Not long ago I wrote an article asking if a .US domain could become just as successful as a .Com.

The story was about CelebrityGossip.us, a domain that I acquired for my girlfriend Erika  as a side project that I thought would be fun for her.

After she showed that she had significant interest in it I thought that I’d help take it to the next level and do some professional development on the project.

So the first step was designing a great looking site that was different than the traditional gossip sites. Erika and her close friend and business partner in this endeavor, Samantha decided to give it a different look and feel and incorporate some original ideas into it.

One of which was including stories from “Old Hollywood”, gossip and scandals from 50+ years ago. Again quality content that’s original will always help a site gain ranking on a more accelerated rate. The site officially launched on June 5^th.

One of the less commonly known ways that you can help establish a brand and accelerate rankings is by using highly targeted re-directs. It’s something that if done correctly accomplishes two goals. One, it helps establish your brand with consumers. Secondly if you have a massive amount of visitors being directed to your site that can help grab the attention of other websites who will then link to you. Plus there can be some SEO benefits as well, but it’s technical and detailed so I’ll spare you.

So now you might be wondering exactly what I’m talking about when I say re-directing traffic. Do I mean just purchasing traffic with PPC or one of the traffic market places? Well you could do that, but I think a better strategy is to find domains and or websites that are highly related to your target audience with traffic and then re-directing that domain with a permanent 301 re-direct. I’m going to bypass the SEO specific details and instead provide you with some metrics instead.

From June 9^th to July 17^th the traffic re-direct sent approximately 450,000 unique visitors. I know, that sounds like a giant expense and you’re thinking how do you possibly send that much traffic to one site affordably. If you can get creative and cut deals with domain owners who have sites that do a huge amount of traffic (even in aggregate) but convert poorly you can accomplish this.…

Bing has a map feature, maybe you’ve seen it, maybe not.

Maybe you figured it was just a clone of Google maps, MapQuest, whatever.

But Bing has features that they don’t have.

Seems somebody took the cool idea of Satellite Images to a new resolution for Bing.

Check it out.

Try the “Birds Eye View” (different from Aerial) of your house and tell me that isn’t far better than Google maps or even Google Earth for most places.

I’ve been checking out foreclosure auctions of properties all over the place and I’ve found this new tool incredibly useful.

That is the end of the guest post.

Now I usually, almost never play with Google maps and haven’t checked out bing.com maps until I read this post.

I think that Cartoonz is on to something.

If you type in “Loews Hotel Miami Beach” for example you will see a big difference between Google and Bing.

On Google you will see PPC ads off the left of the map but no information about the hotel.

On Bing you see a listing for the hotel, its offical website, its address and phone number and a “book it” icon.

On Bing you can clearly see where the hotel is on the map and with just 1 more click you can get directions to the hotel.

The satellite photos on bing are easier to get to and looks better than Google’s.  Bing.com also has 3-D Map options for viewing.

You can read more on Bing Maps by clicking here.

This post was submitted by Cartoonz.…

What’s next?

The recent news about the Kentucky 141 is just the beginning. It is expected that there will be more court challenges to more domains in the coming months.

Remember that a court order from a US court can only be enforced in the USA. Most foreign countries simply ignore US court orders. It is very difficult and expensive to ‘domesticate’ a US court order in a foreign country, and they are normally never successful unless the action involves criminal activity such as drug dealing, money laundering etc.

Threats to domains

Domain owners are threated with lawsuits and invasion of privacy (think email and web server logs) every day. By using a registrar and web hosting outside the USA, you can make these threats go away.

Some types of threats to domain owners are:

1. Threat of civil lawsuit from a US attorney
2. Attempts to enforce a US court order
3. Legal threats to find the identity of the domain owner or web site operator

If you are using a US based registrar and hosting your web sites in the US or using a US parking/landing page company, then you’re in a mess of trouble. You’ll need to hire some attorneys and get ready for a lengthy and expensive battle to protect your assets.

In many cases, the courts will accept the weakest of arguments to allow a court action to go forward.

Generally, the US registrar and hosting companies will give in immediately and hang their domainer clients out in the wind once they receive a threat from an attorney or receive a notice from a US court. They simply do not want to deal with the hassle of being in the middle of any court action involving their client.

If you are hosted offshore using a registrar outside the USA, then none of these threats get very far. US court orders are not enforceable in foreign countries. US attorneys will say that they will take their court order and ‘domesticate’ it in the foreign court, or that they will hire local attorneys and sue you in a local court. These are lengthy and costly processes that typically get nowhere.…

If you travel a lot, you should prepare yourself to be searched and asked a few questions. Mike wrote about laptop and cell phone search and seizure before the Paris meet-up.

The US Customs and Border Service has posted their official policy here.

It happens all the time and it is nothing to be alarmed about. Many countries have broad search authority, not just the US Border Service – try entering and departing from Havana, Cuba, with a digital camera and a laptop.

Here are a few simple tips that should cut down your odds of being searched at border crossings, US or otherwise.

1. Dress well. Put on a shirt, pants, jacket etc and look like you’re an important guy. If you keep wearing those t-shirts and shorts no one will take you seriously.

2. Eye contact. Make eye contact with the border agent and smile. I guarantee you that if you cannot and do not maintain eye contact, they will be suspicious of you. And if you have that t-shirt and shorts on, they’ll pull you over for sure.

3. Be polite. If you are a jerk, they will search you. Yep, I see the jerks get taken into that back room all the time.

4. Pick a good job title and reason for travel. Even though you are a domainer or web developer, the border agents have no idea what that means. So speak their language and tell them you are an executive at an internet company or the President of XYZ Company etc. And tell them you are traveling on business to meet with clients, meet with the bank etc. Don’t tell them you were doing body shots all weekend with two sisters you met on the beach.

5. Protect your data. Don’t carry data you don’t need. Remotely access your email or docs or spreadsheets. There are lots of solutions from simple to rock solid secure to do this.

6. Use encryption. If you have to carry data or if you acquire data while you are away on your trip (say from two sisters you met on the beach) then use strong encryption for your email, hard disk, USB drive, flash card etc. By strong encryption, I mean 4096 bits, not 768 or 1024.

It is pretty common to get distracted when crossing borders while you look for your ID, fill out the paperwork, try and remember what to declare etc.…

I actually owned this domain not long ago. I simply forgot to re-register it and allowed it to slip. Best of luck to you with it, looks like an interesting blog.

Lesson learned, stay on top of your domain expirations!

Anthony

Thanks for the post. We actually did NOT get this domain on the drop, we bought it the last silent T.R.A.F.F.I.C auction held in Miami last October $1,180. We were the only bidder.

We bought this domain for the purposes of starting a blog about the domain industry.

Although we already owned other domains that we could have used, we wanted to take a domain we did not own that had no traffic and see what we could generate with it starting at zero.

The results have really been amazing. In under a month we have gone from a zero Alexa ranking to somewhere around 200,000. We do have the huge advantage of having some great friends with very successful blogs who helped greatly to get the word out.

You basic point is correct, like any valuable asset you have, you need to keep your eye on your domains.

I always think of domain registration costs as real estate taxes (obviously substantially less).

If you don’t pay your real estate taxes the government sells a tax deed on your home and you lose it.

You don’t simply forget to pay your real estate taxes because you know you will lose your house.

Of course with domain registrations you can pay them up to 10 years ahead so you don’t have to worry about renewing them every year. Make sure you have your correct contact info at all times on your registrations (this is required anyway).

This post was submitted by Anthony De Rosa.…