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Probably you have heard some facts about the domain name Whois search and query. Well, the domain name Whois search and query are just some of the common terms that the world of domain name carries. So for those who are not really familiar with these two terms, the domain name Whois search and the domain name Whois query, here are some facts for you.

In particular, the term “Whois” actually stands for a database of registration information for domain names. It is essentially a tool that is commonly applied to search information for a domain name.

Now that you have an idea about the term “Whois”, the next thing to consider is the nature of the domain name Whois search, and then the domain name Whois query. So according to some resources, the domain name Whois search is typically a means to search for domain name contact information. Speaking of the domain name contact information, it is interesting to know that the contact information may vary depending on the domain name registrar and the top level domains such as .com, .net, .org, .info, .biz, .us, and .uk.

Generally, the domain name contact information for the domain name holder and the administrator will be displayed through the domain name Whois search. Along with that, it is just very necessary to ensure that the contact information is appropriate when engaging in the domain name Whois search, otherwise the desired domain name will remain invalid. Also necessary is to know that domain names that are registered within the last 48 hours may not be shown in a domain name Whois search. So if such happens that no contact information is given for a desired domain name, you must not assume that the domain name is accessible. But you don’t need to worry at all for there are services that grant you to check the accessibility of the desired domain names.

On the hand, when it comes to the domain name Whois query, you should note that the domain name Whois query is a homogeneous means of getting hold of contact information from a registrar’s or registry’s database. It is considered that before, when there was a sole domain name registrar, the domain name Whois query would display the domain name holder and the other contacts for a registered domain name. But as time goes by, the domain name Whois query against a registry’s database determines the domain name registrar and the name servers for a certain domain name that is mentioned in the query. And the query against a domain name registrar’s database, on the other hand, determines the domain name holder as well as the contacts that are connected with it.

Unlike the domain name Whois search, there is a great possibility that the domain name is available even if the query does not give the domain name. In fact, it is given that is a domain name is not located in a registry’s database, then the name is probably available, and if the domain name is not located in a registrar’s database, it simply means that the name is not being managed by that certain name registrar.

So whatever the case may be, both the domain name Whois search and query play a large role in finding the domain name and thus they contribute a great part in the domain names industry.

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Does the length of your website’s domain name registration affect the search results at Google? This question has come up recently and a lot of website owners have been wondering about it, especially since it was mentioned in a patent awarded to Google in April. According to the patent, “Certain signals may be used to distinguish between illegitimate and legitimate domains. For example, domains can be renewed up to a period of 10 years. Valuable (legitimate) domains are often paid for several years in advance, while doorway (illegitimate) domains rarely are used for more than a year. Therefore, the date when a domain expires in the future can be used as a factor in predicting the legitimacy of a domain and, thus, the documents associated therewith.” According to this statement in the patent, domains that expire in 10 years are more valuable and legitimate than domains that will expire in less than a year.

Google, in general, is always looking for ways to weed out the bad (spammers) from the good (legitimate) websites. I suspect that they looked for a pattern among the good, legitimate websites and found that most good, legitimate websites have a commitment towards their business and their domain name-they register it for a long period of time. In other words, the theory behind all of this is that if you register a domain name for several years it shows Google that you’re committed to that domain name. If you register a domain name for 1 year then you’re not as committed to that domain name. A lot of spammers use “throw away” domain names and register them for only a year. So, Google uses the length of time that a domain is registered to determine whether the owner of that domain name is committed to it or not.

One domain name owner I talked to recently told me that renewing his domain names once each year was a part of his business plan. He made a certain amount of money each year from each domain name/website, and he didn’t want to cut into the profits of each site by renewing each domain name all at once for several years. “Renewing a domain name for 10 years or even 2 years ahead of time means that I have to spend more money. If I have to come up with $50 or $100 more per year for the domain renewal fees it cuts into my profits”, says John, who wished to remain anonymous. John’s website is probably exactly the type of website that Google wishes to identify. Google is looking to identify quality, well-established websites whose owners are committed to their domain names. According to the statements made in Google’s patent, Google thinks that websites that have been renewed for a long period of time meet that standard.

