The Pasadena, California based webhost started out in 2003 as a shared hosting provider with a twist, offering Windows-based hosting aimed squarely at the ASP.NET developer community.

The company’s developer customers have one-stop access to everything they need, including domain names, SSL certificates and a hosting platform that sports all the latest technologies from Microsoft. That complete package of services enables them to create websites and other web-based applications.

Takeshi Eto, VP Marketing and Business Development for DiscountASP.NET, says that strict focus on the Microsoft ASP.NET market has been critical in building a successful business in the long-term.

“If you try and do too many things, it’s hard to target marketing, and it’s hard to provide adequate support,” he says. “From the very beginning, we made sure that everything we did was about serving the needs of the .NET developer and we’ve been very successful in doing that.”

A Partner with a Similar Perspective

Eto says they looked for a similarly well-focused company when evaluating domain registration providers. Eto found, in OpenSRS, a company that built a reputation for providing the best wholesale domain registration platform and service.

That laser-focus on the specific needs of its wholesale customers was something that Eto could relate to. The fact that he found an API and platform that he liked was icing on the cake.

“We evaluated a lot of registration partners and we liked the APIs that OpenSRS had,” he says. “It made the integration and automation a lot easier.”

Savvy Customers = Tech Support Challenges

DiscountASP.NET’s customer base runs the gamut from hobby sites, to blogs, to businesses. According to Eto, those business customers make up the majority of the base.

“About 60% of our customers are doing some sort of business website with our service, whether it’s the .NET developer themselves, or an application or website that developer did for the business,” he says.

With a tech-savvy customer base like DiscountASP.NET has, providing tech support does offer some challenges. Eto says that overall, the number of support requests is lower than typically seen in mass-market hosting, but that doesn’t mean support is easy.

“The sophistication of the support tickets is very highly technical,” he says. “The challenge for us is to make sure our tech support staff is trained on all the new stuff.”

To ensure that his customers get the help they need, Eto has to look around a little more to find the right people to work in tech support.

“Trying to find talent to hire may take us longer,” he says. “But those that join our team are assured of a dynamic environment where they will always be learning and working on new technology. It’s fun and challenging.”

On Trust

DiscountASP.NET developed its own control panels and hosting platform using .NET technologies because they wanted to demonstrate to customers that they were the best option. “What better way to show that we’re .NET experts? Our control panel is .NET, our website is .NET — it all helps in the marketing message,” he says.

He also says the company works very hard to keep up with the latest developments from Microsoft and aims to be ahead of the needs of the customer.

That kind of commitment to keeping ahead of the game also means Eto needs to rely on, and trust his chosen vendors to do the same.

As far as OpenSRS is concerned, Eto says dealing with the company has been “great,” and that he’s always found OpenSRS to be “very responsive.”

Eto also says that he appreciates the regular interaction he has with OpenSRS people. “I see them all the time at different mixers and networking events and they’re always cool, fun to hang out with and good to do business with,” he says.

It’s definitely a relationship that is paying off and Eto sees a solid future for DiscountASP.NET.

Renewals were our number one support issue, accounting for 36% of support tickets opened. A lot of those calls and emails came from customers (or friends, relatives, colleagues and assistants of customers) that could not sign in to their account. So, we developed a renewal process that no longer required folks to sign in. Now we are getting fewer support calls and we are solving renewal-related problems much more quickly.

You can read the more complete story here.

If you have any questions about how we did this or need any help with implementation, please feel free to email me directly at mgoldstein@tucows.com.

Mexico-based webhost Xpress Hosting has used a customer-centric approach to doing business to become the leading webhost in the region. It was only natural then, for Xpress Hosting to seek out a wholesale Registrar with the same focus on the customer.

Xpress Hosting began working with OpenSRS in 2009. Julian Flores, CEO of Xpress Hosting, says that the company went looking for a vendor that “went beyond, ’okay this is the API, this is how you integrate it…there, you’re good to go. And that’s it.’”

He says they found just that in OpenSRS.

