GoDaddy is immune to its own clever marketing

I came across this GoDaddy press release via Frank Schilling's blog. GoDaddy Chief Marketing Officer Barbara Rechterman says increasing numbers of parents/friends/relatives are registering domains names for newborns. She explains that unlike toys that wind up in the attic within months, TheirName.com is an educational, practical gift that lasts a lifetime.

Given the Wall Street Journal's recent pronouncement that You're a Nobody Unless Your Name Googles Well, I'm surprised Barbara doesn't point out that a search-engine-optimized life starts with the right domain. I do a WHOIS lookup for BarbaraRechterman.com and find that it's... available!? BarbRechterman.com is taken though (with GoDaddy as the registrant), but the parked page it's pointed to doesn't show up in search results. Instead, Google tells me she made ~$500K in 2005.

Likewise Warren Adelman, GoDaddy's Chief Operating Officer. GoDaddy owns HisName.com  as well, and points it to a parked page too. I Google him also, and the top search result shows that he is... president and CEO of NeoPlanet?

Whereas even retail store cashiers at Apple get free iPhones, it seems GoDaddy's senior execs may not have easy access to WebSite Tonight and Online Photo Filer - tools that, according to the press release, make great additions to personal domain names. Frank praises GoDaddy for its clever marketing angle, but how is it supposed to stick if the company's own leadership isn't buying the hype?

That, I think, is the greatest challenge facing not just GoDaddy, but many of its traditional web hosting peers. As a point of reference, Amazon evangelist Jeff Barr not only uses S3 for personal file storage, he even pays for it!

So - if you work in a marketing capacity at a web hosting company, try running your next ad campaign internally first. If you can't achieve significant service uptake among your own employees, maybe you shouldn't expect to generate very much enthusiasm in the outside world either.

Comments

[Doug]

GoDaddy should buy every new employee a domain name. It costs them virtually nothing and is a good idea.

I agree. If you are going to preach or try to sell something because it has certain magic benefits, do it internally first.

[Isabel Wang]

Actually, GoDaddy should REQUIRE every employee to build something with at least one of its products. And product-specific customer inquiries should only be answered by sales and support staff who've used the tools in question for their own projects.

Customers expect people who work at hosting companies to be knowledgeable experts with hands-on experience. The web hosting industry is doomed to irrelevance if GoDaddy and its competitors aren't willing to meet this very fundamental expectation.

[Frank Schilling]

That's a great point Isabel.. It reminds me of a funny story though. Years ago during the dot com bust "echo" days, valuable generic domain names expired and rained down like pennies from heaven. Registrars saw these names falling, advertised the fact that "great names were expiring", yet they failed to capitalize on the opportunity themselves. Hundreds of millions of dollars were made over the course of a few short years amid times of incredible uncertainty. I would suggest folks try to register the first name (in .com or .net) as well as the .com first/last name combo of those they care about. This is more than marketing for GoDaddy. Buying your name as a domain just makes sense. I have personally done so for my own family/friends and expect all popular .com versions of first/last name combos (without a dash) to be exhausted within 3-5 years.

Nice blog ;) I'm flattered to be included in your reading list.

[Isabel Wang]

Hi Frank,

But you are on everyone's reading list :)

I'm coming around to your point of view on the trade-offs between automated domain monetization and active development. BUT - when it comes to YourName.com, I feel like pointing it to a parked page shows carelessness towards your personal brand name. After all, you're allowing the parking provider's software to determine what people see when they want to find out more about you.

Let's take Barbara from GoDaddy as an example. HerName.com is populated with ads for online dating, ring tones and silverware. Is this how GoDaddy wants people to perceive its chief marketing officer?? Couldn't they at least redirect the domain to her Linkedin profile? A photo? Something? Anything?

I think Richard Rosenblatt is onto something with his notion of "ChannelMe". That's what YourName.com should be. I just wish he didn't limit the concept to .tv.