Should you renew your domain name for a long period of time? And if so, how long is long enough? If you want to stay ahead of your competition, then you might consider looking at the length of time your competitors have registered their domain names. If your competitors have generally renewed their domain names for one or two years, you might consider registering your domain name for 5 or 10 years. While putting off your domain name’s expiration date might help your search engine rankings, keep in mind that this may be only a small boost (or a “tie-breaker” among two websites) when it comes to the actual search engine rankings. And, be aware that just because Google has a patent on the idea it doesn’t mean that they’re actually using that criteria now to rank websites. They, too, want to stay ahead of their competition (mainly Yahoo! and MSN).

I’ve registered the domains that I really care about for at least 10 years. Initially, I registered these domains for a long period of time because I didn’t want to lose them-and I didn’t want to go through the somewhat-lengthy annual process of renewing them every year. Since most domain names I own come up for renewal at different times during the year, it seemed as though I was renewing a domain name at least once a month-and renewing them for a few years put it off for a while.

Expired domain name buyers are prevalent nowadays. If your domain name expires, there’s a good chance that someone watching will register your domain name within seconds after it expires. If, for whatever reason, you don’t renew your domain name, someone watching a ‘watch list’ of expiring domain names will try to capitalize on the online business that you’ve built over the years. They know that there is potential website traffic they can have simply by renewing your old domain name. By renewing your domain name for several years, your domain name won’t expire for a while, and it won’t be opened up to expired domain name buyers.

If you really want to stay ahead of the competition, you might consider registering or renewing your domain name for 100 years. Currently, Network Solutions (www.netsol.com) is the only registrar offering the 100 year option, which costs $999.00. GoDaddy (www.godaddy.com), currently offers to renew or register a domain name for 10 years, at a discount of $6.95 per year. Dotster (www.dotster.com), another leading registrar, offers domain name registration and renewals for up to 10 years at a cost of $129.95.

What’s the bottom line? If you’re committed to your online business, your website, and your domain name, then renewing your domain name for a long period of time will not only stop expired domain buyers from registering your domain name when it expires, it will show Google that you’re committed to it-and that may give you a boost in the search engine rankings, as well.

Bill Hartzer is a successful writer and search engine marketing expert who has personally created hundreds of websites over the years.
Extended bio info:

Bill created his first website back in 1996 to help promote his former database software business. It was then when he learned about the power of the search engines and web search, which helped potential customers find his business online.

Bill Hartzer has over 15 years of professional writing experience. He has survived stints as a writer for television, as well as a technical writer for several computer software companies in Florida and in Texas. Mr. Hartzer combines his writing and online skills to create compelling and useful websites for corporations worldwide. Mr. Hartzer focuses on the optimization in the business to business arena, but applies these optimization skills to business to consumer websites, as well.

There is a lot of confusion about the use of hyphens being used in domain names. While researching hyphenated domain names I found a lot of conflicting information so I will give you a distilled view of what is currently believed to be the facts regarding hyphens in domains.

When I started Name Search Domain I had a lot of trouble finding a domain that I could use to reflect the topic of my site. After quite a bit of research I decided on NameSearchDomain.com, without hyphens.

It used to be the case that using a hyphen to separate keywords in your domain name would give you a better ranking in the search engines. For a while this was the case but due to the over zealous use of keywords in domain names, search engines now consider this as a spamming technique. Using hyphens in your domain name still makes it easier for search engines to read but it generally will not benefit your ranking.

If you use an unhyphenated domain name like myself using keywords it is generally believed that search engines such as Google can pick out the keywords. If you use hyphens then the keywords are easier to pick out from your domain name. So if there is no search engine benefit to using hyphens and keywords in domain names why do people still use them. The answer is undoubtedly anchor link benefits and ease of readability.

If you have hyphens in your domain name it is easier for a human to read and recognise the keywords in a domain. Take a look at specialistcheeseemporium.com or visit specialist-cheese-emporium.com. It is quite obvious that the hyphenated version is going to be recognised more easily.

Recognising the domain name is one thing but entering a domain name into your browser is another. It is easier for someone to type the unhyphenated domain name and it is easier for someone to give out the domain name to a customer if it doesn't have hyphens in it. Some people may not know what a hyphen is.