Challenges and Opportunities

The company started out as a specialized application host in 2001, but when customer demand for shared hosting swelled, they listened. That was a move that paid off in spades. The company now provides hosting services primarily to small- and mid-sized businesses throughout Mexico and the surrounding region.

Xpress Hosting sees huge opportunity in a country that is rapidly emerging as a technological nation. But Flores says being in Mexico means the company faces some unique challenges.

“There is a very interesting contrast in Mexico regarding technology,” Flores explains. “We have three major metropolitan areas – Mexico City, Guadalajara and Monterrey – and more than 60% of our customers come from those cities.”

“The urban customers are informed and educated,” Flores says. “They know what they want and they knock on our doors asking for it.”

But those in the rest of the country often need more help from a customer support and education perspective, something that Xpress Hosting is glad to provide. They’ve built their business on providing that kind of one-on-one customer service.

Customer Service Focused

Flores explains that in Mexico, there is a cultural requirement for a personal relationship in business. “It’s not like in the United States where you can do business with someone over the phone, or email. It doesn’t work like that in Mexico.”

“Our customers look for a personal relationship, and that’s where our niche is,” he says. “For example, we provide a specialized account rep for all of our customers and the customer has their phone extension, cell phone number and email address and the rep knows the requirements and special needs of the customer.”

Flores says that the relationship he has with OpenSRS enables his company to react quickly and provide the kind of service and support that his wide range of customers require.

“We have a very successful and close relationship with OpenSRS and our account manager,” he says. “Honestly, it’s been the best customer experience that I’ve had with a wholesale registrar.”

A Very Bright Future

Within Mexico, technology is spreading and the population, especially the youth, are embracing the Internet. Flores says the future looks exceptionally bright for the company and for the country.

“The next 10 to 15 years are going to be quite a ride for us,” he says. “These young people, make no mistake, they are here to replace us and they will have a webhosting account with us. We’ll be a part of it!”

With a continued focus on meeting the needs of customers like Xpress Hosting, OpenSRS aims to be an important part of it as well.

Con sede en México, Xpress Hosting ha utilizado un enfoque centrado en el cliente para hacer negocios y convertirse en el servicio de alojamiento web líder en la región. Fue natural entonces, que Xpress Hosting buscara un Registrador de venta al mayoreo con el mismo enfoque en el cliente.

Xpress Hosting comenzó a trabajar con OpenSRS en 2009. Julián Flores, director general de Xpress Hosting, dice que la compañía fue en busca de un proveedor que “fuese más allá de, bien aquí está el API, esta es la forma de integrarlo … están listos. Y eso es todo.’”

Menciona que encontró precisamente eso en OpenSRS.

Retos y Oportunidades

La compañía comenzó como un tipo de alojamiento para aplicaciones especializadas en el 2001, pero cuando la demanda del cliente para alojamiento compartido creció, ellos escucharon. Esa fue una decisión que dio frutos con creces. Ahora la compañía ofrece servicios de alojamiento a empresas pequeñas y medianas en México y la región circundante.

Xpress Hosting ve una gran oportunidad en un país que está emergiendo rápidamente como una nación tecnológica. Sin embargo, Flores dice que estar en México significa que la compañía se enfrenta a algunos retos únicos.

“Hay un contraste muy interesante en México en relación con la tecnología”, explica Flores. “Tenemos tres grandes áreas metropolitanas – Ciudad de México, Guadalajara y Monterrey – y más del 60% de nuestros clientes vienen de estas ciudades”.

“Los clientes urbanos son informados y educados”, afirma Flores. “Ellos saben lo que quieren y tocan nuestras puertas pidiéndolo.”

Mientras tanto, los clientes en el resto del país, necesitan más ayuda desde una perspectiva de soporte al cliente y educación, algo que Xpress Hosting se complace en ofrecer. Han construido su negocio con esa clase de servicio al cliente “uno-a-uno”.

Enfocados al Servicio al Cliente

Flores explica que en México existe un requisito cultural de una relación personal en los negocios. “No es como en los Estados Unidos, donde usted puede hacer negocios con alguien por teléfono, o correo electrónico. No funciona así en México”.

