xyz.com. This DNS server might then contact other DNS servers on the internet. DNS is therefore is considered as the global network of servers. The great advantage of DNS is that no organization is responsible for updating it. It is what is known as distributed database.

The three letter codes

A DNS server is just a computer thatกs running the DNS software. The most popular DNS software is BIND (Berkeley Internet Name Domain) DNS is hierarchical, treestructured system. The top is donated byก.ก. And is known as the root of the system. Below the root there are seven immediate sub domain nodes and these are กcomก, กorgก, กgovก, กmilก, กnetก, กeduก, กIntก, etc.

DNS consists of two components

Nameserver

Resolver

Nameserver:

This performs the task of looking up the names. Usually, there is one nameserver for a cluster of machines. If the nameserver does not contain the requested information, it will contact another nameserver. But it is not required for every server to know how to contact every other server. Every nameserver will know how to contact the root nameserver, and this in turn will know the location of every authoritative nameserver for all the second level domains.

Resolver:

This runs on a client machine to initiate DNS lookups. It contains a list of nameservers to use. As we have read, the function of each of these nameservers is to resolve name queries. There are three types of nameserversprimary nameserver, secondary nameserver, and caching nameserver. The secondary nameservers are configured for backup purposes. Caching nameservers only resolve name queries but do not maintain any DNS database files. It is important to note here that any change to primary nameservers needs to be propagated to secondary nameservers. This is because primary nameservers own the database records. The changes are propagated via a กzone transferก.

HOW กCACHINGกWORKS

DNS uses principle of กcachingก for its operation. When a nameservers receives Information about a mapping, it caches this information .further queries for the same mapping will use this cached result, thereby reducing the search cost. The nameservers don’t cache forever. The caching has a component called time to live (TTL) and the TTL determines how long a server will cache a piece of information. So when the nameservers caches receive an IP address, it receives the TTL with it. The nameserver caches the IP address for the period of time then discards it.

When a process needs to determine an IP address given a DNS address, it calls upon the local host to resolve the address. This can be done in variety of ways:

Table look up. On UNIX hosts, the table is /etc/hosts.

The process communicates with a local nameservers. This is named on a UNIX system.

By sending a massage to the remote system that is identified from the information in the file/etc/resolve.conf.

When a nameserver receives a query for a domain that is does not serve, it may send back a referral to the client by specifying better nameservers. Typically operate in the recursive manner wherein any DNS server passes requests it cannot handle to higher level server and so on, until either the request can be handled or until the root of the DNS name space is reached.

The nameservers contain pointers to other nameserver with the help of which it is possible to traverse the entire domain naming hierarchy. A host with the initial nameserver addresses has to be configured. After this, it is able to use DNS protocols to locate the nameserver responsible for any part or the DNS naming hierarchy.

Thus when a nameserver receives a request, it can do one of the following:

It can answer the request with an IP address. This method is called iterative. In this, the client simply asks the server to resolve a domain name. The server accesses its database, finds its IP address and sends that back. If the server does not find the address, it sends back an error ;DNS not foundก). Contact another nameserver and try to find the IP address for the requested name. Send back a referral to the client specifying the IP address of better nameservers.

A popular user interface, called กnslookupกis available on the UNIX system. With this, you can perform any DNS function. This program also displays the result to the user. Using is nslookup, you can obtain a listing of all the hosts in a zone. In order to do this, you first need to identify the nameserver for the zone.

The threats that are associated with the DNS are due to the lack of integrity and authenticity checking of the data held within the DNS. Also, other protocols can use host names as an access control mechanism. The internet engineering task force (IETF) has come up with DNS security (DNSSEC) extensions to DNS protocol. The main objective to DNSSEC is to provide authentication and integrity to the DNS. These are provided through the use of cryptographicก

About The Author

Pawan Bangar,

Technical Director,

Birbals, Ebirbals, SeoBirbals, Hbirbals

India.

Visit us at:

www.birbals.com

www.ebirbals.com

www.hbirbals.com

www.seobirbals.com

[email protected]

This article was posted on September 22, 2003

by Pawan Bangar

How To Avoid A Business Naming Disaster

How To Avoid A Business Naming Disaster

by: Marcia Yudkin

An entrepreneur of my acquaintance, in a rush to get his new company up and running, launched his new online publishing venture with a press release and great industry fanfare. Not three days later, he received the kind of letter business owners dread: a ceaseanddesist request from the lawyer for a company that said the name of the new venture infringed on their trademark. Ouch!