There is believed to be another benefit of keywords in domain names and that is anchor links, that is keywords in back links to your site. If a webmaster links back to your site from their site they often use the domain name as the anchor text. This is obviously good for you as it helps in reinforcing those keywords with your site to the search engines. So if your site is specialistcheeseemporium.com they may type this as all one word or possibly as specialist cheese emporium. For the hyphenated version they would probably type specialist-cheese-emporium.com.

So when choosing your domain name and deciding on whether to use hyphens you need to consider how the domain name is going to be interpreted and used by other people, not machines. I chose my domain name without hyphens purely because most people will type domains without the hyphens. I do use hyphens but only in my filenames as this makes it easier for people to read and people are less likely to type in a page name as they are a domain name.

Find out more about Domain Names at Name Search Domain. Stuff you need to know if you are thinking of buying a domain name.

Perhaps you already know that it is possible to get a free domain name. However, have you ever wondered how a country can afford to give away its domain names for free? Why would a country just give away its domain names instead of charging for them?

1. Free Domain Names from Dot TK

It is possible to get a free top-level domain name from Dot TK (www.dot.tk).

According to their website, “Dot TK is a joint venture of the Government of Tokelau, it’s communication company Teletok and Taloha, Inc., a privately held company. The Government of Tokelau has appointed Taloha, Inc. as the exclusive registration entity.”

Of course, for free .tk domains, ownership remains with Dot TK. This means that you can’t sell it. As well, there are other restrictions and disadvantages of free .tk domains, including:

-You can register only a maximum of three free domain names;
-You need 25 visitors within a ninety day period;
-You need to have existing web content somewhere so that your dot tk name can be forwarded to it; and
-Dot TK uses frames to show your website. This being the case, you may have issues with navigation (bookmarking or finding specific pages) and search engine friendliness.

For serious business use, you might want to pay the nominal cost for a domain name.

2. Why Do They Offer Free Domain Names?

Still, it is free. Why would they do this when they could make money from the sale of domain names?

According to their website: “Why does Dot TK give away free domain names? We believe that the Internet was supposed to be ‘Free’. Meaning no charges, payments or expected return favors.”

3. How Can They Afford to Give Away Free Domain Names?

This logically leads us to our next question: How can they afford to give away free domain names?

Dot TK makes money from paid domain names, including some special and trademarked names.

To help support Dot TK, you can optionally have an ad displayed on your website. Thus, they do receive some advertising revenue from this. However, the big money would be in the sponsorship by large corporations.

4. Other Free Top-Level Domain Names

By the way, this is not the only ccTLD (country code Top-Level Domain) that gives away some domain names for free.

As just one example, cg is the ccTLD for the Republic of Congo. Each of its citizens and lawful residents are allowed one free .cg domain name.

5. Free Subdomain Names

Additionally, subdomain names are also available for free. For example, eu.org states on their website that their goal “is to provide free subdomain registration to users or non-profit organizations who cannot afford the outrageous fees demanded by some NICs, especially in Europe.”

As well, nr is the ccTLD name for the Republic of Nauru. You can receive a free subdomain name from co.nr. Thus, your domain name could be something like yourcompany.co.nr.

Why do countries give away free domain names? They want their citizens and others to be able to enjoy the benefits of domain name use without cost being an issue. It can also be a promotional method designed to get the word out about their ccTLD.

How can these countries afford to give away free domain names? Advertising revenue and the sale of paid domains are two ways of funding free domain names.

J. Stephen Pope, President of Pope Consulting Inc., has been helping clients to earn maximum business profits for over twenty-five years. To learn more about domain names and other profitable Work at Home Small Business Ideas, visit www.yenommarketinginc.com/domain-names.html

Registering a domain name with malicious intent or in bad faith is popularly called Cybersquatting in WWW. This is usually done for monetary reasons whereby one books a domain similar to a registered trademark or copyright of any known company and then tries to sell it to the concerned company at an exorbitant price.

For example, if one registers a domain nike.net and then attempts to sell it back to Nike, it is cybersquatting. It will be in addition a violation of law if he/she puts up a website on nike.net describing Nike products and services in bad taste. On the other hand, if someone own a company trademark like Nike Foods and host a food website on nike.net, there is no cybersquatting or violation of law. So, it is the intention and not just the name which amounts to cybersquatting.