“Nuestros clientes buscan una relación personal, y ahí es donde está nuestro nicho”, dice. “Por ejemplo, ofrecemos un representante de cuenta especializado para todos nuestros clientes y el cliente tiene su extensión de teléfono, número de teléfono celular y la dirección de correo electrónico y el representante conoce los requisitos y necesidades especiales de sus clientes”.

Flores dice que la relación que tiene con OpenSRS permite que su compañía reaccione con rapidez y proporcione el tipo de servicio y soporte que su amplia gama de clientes requieren.

“Tenemos una relación muy cercana y exitosa con OpenSRS y nuestro representante de cuenta”, dice. “Sinceramente, ha sido la mejor experiencia de cliente que he tenido con un Registrador de venta al por mayor.”

Un futuro muy brillante

En México, la tecnología se está extendiendo y la población, especialmente los jóvenes, están adoptando la Internet. Flores afirma que el futuro se ve excepcionalmente brillante para la compañía y para el país.

“Los próximos 10 a 15 años van a ser un paseo muy interesante para nosotros”, dice. “No se equivoquen, estas jóvenes generaciones, están aquí para reemplazarnos y ellos tendrán una cuenta de alojamiento web con nosotros”. Nosotros vamos a ser parte de este cambio! ”

Con un enfoque en la satisfacción de las necesidades de los clientes como Xpress Hosting, OpenSRS espera ser una parte importante de este cambio también.

Much thanks goes to OpenSRS Tech Support Analyst Carlos Barrientos for translating this post to Spanish. Muchas gracias!

KPN is the leading telecommunications and information and communications technology (ICT) service provider in The Netherlands, offering wireline and wireless telephony, internet and TV to consumers, and end-to-end telecommunications and ICT services to business customers.

With more than 33,000 full-time employees, millions of customers and $13.5 billion Euros in revenue in 2009, KPN is a huge player in the communications sector in Holland. That reach is beginning to spread through other countries in Europe and as far away as the USA. KPN boasts 2.5 million broadband Internet customers, representing about 43% of the market in the Netherlands as of 2009. The company controls about 50% of the Dutch mobile phone market and over half of the fixed phone line market.

OpenSRS Reseller since 1999

The company has been an OpenSRS reseller since 2000, starting with a move to OpenSRS from Network Solutions when the domain name industry was opened up to competition in 1999.

Joost Pisters, Senior Consultant, KPN, remembers the initial conversations about moving to OpenSRS. “I heard about this company, OpenSRS. I contacted one of the sales guys on the phone and he offered to fly out next week to have a talk,” he says.

“‘What? You’re actually going to come to see us? In person?’” he recalls asking, incredulously. Pisters says he knew then that OpenSRS was a company with a focus on customer service. “That showed me that OpenSRS had a totally different attitude towards resellers and towards the business,” he says.

KPN and OpenSRS enjoyed a ten-year relationship with KPN using the OpenSRS system to manage all of its domain registrations with the exception of .NL domains, for which KPN is an accredited registrar.

In-house or Out-source?

In the spring of 2010, the .NL Registry was requiring Registrars to move to a fully automated registry model with an Extensible Provisioning Protocol (EPP) interface. The change would literally happen overnight and all registrars were required to rewrite their systems to comply with the changes on the registry side.

KPN had developed and maintained its own registrar platform since 1997 to handle its .NL business, but the switch to EPP at the Registry gave them a good reason to look at whether that was the best way to operate.

The company decided to move everything over to the OpenHRS Registrar solution that OpenSRS provides. OpenHRS is built on the same technology that powers the OpenSRS domain management platform and is used by registrars around the world looking for a powerful, managed solution that integrates with leading domain registries.

Pisters says KPN makes a point of looking at off-the-shelf solutions when ever it can, and consolidating operational processes between .NL and the rest of its domain registration interfaces made good business sense.

“We already had an interface with OpenSRS, so why not use it for our .NL domains?” says Pisters. Because the two platforms are essentially the same, integrations with OpenSRS work seamlessly with OpenHRS, offering Resellers an easy upgrade path if they ever decide to become an accredited registrar.

