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Super Bowl Commercials & Domain Names

Tim Evans — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 23:35:06 +0000

Ever since I can remember, I’ve been fascinated with the art of making a good commercial. Those who are marketers, I’m sure can appreciate this too, especially when a commercial makes an audience remember the brand and remember the product or service.

But with a record breaking audience of 106 million people, I was blown away at the lack of importance to the companies who spent $2.5-$2.8 million (not including the cost of production or compensation for the actors) for 30-seconds of airtime and either did not display their company website address or displayed it at the very end of the commercial in small font with only a few seconds left to display the domain name.

Early last week I posted a question on Twitter and got some responses back from other sports tweeters, @rscibetti and @sportsologist. I had originally asked what people thought the percentage of Super Bowl commercials will make reference to their company website.

I asked this question because back in January 2007 for Super Bowl XLI (Colts vs. Bears), I did an unscientific study (a legal pad, a pen and a few beers) on what commercials had domains in their ads and it was shockingly low; close to 50%.

Fast forward to 2010 and you would think that everyone would display their website address. Well, think again. I was at a Super Bowl party and thought I could use Twitter and tweet my observations on my BlackBerry (a great way to post notes when paper is not available) and the results showed a decent improvement for the display of website addresses from the amount promoted in 2007. The screen shot below shows the first set of commercials and in this sample, 68% of commercials showed a website address.

Overall, of the 41 commercials commented on, 31 made a reference to website address (75.8%). For the 11 commercials who did not (Bud Light, Coke, Audi, Intel, etc.), what were you thinking?! If you are going to spend that kind of dough (and I sure hope Bud Light negotiated a quantity discount with CBS), you should place a greater importance on taking advantage of creating a call to action for the audience to go to your website.

And finally, with the display of company websites promoted at 75.8%, you would have thought that the promotion of companies’ social networking accounts for Twitter and Facebook would have been taken advantage of especially with 106 million viewers watching, of whom which have mobile phones to actively use Twitter and Facebook during the game, but the results of this were extremely dismal. Only 2 companies out of the 41 commercials tallied mentioned their social networking accounts; Honda (promoted their facebook.com/honda fan page) and eTrade (promoted social media icons for Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube).

There is one thing that is certain, as long as there is a Super Bowl, advertisers will be spending money. And as the internet and social media continue to take over our lives, especially for sports fans, companies will only increase their promotion and brand awareness using domain names and social media.

Feel free to post our comments below or to me via @athlete on Twitter on what you thought of the Super Bowl commercials.

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About Tim Evans

Tim Evans is the CEO of Athlete Web Design, a web design and internet marketing firm for athletes and sports professionals based in Chicago. Tim has been online since 1997 and is an expert in the domain name sales, acquisitions, and monetizing realm. This expertise in domain names has evolved into helping athletes and sports professionals with a virtual presence online through official websites for athletes / sports entities. Twitter: @athlete E-mail: tim@athletewebdesign.com

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It’s a Numbers Game – Sports Vanity Toll Free Numbers

Tim Evans — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 17:52:21 +0000

We all know there are numerous ways to brand your sports business. From a professionally designed and well optimized website, to having consistent social networking usernames across a variety of social media platforms, you are well on your way to promoting your brand.

With a passion for domain names over the years, I have been able to appreciate what it means to have a unique vanity toll-free number. With domain names, you can have a maximum of 64-characters (numbers and letter combinations) to create a domain name, but with a toll free number, you only have seven digits to work with. Because of this length limitation, at least at the level of a true 800#, there are no numbers left in the 800# database left that have been unused.

So how do you find an 800# to market your business? I’ve been using TollFreeNumbers.com over the years because it allows you to search for that perfect number and it lets you know if it is available.

For my Athlete Web Design company, I knew it would be as impossible to get 1-800-ATHLETE as it would be to getting Athlete.com for a reasonable price, even if the owner of the toll-free number wanted to sell it. So I figured the next best option would be to get “WEB” in the three middle digits and 1-800-WEB-7502 (1-800-932-7502) was no longer being used.

A true 800# is the most desirable of numbers because it has been around the longest and most people associate a toll-free number having 800 in it, but you could also search for toll-free numbers using 888, 877, and 866. Because it is a lot easier to find a nice vanity number with these toll-frees, I’ve noticed more and more companies using the non-800# toll-frees.