Cybersquatting was made illegal by the passage of a federal law in 1999 known as the Anti-Cybersquatting Consumer Protection Act. The law became necessary because numerous large companies were forced to pay large sums to buy their domain names from third parties. These companies included such notables as Panasonic, Fry’s Electronics, Hertz and Avon.

Cybersquatting is quite common specially against the popular brands but most of the time, the victim company doesn’t know about it. How do you know if a company is a victim of cybersquatting? Type in a name that is a trademark or copyright like Sakshay preceded by “www” and following by “.com”, “.net” or “.org”. If you get a valid web site which looks like it is related in some way to the domain name, then there is no cybersquatting in effect (although this could be a simple trademark violation). However, if you get one of the following results, then this could be a cybersquatter.

- Can’t find server

- under construction

- page with no relationship to domain name

Of course there could be a reasonable explanation for each of these results, so they do not always mean there is cybersquatting occurring. It’s a good idea to contact the domain name owner before taking any legal action to find out what’s going on.

Since there can be many reasons both in favor and against cybersquatting in any specific case, how can one prove someone is cybersquatting?

- The domain name registrants intention was to profit from your domain name in bad faith

- Your trademark was in effect and widely known at the time the domain name was registered

- The domain name is identical to your trademark

- And you have actually registered the trademark

How do you know there is a bad faith intent? Well, there is probably no bad faith intent if one of the following is true:

- domain name is the same as the person’s name or nickname or company providing services or products in different domain.

- They are actually selling or intend on selling something on their web site
- They have registered the domain prior to your trademark registration and have been using the domain name for some purpose or other.

- Does the web site owner actually have a legitimate use of the domain name? This would be, for example, true for a company named “Nike Foods”. They would have a legitimate reason for owning the “Nike” domain name.

Some clues that cybersquatting is occurring include:

- The domain name owner has put up a web site which in some way harms your company. For example, if you had somehow purchased “TATA.ORG” and created a web site about how inferior are TATA products, you are cybersquatting.

- If the domain name owner never legitimately used the domain name and simply offered to sell it to you, he is cybersquatting. If a person buys up a lot of names and has sold them over and over, there is a pattern of cybersquatting.

- If the domain name is the same as a very famous trademark, then it has a greater likelihood of being considered cybersquatting.

What can happen if someone is found guilty of cybersquatting is they can be ordered to hand over the domain name. In addition, if the domain was purchased after 1999, they can be ordered to pay monetary damages.

Dr Ravi Chamria is the CEO, Sakshay Infosystems Pvt Ltd. He can be contacted
at ravi@sakshay.net or you may visit http://www.articlesworld.com and
dhandaulat.com

Through my experience as president and founder of
DomainPurpose.com, I’ve come to an understanding that behind
every registration of a domain name lays a purpose. Further
More, behind most domain projects is a story of passion,
excitement and inspiration. Who better to illustrate this point
then Michael Furdyk, who became a dot com millionaire in 1999 at
the age of 17.

Michael Furdyk is a young man and domain name owner with a
vision and a compassionate heart. He has a unique understanding
that the Internet has the power to create positive change if
used responsibly and with a purpose. In the Internet world,
Michael Furdyk is a domain name owner who I root for. I’m
excited to share his story and new domain venture with you.

Michael Furdyk is the co-founder of TakingITGlobal.org, a global
non-profit online community for youth engaging members in over
195 countries. In the past, he has turned his interest of
computers into a series of successful online companies,
co-founding MyDesktop.com in 1997 (later sold to Internet.com in
1999 for $1-million) and BuyBuddy.com in 1999 (which closed a
$4.5-million round of funding in late 2000). Over the last few
years, Michael has done work for many large corporations,
including Xerox, CIBC, IBM, and recently a 6-month consulting
engagement with Microsoft in Seattle , Washington.

As one of the “10 entrepreneurs who shaped the year 1999″,
according to Profit Magazine, and one of Teen People’s “20 teens
that will change the world (2000)”, Michael has shared his
experiences as a member of the Net Generation by speaking at
many events, including two of Microsoft’s Anytime, Anywhere
Learning Summits, the Boca Raton gathering of The Business
Council, and TED11. He has made numerous media appearances
including The Oprah Winfrey Show, Time Magazine, Fast Company,
Business 2.0, BusinessWeek, CNN, MSNBC , USA Today, Globe and
Mail, and the National Post. He is also a frequent contributor
to Canadian Business Magazine.