My colleague held emergency brainstorming sessions with his cronies, registered a new domain, announced the name change, only to receive a barrage of criticism from British and Australian colleagues that for them, the new name had negative and even somewhat obscene connotations. He changed the company name and corresponding URL again. Quadruple ouch!

The moral of the story: Names matter. In your inventor’s zeal for getting the technical stuff right, don’t leave a blank for the company name and then pick one at the last minute. Take the time to choose a business name that has these characteristics:

Suggests the content or subject area of your business

Has pizzazz

Makes a positive impression on your target market

Can be easily spelled and pronounced

If the company will mainly do business online, corresponds to an available domain

Is legally available for use

Tips for Brainstorming Names

A comprehensive, free guide to brainstorming a winning company name can be found at www.yudkin.com/generate.htm. Another series of steps to follow are these:

1. Find 810 company names that you like – not necessarily in your own industry.

2. Analyze the type or formation of these names. For instance:

Google, Yahoo – short, sounds humorous

Dr. Pepper, Green Giant – based on a fictitious character

Done Yesterday, Call Caren! – describes a result or says what to do

Speedy Muffler, One Stop Frame Shop – states the competitive advantage

A Quiet Touch, Tranquility Day Spa – emphasizes a feeling

Queen of Clean, A Hire Authority – catchy, uses a meaningful rhyme or pun

Riviera Diamonds, Niagara Well Services – evocative geographical reference

3. Use the patterns of the names you like to think up new names that fit your line of work, target audience, competitive strengths and personal preferences. Always brainstorm dozens of possibilities, not just a few.

4. Run your candidates through the criteria listed above. Get feedback from trusted friends, clients and colleagues. Select your top choice from those remaining.

Checking the Availability of Company Names

The surest way to avoid getting a ceaseanddesist letter is to hire an attorney to do a trademark search. Refer also to these free online resources for business name availability in various Englishspeaking countries:

United States:

http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/gate.exe?f=tess

About The Author

Marcia Yudkin is the author of 6 Steps to Free Publicity and ten other books hailed for outstanding creativity. Find out more about her new discount naming firm, Named At Last, which brainstorms company names, new product names, tag lines and more for entrepreneurs on a budget, at http://www.NamedAtLast.com.

[email protected]

This article was posted on August 31

by Marcia Yudkin

Competing with the Big Names

Competing with the Big Names

by: Derek Croote

If you have ever been in an industry with long established, big name companies then you know it is hard to beat them in the search engine rankings. So you go to their pages to see how they are ranking so high, but they are not using the techniques you were told to use. Furthermore, they only have the word you searched for displayed once in their body text, not in their title tag, heading or meta tags. This can’t be right! However, it is. The only possible way to compete with the big names is with links, frequently updated content and name recognition.

The long established sites have received so many links over the years they don’t have to plaster their pages with certain keywords for high rankings.

Links can be hard to come by, especially if your site is new. There are countless ways to get them, but here are a few that will get you high quality links:

Writing articles

Reciprocal linking to relevant sites

Participating in forums

Frequently updating content

Creating free tools

Submitting to directories

Buying text links

Frequently updated content will generate a large number of oneway links, if people know about it. For people to find your compelling content, you have to get your site name out there. If no one knows about your content, how will you get links? To get you name out there you have to:

Become the leader in your industry

Write press releases, articles and free ebooks

Use paid advertising

Start a newsletter/ezine and a blog.

Target the right keywords

Beating the leading names may be difficult, but it is achievable. Gaining links and getting your name out there will be key in competing with these powerful sites. You will get to the top of the rankings in the search engines with time and hard work.

About The Author

Derek Croote is a SEO, web design and usability enthusiast. Derek is the webmaster of http://www.saratogalakesideacresassociation.org, a small homeowners association. You can reach him at [email protected].

This article was posted on April 16

by Derek Croote

Good Domain Names Make Your Dreams Memorable

Good Domain Names Make Your Dreams Memorable

by: Terry Nicholls

กWhat was the name of that website? It was good. It has something to do with…ก

Is your web site like many others?

Domain names always on the tip of a visitorกs tongue, but not quite memorable enough?

Your choice of domain name needs to be easy to remember, as well as focused enough that your visitor will know right away what your site is about.

A Few Rules

Some rules do apply when deciding on a domain name:

Domain names must be at least two characters long but no more than 63 characters, not counting the TLD.

You can use any combination of letters, numbers, or hyphens, but you can’t use a hyphen as the first or last character.

Domain names are not casesensitive, so myhomebasedbusinessadvisor.com is the same as MyHomeBasedBusinessAdvisor.com.

Choosing A Domain Name

Choosing good domain names is almost as important as choosing your actual business (see our Startup Ideas page).