Here are just a few sports and media related companies using non-800# toll-free numbers:

1-888-539-SIRIUS (Sirius/XM Radio)
1-877-NFL-KICK (Sirius NFL Radio Show – Ch. 124)
1-888-SAY-ESPN (ESPN’s national toll-free)
1-866-STUB-HUB (StubHub.com)
1-866-2-RIVALS (Rivals.com)

Although 7-letter, 2-word vanity toll-free numbers are not easy to find, some are still available. At the end of December 2009, 1-877-FAN-FEST was available and I picked it up for a project we are working on. I was amazed that a phone number like that was still available.

If a toll free number is available, and if the final 4 digits do not end in with consecutive numbers (i.e. 1000, 1100, 0000, etc.), you can get the number for $50-$80, depending on what toll-free exchange it is (800, 888, 877, and 866). If a number does have the final 4 digits ending with easier to remember digits such as 1000, 1100, 0000, etc., plan on paying a premium for this, because it is more desirable and easier to remember. For example, 1-877-FAN-0000 is an available toll-free number, but is going to be $599.00 to pick it up, vs. $49.95 if you just were to buy 1-877-FAN-1247.

Looking for a vanity toll-free number for your sports business? Below are just a few examples of vanity toll-free numbers that are currently available:

1-800-521-ESPN (great for a local ESPN affiliate who needs an 800#)
1-800-TIX-6700 (great for a ticket broker needing a memorable/established #)
1-888-921-SHOP (online or retail shop toll-free #)
1-800-MVP-3100 (is your organization an MVP?)
1-866-91-HOOPS (basketball related company or organization)
1-877-855-PICK (great for a Las Vegas sports book)
1-800-600-LINE (a more memorable/marketable vanity number for sports bets)
1-800-TEAM-597 (need a toll free number for your team?)

Vanity toll free numbers are a fascinating aspect to branding a business or organization. Feel free to post your questions and comments to me on Twitter @athlete as well as post your experiences with your organization’s toll-free number below.

By the way, for all you New Orleans Saints fans, 1-800-WHO-DAT-1 was disconnected last month and can be requested as a backordered.

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Athlete Branding & Owning a Domain Name

Tim Evans — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 14:41:13 +0000

Why an athlete should care about their domain name and personal brand.

As long as domain names have been around, professional athlete domain names have been valued property by domain speculators (domainers), cyber squatters, and sports fans. If you do a whois search for most professional athletes, no matter what the sport, chances are that the domain is registered. Even college athletes who have a shot at the professional level as well as high school recruits who haven’t committed to a school are having their domain names registered.

In a future post, I will dive deeper into the domain name speculator market, why names are registered, how to inquire about buying or recovering a domain, etc. But in today’s post, I want to go over the reasons why you should own your own domain, and why an athlete should place a high value on owning their own domain.

Before the internet, branding an athlete was only done via commercials, magazine ads, and radio spots. But with the age of the web and social media, from sports fans to teammates, family and friends, and advertisers and sponsors, anyone can type in a player’s name, do a search, and pull up everything they want to know about an athlete. So here’s my question to you: Would you rather send visitors to your Wikipedia profile or to your very own custom designed and personally branded website?

For the athletes who do have a website, depending on how recently the site was launched and how your site was designed/developed, the official site should rank #1 no matter what search engine is used (a newer site does take a little while to climb the ranks above player profile pages). But for those who do not have a site, fans have to go elsewhere to the likes of Wikipedia, league profile pages, team profile pages, Yahoo.com, CBSSports.com, etc., ultimately diverting traffic to other virtual real estate.

In my experience helping athletes build their brand online, here are 5 reasons why an athlete should own their own domain:

Creates a consistent place for visitors to learn more about you on and off the field.
Allows potential visitors using type-in-traffic of a domain name find your official website immediately.
Gives the ability to promote your favorite charity or your own charitable foundation year-round.
Protects your brand from cyber squatters, irate fans or fans that have an agenda.
Allows for marketing off the field for opportunities after a playing career is over.

There are more reasons that just these five for owning your own domain name to build your personal brand. Feel free to discuss this in the comments section below and via Twitter.

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Where To Find Sports Domain Names

Tim Evans — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 19:51:52 +0000

The domain name industry has come a long way in the last 20 years. In the early 1990s, an individual needed to write in and request a domain name and there was a limit of five names. A few years later, Network Solutions came on the scene and you could register a domain name, but had to commit to a two-year registration fee of $70 – it was so primitive back then that they would even allow you to register names and they would send you an invoice for the domain. There was no obligation on the invoice, so if you didn’t pay it, the domain would back into the pool of available names.