I asked Michael Furdyk a few questions about his new domain
venture. Here’s what he had to say:

Shaun Cronrath: What is the vision for your domain?

Michael Furdyk: TakingITGlobal.org is an outlet for my
passion and excitement enabling young people to become empowered
users of technology, using it to conquer any inhibitions they
feel about their ability to change the world. Through both a
vibrant online community, and active local initiatives led by
youth from around the world, TakingITGlobal.org will instigate
positive global change of unimaginable impact.

Shaun Cronrath: What is the purpose of your domain?

Michael Furdyk: To inspire young people to follow their
dreams. To inform young people about the wealth of opportunities
that surrounds them. To involve young people in online and
offline communities where members & mentors contribute to, and
gain from the TakingITGlobal.org experience while fostering a
sense of global awareness, collaboration, and leadership.

Shaun Cronrath: How did you think of this idea?

Michael Furdyk: Rollerblading down Parliament Hill in
Ottawa Canada, my friend Jennifer Corriero and I reflected on
the experiences we had racked up over the previous few years,
consulting for major corporations, advising governments,
speaking at big events - and being listened to. We wondered,
“What if every young person was connected with the kind of
opportunities we had?” TakingITGlobal.org grew out of that
simple question and developed into a dynamic global network
driven by youth.

Shaun Cronrath: When did you realize that sharing your
passion via TakingItGlobal.org could turn into something
successful?

Michael Furdyk: After press coverage about our ambitious
plans for a dynamic youth-led network to augment the stagnant
educational system and provide real opportunities and
inspiration for youth emerged; TakingITGlobal.org attracted a
crowd of support and success followed.

Shaun Cronrath: How has your life changed since you
registered and launched TakingItGlobal.org?

Michael Furdyk: I love the work we do at TIG, so my life
has been great! I am super committed to the work we are doing
and always talk about it. Since launching TakingItGlobal.org,
I’ve got to travel all over the world and meet people from all
walks of life. I’ve also been able to use these opportunities to
speak with diverse audiences about my passion for technology,
TakingItGlobal.org and important issues affecting the world.

Shaun Cronrath: How has other peoples lives been effected
since you registered and launched TakingItGlobal.org?

Michael Furdyk: TakingITGlobal.org has helped inspire
over 10,000 youth members from over 195 countries to become
informed and involved with their ideas and visions.

Shaun Cronrath: As a successful domain name owner, any
words of advice for people who want to use a domain name as a
vehicle to share their passion in life?

Michael Furdyk: Subscribe to the belief that passion and
persistence will get you further than desire. Love what you do,
and you’ll do it well.

When seeking domain names most people get confused over whether to settle for a dot com address or a dot net one. More so in recent times when dot net addresses have risen in popularity and usage on the net.

There are a few important facts that one needs to realize before they opt for a dot net address. Quite often when people need to commit the address of a website to memory, they will not remember the dot net and the first place they will check is the given address with a dot com ending. Many times when they do not find it there, they will hardly ever think of using dot net to repeat the search. That is a lost visitor and maybe even potential client.

What is even more worrying is that there is increasing evidence to suggest that an increasing number of people end up at a website after hearing about it either from a friend or acquaintance, or by seeing an advertisement on Television or hearing about it on radio or reading something about the site. When committing the website address to memory very few will distinctly remember the dot net address if that is the domain name that you have chosen.

Having said that, let us also appreciate the fact it is becoming increasingly difficult for anybody to land a decent dot com address. After years of use, there is hardly any short catchy name that you can think of that will not have been already taken up. Do not even mention search-engine key word friendly domain names which will be virtually impossible to get. This is the reason why folks often settle for a dot net address. Others do not even bother to start their search with dot com domains. This is a big mistake despite the unavailability of good dot com domains, which we have already acknowledged.

Exhaustive efforts should be made to try and secure a dot com domain before you give up and move to dot net. For example you can try and search for abandoned domain names. In fact by making an effort to be really creative and not hurrying the process, it is quite possible to secure a reasonably good dot com domain. You can be sure that it will be well worth the extra effort and time you put into it which will result in better success when you begin to seek traffic. Of course if you just cannot get a dot com domain, a dot net one is a good second choice.