A successful switch

In the weeks and months before the big switchover, OpenSRS worked very closely with KPN to ensure that both companies were ready. “The team did a fantastic job, quite literally working day and night in the weeks leading up to the switch. They had a tremendous job to do and everything was successful,” says Pisters of the work done to get everything ready.

On the big day, KPN was registering .NL domains through OpenHRS an hour after the registry came back online after moving to its new EPP implementation.

“It worked great. You guys had time issues as well, but that is to be expected. Even if you are an agile, fast-moving company like OpenSRS is, it’s still a big undertaking,” says Pisters.

It’s a matter of trust

Both Pisters and KPN realized that there are risks taken on with a project like this one, but Pisters says he always felt confident that OpenSRS would pull it off.

“It’s a huge trust thing. Giving .NL to you guys [OpenSRS] in such a short period of time was risky. It’s always risky to do something like that, but if I was confident with anybody, it’s with OpenSRS,” he says.

For KPN and Pisters, it came down to the long-term relationship that KPN had with OpenSRS.

“Based on everything that we’ve done together over the last ten years, I had complete confidence in you guys delivering what you had promised us,” says Pisters. “That’s exactly what you guys did.”

As with thousands of other OpenSRS Resellers, emerion has been a customer since the beginning. Hilmar says that there were a couple of reasons they chose OpenSRS to power their domain registrations.

He notes that the fact that OpenSRS was one of the first Registrars to offer an API was very important. “We found OpenSRS [in 2000] and we were very impressed about the API because it allowed us to automate our domain registrations,” he says.

On Choosing a Registrar Partner

Of course, price was also a key consideration, but Hilmar says it shouldn’t be the top concern for those looking for a registrar partner. “Price is an important reason in this market, but it’s not the only reason to select a registrar,” he says. “It’s important for everything to work well day-to-day in this business.”

Hilmar says communication is also something to think about. He notes that he enjoys the level of communication that OpenSRS provides both through email messages that keep him informed of what’s new and also through regular contact with his account manager, Luigi Lagonigro, who works out of the OpenSRS office in the UK.

From a service availability standpoint, Hilmar says he likes the way OpenSRS keeps him informed of what’s going on. “[OpenSRS] has a status page so we can see by ourselves when something happens, and when it will be resolved,” he says. This allows emerion to more quickly react to, and minimize, any potential impacts on its customer base when service interruptions take place.

This focus on good communication is a philosophy that the company embraces for its own interactions with customers.

Emerion Embraces Social Media

Hilmar says the company is using both Facebook and Twitter to network with current and potential customers. With its Facebook page, emerion has attracted well over 1,500 fans already.

They use social media primarily to keep their customers informed. “We update the community with hosting news and provide them with an inside view of the inner workings of their hosting provider,” he says. But he cautions that too much information can have a negative effect, adding that “people can get angry about it” if you communicate too much.

As for the future, Hilmar says they’re just getting started in the social media space. “There are many ways to use social media. We will do more in future because we believe in the dynamic of the social interactivity,” he says.

A Beneficial Mix of Both Business and Personal Accounts

Emerion’s customer base ranges from personal shared hosting accounts to businesses with more advanced needs. He says having both types of customers allows them to better tailor their systems and provide better service to everyone.

“Honestly, we need both,” he says. “It’s interesting to work with the private customers because it’s an advantage to make the service easy to use for them and to improve the usability.”

But on the business customer side, Hilmar says the customers are often more demanding. “The business customer has more and special needs,” he says. “They want specific things and we improve our service with that needs and try to implement it as standard.”

Emerion welcomes both because they find the mix to be beneficial. “We try to cover both directions because at the end they both fit together very good,” he says. From his experience, servicing both types of customers helps improve the offering overall.

Emerion’s Custom Cloud Solution

Emerion has deployed a custom, clustered server system, which is a cloud,
and offers burstable resources for customers. It provides this in conjunction with a hosting control panel it developed in-house for an end-to-end system.

