News From Traffic East 2005

[Duke]

It was an amazing event. A lot of people are just getting home and are exhausted (I slept a total of 16 hours over 4 days). I got home late yesterday and haven't even unpacked yet. There are some very exciting things going on in our space and the way things have evolved over the past few months was stunning to me. Almost every company (and all of the big ones were there) announced a new development or plans to roll one out soon.

One very widespread theme I saw was a shift toward developing domains (and groups that are interested in helping you develop your high quality domains if you don't have time to do it yourself). Dan Warner of Fabulous.com told me as I was leaving yesterday that in a year or two we won't even be talking about selling domains - we will be talking about selling businesses. He said it will be all about publishing.

The PPC companies are reacting to this potential shift of their customers away to various development plans by rolling out new programs incorporating landers with links that can convert traffic to $ in multiple ways and look more like websites with graphics, layouts and in some cases content for SEO (the trick of course being to do that in a way that doesn't get the pages delisted in SE's). They will also have some pretty remarkable stats features - just like you get from your developed web sites (check out the new SedoPro program for instance). DomainSponsor and all of the others are planning big changes too. Despite short term fluctuations - it looks like the end result will be more money for us.

I am going to be tied up the next two days going through hundreds of photos and writing the show wrapup article which should be out Monday night, so I won't have a chance to communicate much until I'm done with that (also did not have time to do so while I was at Traffic, especially since the Wifi signal in my room was too weak to work). I'll catch up on all of the threads and necessary replies as soon as possible.

 

[mole]

Thanks for the update, duke.

 

[EM @MAJ.com]

Please update us regarding auction in Traffic.

Thanks Duke,
Em

 

[Kjel]

"Hundreds of photos" Duke, and that was the best one of me you could find? We'll have to send someone more photogenic next year . . .

 

[Duke]

"Hundreds of photos" Duke, and that was the best one of me you could find? We'll have to send someone more photogenic next year . . .

Don't feel like the Lone Ranger Kjel. If being photogenic was required it would have been a lot smaller conference and I know of at least one domain reporter who would have been denied credentials.

 

[Domainut]

at least you got my best side

 

[EM @MAJ.com]

Don't feel like the Lone Ranger Kjel. If being photogenic was required it would have been a lot smaller conference and I know of at least one domain reporter who would have been denied credentials.

Well done RJ.

Thank you for sharing this information to everyone here.
Em

 

[Duke]

at least you got my best side

You got that right Sid (though I'm not the one who took the picture of the back of your head at Boston's). If you take a closer look at the picture you'll see I was sitting at the table with you. Since you didn't notice that, I can see I made a really big impression!

 

[Leading Names]

Great report as usual.

Wish I had been there - sounds like a great event!

 

[Domainut]

You got that right Sid (though I'm not the one who took the picture of the back of your head at Boston's). If you take a closer look at the picture you'll see I was sitting at the table with you. Since you didn't notice that, I can see I made a really big impression!

I was referring to the photo that you chose to use not that you took the picture, I did enjoy meeting you and the conversations that we had. And definitely look forward to future meetings. Maybe next time I'll bring my better half and we can do dinner.

Actually I believe that we talked in more detail about the industry on the phone than at the conference, but I felt sorry for your wife and did not want to bore her with more domain related talk.

 

[Duke]

I was referring to the photo that you chose to use not that you took the picture, I did enjoy meeting you and the conversations that we had. And definitely look forward to future meetings. Maybe next time I'll bring my better half and we can do dinner.

Actually I believe that we talked in more detail about the industry on the phone than at the conference, but I felt sorry for your wife and did not want to bore her with more domain related talk.

There are a lot fewer distractions on the phone than at a conference with 300 people around! But once you add a face to the phone voice it seems to add another dimension to the relationship. I did find that my second meetings with people this time out were far more rewarding than the first ones. On the initial meeting you just kind of break the ice as you don't know each other and that gives you a basis to build the relationship by phone/email until you meet again. That happened with several people I met last year and this time we spent much more face to face time together and got to know each other a lot better.

Though Diana was left waiting a lot and subjected to non-stop domain talk, she really enjoyed being there (she has actually started buying a few domains of her own - guess she decided if you cant beat them, join them). Definitely love to have dinner with you and your wife next time around.