About the author: Lois S. is a Technical Executive Writer for Website Source, Inc. http://www.websitesource.com. Her established writing skills coupled with experience in the website hosting industry have provided internet professionals with marketing, product and service ideas for many years.

Internet Domain Registration QuickTip breaks down the
Internet Domain Registration Process in to simple, easy to
follow steps. Learn how to choose a Domain Name that is right
for your needs and how to easily register your Domain Name
through the proper Internet Domain Registration authority.

“What is a Domain Name?”

In order to establish a web site or web presence on the
Internet, you first have to complete the Internet Domain
Registration Process to own a domain name. A domain name, such
as “web-host-guide.net”, is a unique name that is the identifier
to your Internet Web Site. Before you can select a Web Hosting
Plan from a Web Hosting Service Provider, you must choose an
applicable domain name for your Web Hosting intent. (Choose
fast, because the good ones are going quick).

Domain names are the names that you type in on your web browser
to take you to a particular web site, such as
www.web-host-guide.net

Domain names may refer to names on the Internet that are
represented by a individual, a business, charitable or not for
profit organizations, educational institutions, state and
federal governments, as well as many other types of entities.

Certain Domain Name extensions, like .edu, .gov, .mil, may only
be used by relevant organizations.

How to choose a Domain Name

While there are many varying opinions on what criteria you
should use in choosing your domain name, the following
guidelines hold true for whatever name you choose:

A good Domain Name is:

easy to remember

short and sharp

meaningful - conveys a clear message

easy to spell

unique, descriptive, and specific to your intent

As basic, descriptive Domain Names are becoming very rare, you
may have to come up with different iterations of the name that
you are seeking.

Domain Names may range in length from 2 to 63 characters, not
including the domain suffix, (.net, .com, .edu, etc.). Any
letters in the alphabet may be used, as wells as numerals 0-9.
Domain Names can also include a hyphen (-), and a underscore(_).

Choosing a Internet Domain Registration Service

A Internet Domain Registration Service Provider is an entity
that registers your Domain Name. The Domain Name Registration
Service Provider may be a ICANN-accredited domain registrar such
as Network Solutions, (which I do not recommend), GoDaddy.com -
who I personally use, or a Web Hosting or Internet service
provider who has legal authorization as a network registrar.

As there are a lot of providers offering Internet Domain
Registration Services, choose wisely.

Aside from the nuts and bolts of where to register your domain name and purchasing a good economical hosting service, there are a few things to know about buying a good domain name, that only experience can teach.
Here are a few tips to get you started on the right foot:

1. Buy only “.com” and don’t trouble yourself with the others.
Although the domain name players have gone to some trouble to publicize and market to us about the availability of other extensions such as .org, .net, .us and others…there is still no real reason to buy anything but “.com.”

If you currently have a domain name that is not a “.com,” I strongly suggest you obtain it. Or, if that’s not possible, consider finding a new domain name.

The rationale is simple: if the point of having a website is to get people to visit it, the best rule of thumb is to make it easy to remember. If your customers have to think in order to get to your website, and maybe even have to type in a wrong domain first before they finally reach you…you want to change that so they don’t.

2. Buy your own personal name.
What better way to make it easy for your customers to find you? As you become better known online, and as you build your customer database, it will become increasingly important for your customers to be able to find you based on your personal name.

Buying your personal name allows you to build credibility for your brand identity and makes it easy to “Google” you. Ever tried typing in just your first and last names at Google? Try it and see what happens.
If you aren’t showing up in the results, you will want to work on this. And buying your own personal name as a domain name is a simple and very effective way to get going.

3. Buy the most common spelling mistakes for your domain.
Even if you follow the advice in (2) above, it may be inevitable that some of your visitors will misspell your domain. It’s human error.

So although these may not be obvious to you at first, it’s worthwhile putting your antennae up in order to figure it out. The first hint? If you misspell your own domain name, chances are others will. Be sure to grab the most common ones.

Example: www.Google.com, www.Gogle.com and www.Gooogle.com all go to the same page. Why? Google “gets” that lots of people type in too few or too many “Os” and has set it up so everyone gets to the right place.