In 2001, Network Solutions lost its monopoly, and companies like GoDaddy came on the scene offering domain names for less than $10/year. Although the internet bubble burst between 1999-2000, excellent domain names became available when people chose not to renew their domains fearing that the internet was not all that it was cracked up to be. This allowed for many people to find great names.

Fast forward 8-9 years and here we are in November 2009. Is it easy to find a one word dictionary term domain name? The answer is no; the days of the single word names being available for registration are long gone. What about a killer two-word or three-word domain for that new sports business you are starting up? Or even finding your first and last name? The answer to these questions, in my opinion, is yes – you can still find great domain names with the right tools, and background knowledge.

Here are just a few of the many ways I research domain names for my business and for my clients.

1. Check the desired domain at your favorite registrar, such as GoDaddy or Moniker. I would not recommend checking domain names at Network Solutions. They’ve been know to put a hold on the domain you research so you could only use them as the registrar.

2. If the name is already registered, and you still would like this name, check the site to see if it is being used for anything. If it’s an existing company, then you’re pretty much out of luck and you’ll need to think of a new name. But if it’s a blank page, a parking page, or a page with ads on it, that is a good sign that the owner has registered it with the intent to sell it. You can then look up the contact information for the owner of the domain name and see if it is for sale.

3. Use third-party sites such as GoDaddy’s TDNAM, SEDO, AfterNIC, and BuyDomains, to research potential keywords that you’d like to have in your domains.

4. You can also do similar keyword search as in the above with Just Dropped and Domain Tools’ Advanced Auction search.

Just Dropped allows you to search for names that have deleted over the past 90
days as well as name that are going to becoming available in the near future.

The Advanced Auction search tool at Domain Tools allows you to search for names by
keyword as well as see if they have any linking value from the Yahoo and DMOZ directories.

Notable sports related domains becoming available in the next few days include:

AthleteStocks.com – November 25, 2009
BadBets.com – November 26, 2009
AnyAthlete.com – November 30, 2009
CycleGifts.com – November 30, 2009
GameTrends.com – December 1, 2009
SoccerLinks.com – December 3, 2009
SportFun.com – December 3, 2009 (name was originally registered in 1996)
SportPitch.com – December 12, 2009
SportSeats.com – December 13, 2009

In the coming weeks, I’ll be going over some of the details and intricacies on the above methods of finding a great domain. If you have a domain name story or an idea that you would like to share with the readers, please comment below.

With 63,688 domain names dropping tomorrow, I’m sure there is a golden nugget domain you can use to help build your sports business or your personal brand!

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Find a Sports Job by Giving First

Tim Evans — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 22:38:17 +0000

Part of my thoughts in starting SportsNetworker was to use my contacts in the sports industry for the purpose of helping others find or advance a career. That has worked out for many people. I enjoy hearing about people’s success.

While some people look to find an existing position in the sports industry, others simply blaze their own trail. These stories are unique and are often worth telling. Consider Joe Davis, who just a few short years ago launched Big-Game Preserve Video Production.

Davis originally started Big-Game in the living room of his rural Michigan home. At that time, his operations consisted of nothing more than two VCRs, a crate full of VHS tapes, and a record/pause button.

From these humble beginnings, Big-Game has evolved into a professional production company with state-of-the-art editing equipment and clients from around the country. Big-Game uses Final Cut Pro editing suite (which is the same program Hollywood used in making “Batman Returns”). This allows Davis’ team to offer a variety of products including team highlight films, recruiting films, promotional videos, commercials, and more.

Equally impressive, is the fact that each film option is fully customizable and Big-Game will work with its clients to create the perfect video for their purpose. In fact, Davis and the team at Big-Game produced the video used to promote LinkedWorking, the book I co-authored with Frank Agin and released on March 1st. (Watch Video Below)

If you are looking for a professional yet affordable post-production company, then consider Big-Game. They provide a top-of-the-line, customized product, but they do it without forcing their clients to “go deep” into their pockets.

With Big-Game, the game plan is simply … you provide the footage, and they capture it forever. To learn more about Big-Game Preserve Video Production visit its website at www.biggamepreserve.com or contact Joe Davis at 517-316-5826 or via e-mail at davisj@stu.beloit.edu.

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