There are many different schools of thought when it comes to picking good domain names.

Some say to choose a short, concise name.

Some like numbers in the name, some don’t.

Hyphens and underscores as opposed to words all running together are another debated topic. Itกs mostly a matter of easier reading for your human visitors. Which do you find easier to read?

myhomebasedbusinessadvisor

my_home_based_business_advisor

myhomebasedbusinessadvisor

Generally, the hyphens between words make domain names easier to read for most people.

While search engines don’t rank domain names, a keywordrich name will let your visitors know what your web site is about before they get there. This makes them more comfortable because they know what they’re getting in advance.

Also, when you get other sites to link to yours, that link is usually based on your domain name. This means that your main keyphrase (which you used as your domain name) will be the actual anchor text and search engines do give additional ranking for that.

Domain names play a major role in making your dream memorable to the world.

Take the time to do it right and your dream of a homebased business will be seen all over the world!

For a more detailed explanation of domain names and domain registration, and more great advice for your homebased business, please visit My HomeBased Business Advisor.

Terry Nicholls

My HomeBased Business Advisor

myhomebasedbusinessadvisor.com

Copyright © by Terry Nicholls. All Rights Reserved.

About The Author

Terry Nicholls writes from his own experience as someone who wanted to start his own homebased business. Now that he has, visit My HomeBased Business Advisor Helping YOUR Home Business Start and Succeed for free help for YOUR home business, including ideas, startup, and expansion advice.

This article was posted on December 29, 2004

by Terry Nicholls

8 Tips for Choosing a Domain Name

8 Tips for Choosing a Domain Name

by: David Cooper

If you’re just starting out on the Internet, choosing a domain name is one of the first major decisions you will have to make. I won’t say that choosing a name for your site will determine the overall success or failure of your online business. It will, however, affect almost every aspect of your business. Finding a good domain name requires extensive planning.

I would like to offer some tips for successfully choosing a domain name:

1) Use the .COM extension. This is still the number one choice for the majority of online businesses. While, .NET,.ORG,.INFO,.BIZ, and .US are viable alternatives they are not as widely recognized as .COM. The .COM extension will immediately give you and your business more credibility. Also, because we are creatures of habit many people automatically include .COM when typing in almost any web address, so why not capitalize on human nature?

2) Keep it Short. Whenever possible your domain name should not be longer than 1315 characters, numbers, or hyphens. It is much more difficult for the average person to remember longer variations of a web address.

3) Make it Sticky. You want your domain name to be easy to remember. Make it stick out in peopleกs minds. Be creative. Be Unique.

4) Minimize Confusion. You should never lose a prospective customer because they misspelled your domain name, or they used the wrong extension. If you can afford it, register other variations of your domain name and have them redirect to your main site.

5) Include Keywords in Your Domain Name. Try to include at least 1 and if possible 2 keywords in your domain name. Many of the experts believe this can help with the way some of the search engines index and rank your site.

6) Be Descriptive. Your domain name should have something to do with your business. Make it descriptive of your site, your product offerings, or your service.

7) Search for Deleted Domain Names. Domain names that were once registered but have expired turn up every day. With some research you might be able to find one of these names that would be a good fit for your business. You can search for deleted domains at http://www.deleteddomains.com

8) Check for Trademarks. You should do this before registering your domain name. Search as many existing trademarks as possible and look for possible conflicts. Obviously you want to choose a name that is unlikely to cause you any legal problems. Trademark research can be done at the following sites:

U.S Patent and Trademark Office http://www.uspto.gov

Thomas Register http://www.thomasregister.com

The Trademark Association http://www.inta.org

Nameprotect http://www.nameprotect.com

If you need help with researching your domain names try the following websites:

1)Nameboy http://www.nameboy.com

2) GoDaddy http://www.godaddy.com

Both Nameboy and GoDaddy are wellknown registrars and will allow you to search for and register domain names.

You can register a domain name today for less than it costs for a nice lunch. There is really no reason not to put forth the effort and money to register a domain name that you can begin building your online presence with.

Your domain name is your first chance to build credibility with your visitors. Keep in mind that you never get a second chance to make a great first impression.

Remember, choosing your domain name is one of the most important first steps you will take in building your online presence. Make it a step forward. Happy Hunting!

About The Author

David Cooper is the editor of the 1SourceWebMarketing Newsletter. David specializes in helping people with their internet marketing efforts by offering real world tips and strategies. Subscribe to his FREE newsletter at: http://www.1sourcewebmarketing.com

[email protected]

This article was posted on March 17, 2004

by David Cooper