Domain Name Strategies and Best Practices to Advertise and Grow Your Business.
Thank goodness it’s near the end of a work week.
As I entered through the Village of Volente, Texas to make my way to the office this morning, I happened to pass two interesting yard signs.
I say interesting because both signs were actually advertising using a .com domain.
Living in Austin, Texas, it’s often a challenge to escape the breakfast taco urge and madness on any day of the week. ??
I do pretty good about not making frequent stops over at the 183/Duval Rudy’s. Too bad I meet with a group of men their once a month or I would otherwise live a breakfast taco free life. 🙂
One of the things I love about Rudy’s besides those delicious breakfast tacos (hungry yet!?) is checking out their local business ad boards.
These custom cork boards remind you of a school chalk board as they are 4 x 6 at a minimum.
Nevertheless, the cork boards, located and adhered to external walls of Rudy’s, are covered in business cards, posters, postcards and anything else one can advertise.
I love perusing the wall of ads to spot companies that “get it” and those that don’t. If you don’t know by now, “get it” is the phrase I adorn companies, organizations, or people with that know how to effectively use domains to grow their business.
But for those that “get it”, there are a vast number of business and personal brands that miss the mark, and quite often.
This day, I spotted there are two events here in Austin and that “get it”: Austin Record Convention and Out of Ink 2017: Object Lessons.
The other day I ventured over to check mail and found my monthly edition the the Community Impact.
It’s filled with all sorts of articles, highlights, and advertisements pertaining to the greater Austin metroplex.
I personally read it for the latest updates on new businesses launching or unfortunately closing.
Then there is also the red hot real estate market here in Austin that I like to keep tabs on.
But the most interesting thing that captivates my attention are the various ad types.
From small mom and pop to larger middle market companies, there are quite a few companies hoping their ad catches the eye of a potential customer.
Although it’s sad to admit, churches are often quite behind when it comes to embracing and harnessing the power of technology to share their faith.
Fortunately, I’m grateful to be an active member of a church in the eclectic city of Austin where only roughly 16% of the population actively attends church.
Our church embraces technology and does a decent job effectively using domains to share the Gospel and draw awareness to the Gospel in general.
I’m always amazed and encourage to encounter churches embracing domains to grow their church as well as share the Gospel.
Welcome back! As I was in search of a sporting event the night we arrived home from the hospital after the arrival of our beautiful baby girl, I encountered MLB game.
Not much of a baseball fan outside of the Texas Rangers, I decided to let channel surfing rest and watch a few innings.
As innings progressed, I took notice of a billboard behind home plate.
Although present, it wan’t the normal MLB team domain name that was on display as the main attraction and that caught my eye.
As I drove into work the other morning, I was reminded that summer is here.
How? Well, one of the first reasons I knew it was summer was that there were only 5 to 6 cars on my commute.
For the next 3 months, I can say that I’ll have Austin’s traffic beat.
Most of the time, my commute consists of seeing 2-3 school buses, teenage drivers and parents trying to get kids off to daycare and school.
The second reason I knew summer had arrived was that I saw Austin’s Affordable Party Bus, Fly-Rides.com, at the intersection 2769 and Bullock Hollow in route to Volente, which is where I office.
The music was blaring and it looked to be standing room only on the bus. I could make out trunks, bikinis and swimsuits so I know it had to be a high school or college end of school party.
Below is a picture of the bus i snapped on my way home the same day:
Nevertheless, I continued towards the office, envying the party bus of youth in their prime just living up the weekday with a lake party.
As I pulled into Volente, passing the Volente Shore Club, the third reason that let me know summer was here was seeing a white banner with blue text.
Before I call it a day and put and end to this work week, I wanted to quickly share a few Austin events for the month of June that are using great domains (in my opinion).
Everyone that lives or visits Austin knows that there are multiple events every weekend, especially since Austin is known as the “Live Music Capital of the World”.
There’s not a weekend that I can think of that Austin runs short on events or things to do.
Just the other day while watching TV, I happened to be channel surfing and an interesting thing occurred.
As I was trying to make myself a birdie and fly far away from the captivity of toddler cartoons, I happened to land on Dr. Charles Stanley’s, senior pastor of First Baptist Church in northern Atlanta, Georgia, InTouch Ministries TV segment.
As I’ve read a few of Dr. Stanley’s books, heard his son Andy speak a time or two, and caught a few of Dr. Stanley’s sermons, I decided to allow channel surfing to cease once I realized it was him.
And before we go any further, No, I’m not going to pepper you with his sermon (although it was good enough to share, as it is always).
But as Dr. Stanley taught and shared the word of God, I was attentively listening when a domain name flashed onto the screen in the lower left-hand corner.
It’s Friday. It’s May. And the Texas heat is beginning to usher Spring out and Summer in.
We’ve had quite a few showers and thunderstorms over the past months that have filled our lakes beyond capacity here in Austin.
There’s only a few more weeks before schools out for summer, and our lakes are filled with boating, water skiing, jet skiing, laughter, swimming, and splashing.
In addition, there will be quite a bit of swimming pools, spas and hot tubs put into service this summer too.
Speaking pools, spas and hot tubs, I happened to catch a late night commercial in between the news and Jimmy Fallon that caught my eye.
GoDaddy has long been known for their raunchy and unadulterated Super Bowl commercials to say the least. Just run a search for previous Godaddy Super Bowl commercials and you’ll see.
But this year, Godaddy did something that even I didn’t expect for GoDaddy to do: make a tasteful, value-add commercial.
Of course the Godaddy spray tan commercial which I personally don’t think people, especially small business owners, will understand that GoDaddy offers domain names, website hosting, and website design and builder services for small businesses.
In my humble opinion, this commercial makes GoDaddy appear to offer a tanning spray service and not a technology business offering domain names, email and web hosting, website design, and SEO services.