Hilmar says they decided to opt for a custom solution because it allows them to better serve their customers. “We wrote the software for our hosting control panel all by ourselves and it works together with our own system. Nothing else fit the specific needs of our customers,” he says.

He adds that it allows for more flexibility in providing an easy to use service. “With out own system we are more independent to do interfaces for our customers. It allows us to make it easier for our customers.”

That focus on “ease of use” and a commitment to providing a high level of customer service will no doubt serve the company well as it continues to grow.

Special thanks goes to Heather Leson who did a ton of work on this profile and also to our European office for facilitating a face-to-face interview with Bernd Hilmar at WebhostingDay last week. And of course, special thanks goes to Bernd for taking the time to meet with us and answer all of our many questions. We appreciate it!

Yola.com was founded in 2005, in Cape Town, South Africa, getting its start as an affiliate business that needed a way for their customers to quickly and easily create affiliate websites and pages.

Later, they spun off the website creator tool as Synthasite and things took off from there. The company picked up the current Yola.com branding in 2009, a name that Chris Muller, Director of Business Development for Yola.com, says better represents what the company is all about.

“The name Yola comes from a hindi word that means ‘hatch’,” says Muller. “The Yola brand has helped us move beyond the basics of website building with the Synthasite name to establish us a place to build and grow your entire business online. We also loved that we were able to get a domain name that was short, phonetic, and would work around the globe.”

Yola’s focus is what the company calls ‘micro-businesses’–small companies with one to five employees–and the company’s goal is to help them get online, and establish a web presence.

“Micro-businesses don’t have either the budget or the time to manage a large website but they do need to get their brand out online and maintain a web presence,” says Muller. “That’s where Yola comes in.”

Domains were a focus from the start

Yola has adopted a ‘freemium model’ whereby users can create a free site on a subdomain. Paying customers can buy a premium package that allows them to buy and use their own domain name, along with more advanced features like premium themes and additional storage.

“Domains were the first product that we charged for on our website,” says Muller. “From the start, we realized there was a revenue opportunity there.”

“It’s fundamental to a small business’ needs. If I own Chris’s Coffee Shop, I need to own ChrissCoffeeShop.com. In addition to the Twitter account and everything else that I have to do, I need that domain,” he says.

Muller says that offering domains fits in with Yola’s approach to providing a “one-stop shop” for their customers when it comes to their online presence.

“If they’re coming to us for their web presence, and they’re coming to us to build the website and everything else that’s on it,” he says, “then I think it’s logical to let them manage everything, including the domain name, from one place.”

ccTLDs and Name Suggest to help customers find the perfect domain

Yola’s userbase is global–50% of their users are outside of the U.S.–and because of this, they recently added ccTLDs to the mix of domain offerings.

“We just added .co.uk, .eu and .ca domains based on a combination of where our traffic comes from, and what our customers have been requesting,” says Muller. “It’s been great. We simply added them to a drop-down and their sales have taken off without any marketing push. It’s an important step towards localization.”

Yola sees the domain name as a critical part of offering localized service to their customers. Muller notes that “having a localized domain name is almost as important, or even more important, than having a localized website.”

Yola also makes use of the name suggestion tool that is a part of the OpenSRS API. They offer up relevant alternative domain suggestions to users during the initial search and help their users find the perfect domain name for their business.

Muller says they realized that SMBs are building a brand around a domain, and that helping the customer find the right domain goes a long way in ensuring that customer is successful and remains a customer for the long term. He says Yola makes extensive use of the name suggestions and that they’ve found that the OpenSRS tool to be “very effective for us and very helpful.”

Managing a move

Yola came to OpenSRS after starting out with another domain name registrar.

“We chose OpenSRS because of their robust APIs and the flexibility that their platform offered around messaging and options such as a variety of ccTLDs that we could offer down the road.”

Fortunately, the experience that OpenSRS has in managing transitions onto the OpenSRS platform from other Registrars meant the move went very smoothly.

“It worked out really well. Working with Steve Barnes (Business Development Manager at OpenSRS) saved us lots of days and the transition went really well,” Muller recalls. “It was fantastic, as smooth as we could expect.”