4. Double check your domain names for odd or unintentional meanings.
This one is a bit mixed, because if your domain name turns out to be something quite funny, it might be just that much more memorable and bring you free traffic. But you may not want to be remembered in that way, and the traffic that results could be a detriment to you. (The wrong target market just clogs up your system, uses bandwidth, and creates customer service inquiries you don’t want.)

So do a double check to see if your domain says something you didn’t expect.

What do I mean?

www.newsextracts.com is actually a clipping service, but could be interpreted to be something rather more racy.

www.whorepresents.com is actually a site where you can find a given actor’s agent or manager, but can be interpreted to be something else.

Last but not least, as with everything online, ebusiness owners have the luxury of easily and quickly asking our customers most anything, including “What do you think is the best domain name for this project?”

So when in doubt, ask your customers what they think. Give them a choice of a few domains you’ve narrowed it down to, and offer a prize of some sort to encourage participation. It works, and you’ll end up avoiding potholes along the way.

Andrea J. Lee coaches entrepreneurs and online business owners. As Thomas J.Leonard’s General Manager, she helped build and manage the largest network and trainer of personal and business coaches in the world. Now the CEO of Andrea J. Lee Group of Companies, she writes, speaks and consults on Marketing, Internet and Business systems. For more helpful tips, visit www.39lessons.com

Domain parking has become quite popular because it allows people to buy domains that they do not have content for, but still profit from them. Then, if the domain is successful, one can expect to sell the domain for 6-96 months worth of revenue! The money that can be made of parked domains is truly unlimited if proper networking and advertising is done. To make as much as possible you also need to work with the right domain parking service, and it can be difficult to ascertain which is the correct service for you. Below you’ll find a review of the top domain parking services to help you decide which may be the best fit for you.

NameDrive.com

This is an attractive website that will allow you to both park and sell. Namedrive.com also offers an affiliate program so you have the opportunity to make even more money through those that you are able to refer to ww.namedrive.com. You’ll find that the website offers you website tracking so you can see exactly what is taking place on your domain at any time. You’ll also benefit from monthly payouts, which is nice, because it keeps you motivated to keep advertising and marketing to drive traffic to your website. While all of this seems great, it can be sort of a bummer that you have to share any revenue that you make with namedrive.com. Unfortunately, the website does not really specify how the revenue will be split, which raises some eyebrows, for sure. Overall, this seems like a great website to work with for parking and selling, as long as you don’t mind sharing your revenue.

ParkQuick.com

This is a website that parks websites and links to others that buy and sell, as well. The front page is a bit misleading because they keep referring to the other websites, so you are almost drawn away from this website! You’ll experience great revenue with this website as they use content on each of your parked websites to attract both Internet users and search engines. You’ll be paid according to page views and clicks, but the website doesn’t offer much information about payment or shared revenue. The website almost seems to dodge the cost of their services, as after 20 minutes on the website we could not find a direct link to the cost of their service or revenue sharing programs. While the website is probably great, the overall opinion was that they just weren’t all that upfront about much of anything.

Sedo.com

This website will allow users to buy, park, and sell, so it’s highly convenient for those that want to do a little bit of everything in one place. The website will pay out as soon as your account holds at least $20 and will payout by Paypal or bank transfer. While the website offers the ability to do everything you need, revenue generated from your parked websites will be split with Sedo.com. The website is a bit complicated, but overall seems to be a decent resource for those that want to buy, park, and sell.

WhyPark.com

This seems to be the bet website for parking your domains! Not only is this website very upfront and uncomplicated, they are also very straightforward about their services and the cost of their services. You can register up to 100 domains with WhyPark.com for just $100. This is a one-time fee that you will pay and you will not split any revenue with them, ever! While the $99 may seem like a lot now, it will seem like so little later because you can make more than that in one month! That means you will not have to split your revenue later on, so you can make a lot more. Because WhyPark.com specializes in parking, you will get a lot of traffic to your sites because they use keyword rich content that will attract all of the visitors you could ever hope for. WhyPark.com also gives pointers on how to drive traffic to your site through advertising, which is awesome. This was definitely the overall favorite for domain parking, hands down!

Earn more from your domain names by instantly creating content-rich web sites rather than parking your domain names. Monetize domain names at http://www.whypark.com.