Poised for growth

As for the future, Muller says Yola is intent on continuing to help small business manage and grow their online presence. On the services side, Yola is partnering with Logoworks by HP to offer professional design services, Wpromote to offer search engine marketing, and TRUSTe for management of privacy policies.

On the domain side, Muller says “We’ve done a lot of work over the past few months with domains, like adding ccTLDs, adding transfers, changing the way we do availability checks. We’re really excited.”

Adding the ability for customers to transfer domains to Yola and OpenSRS from other Registrars or webhosts was no brainer, according to Muller. “Allowing customers to transfer domains that they already own to Yola helps us become a one-stop shop for small businesses online.”

Looking at the product roadmap, Chris says Yola is going to keep adding value to their premium bundles and expand their resources for small businesses. One of the ways they’re going to do this is by including domains and related functionality in the core offerings. He also said they’ll continue to expand the ccTLD offerings and continue to refine their domain suggestion tool to help customers find the perfect domain name on which to build their business.

What is a WHIR Networking Event?

What a great opportunity to meet our Resellers, peers and new friends in a social setting! The WHIR created videos in each of the cities during the 2009 season. As you can see, the events provide a casual environment to enjoy some food and drinks, and network with other folks in the web hosting and domains industry. The WHIR did a fantastic job organizing these events and we are really looking forward to building on this success.

We’ll send you personal invitations for events in your area. If you are located or traveling to the these events, please join us. Representatives from our Sales and Product Management teams regularly attend. Feel free to contact us to arrange meetings.

Sign up now for the first WHIR event: Los Angeles – Thursday, January 21, 2010

You can RSVP for all these events in advance.

All events are listed on the OpenSRS’s event page. You can also follow @opensrs and @thewhir for promotions and details about all the events.

Masterhost is one of the largest Russian webhosts and an OpenSRS Reseller. We are fortunate to have Alexander Ovchinnikov, COO, join us to talk about Masterhost and the Russian Internet industry.

1.The services you provide are diverse from hosting to domains. Tell us more about what you offer your customers.

Masterhost has been successfully operating since 1999, which means this winter we are celebrating our 10th anniversary. The services we offer include: virtual hosting on unix and windows, including the provisioning of Virtual Private Servers (VPS), offering dedicated servers in Russian and European data centers, and the registration of domain names. We are also accredited Registrar for the TLDs .ru, .su, .?? (IDN). We’re especially proud to be the 2008 winner of the 2008 RUnet Prize award in the category of “Technology and Innovation”. RUnet award was established in 2004 and is a national award in the field of high technology and the Internet, to encourage outstanding achievements and companies – leaders in the field of information technology and electronic communications.

Masterhost is the leading company in Russia confirmed by an independent market hosting statistics on placement of domain names on the servers hosting provider. By the number of supported active sites, Masterhost is among the third largest hosting providers in Eastern and Central Europe (Netcraft, 2007) with more than 150, 000 domains.

Our VIP clients (approximately 55,000 in total) include the largest and very-well known Russian businesses including TV channels, news agencies, popular portals, Russian MSN Weather, AD networks, entertainment web-sizes, newspapers, telco web-sites, travel web-sites. We aspire to be an innovative knowledge company by providing free hosting projects in the field of education and educational programs for the non-profit educational web project. This project is in collaboration with Microsoft.

2. The Russian market is growing. Can you tell us more about RUnet (Russian Internet) and your locations (Moscow and St-Petersburg).

RUnet is a description for Russia’s national Internet presence. The .RU domain is among the top 20 country-code top-level domains with one of the highest rates of growth over the past five years. (approximately 2,494 835 registered .RU domains). Masterhost has more than 150 000 .RU domains, which is about 11.5% of the total market share.

It’s estimated that the number of RUnet Internet users will increase by approximately 34% in 2009. This is determined by factors such as interest and demand of the population to gain access to the web. There is an active development of the Russian market with various service providers and services (Internet service, broadband, and hosting providers). Internet access is mainly concentrated in Moscow (68%) and St. Petersburg (10%). The remaining 22% is in other regions including major cities such as Novosibirsk, Krasnodar, Ekaterinburg, etc. Masterhost is actively promoting its services these regions.

3. How did Masterhost grow as an Internet business? ??

The company was formed in 1999. In the early days of its existence, the company’s management had a primary goal of not expanding too fast, but rather to accumulate the work experience and build a solid team of professionals. The company’s management made every effort to ensure the proper level of service was built to provide the required level of quality. Masterhost employees over 150 highly skilled specialists who focus on quick and effective solutions to any problems faced by our customers. Their approach to work is crucial to our success. All of this allows our company to be an absolute leader in Russia’s market hosting.??

4. How long have you been an OpenSRS Reseller and how has your partnership with OpenSRS helped your company succeed??

For our clients, we carry out all necessary procedures for the registration of domain names in the most popular domain zones in Russia and the world. We have been working with OpenSRS since 2005. To date, through your company, we register or renew in the order of 250 domains per month in such areas as: .com, .net, .org, .info , .mobi, .eu, .co.uk, .org.uk, .biz , .cc, .tv , .me and .name.?

?5. What do you think about the growth of new ccTLDs?

Unique domain names are a scarce resource in the 21st century yet required for virtually any business. Many ccTLDs are now open for international business. ccTLDs don’t really increase without major geopolitical changes. There are other options.

With .tel, you can:

• Bring all your communications under one name
• Control how people reach you, directly from your phone or computer
• Increase your search engine rankings
• Get found online without spending on creating, hosting, or maintaining a website
• Gain a powerful and effective mobile presence
• Make a profit on your .tel page with advertising
• It uses DNS as a data store rather than the traditional method of TLDs mapping DNS to websites.

Over 50% of small businesses in the US don’t have a website, but they all want to be found online. A .tel domain offers a solution as a lightweight online presence that doesn’t require technical skills or extensive funds. For those businesses that have a website already, .tel is a mobile-optimized site and a way to promote other online resources and improve SEO rankings through back links. A .tel domain easily integrates into normal websites as a contact-us page, so when a business moves or changes phone numbers, their clients can still find them with an easily-updated .tel page.

.TEL won Best Domain Name TV Commercial in the nametalent.com Domain Name awards with this video:

Quick Links:

• Telnic is the registry provider of this sTLD (Sponsored TLD)
• Telnic began the process for .TEL in 2000. .TEL has been fully available since March 24, 2009.
• There are over 250,000 .TEL domains worldwide
• .TEL Fast Facts sheet
• Selling points for your customers
• Interview with CEO, Khashayar Mahdavi

Promotion: If you or your customers have a .tel, you could win a digital camera by sharing your .tel story.

Available Resources:

• Browse tutorials, tips and other help materials in the .TEL community
• .TEL Newsletter
• Developer tools including client code and white papers
• Follow .TEL on Twitter
• Subscribe to .TEL RSS feeds
• Read the .TEL Blog
• Join the .TEL Forum
• Connect on Facebook
• Join the .TEL LinkedIN group

.tv is the preferred destination for video, ?lm, animation, user-generated content and playable media of all kinds. It’s also a great choice for product demonstrations, how-to videos, keynote addresses, plus training and educational content. Whether you are in the business of creating videos or just use videos in support of your business, a .tv domain name is the natural place for your video content to live. Some of the most prominent .tv sites on the web include: Leo Leporte’s twit.tv, justin.tv, ustream.tv and blip.tv.

When you sign up for the .tv promo (until December 31, 2009), we’ll give you a complete package of .tv marketing materials (.tv logo, icons, animated banner ads and email templates).

Quick Facts:

• VeriSign is the Registry provider
• It is a TLD that is a statement about who you are. You can tell people to expect video on your web site by choosing a .tv.
• .tv is a ccTLD
• There are no residency restrictions.
• .tv was started by dotTV in 2000.

Available resources:

• VeriSign’s Watch.tv site
• Watch.TV Blog
• Watch.TV FAQs
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