From Domainer To Revolutionary: The Plan To Unseat Google
Frank Schilling describes in a post on his blog how the world's six top domain owners could leverage their power to set up an alternative search engine and advertising network that might eventually unseat Google, the world's top search engine, whose monopoly-like powers are increasingly feared by website owners, online marketers and privacy advocates alike.
Here's how it could work.
Domainers control a large portion of the web's traffic. According to Frank, the world's top six domainers alone receive more than 300 million unique visitors to their domains each and every month.
Right now, most domainer-owned domains are parked, which means that they show nothing but PPC (pay per click) ads provided by Google or Yahoo. If domainers were to set up uniform wikis with paid-search listings and relevant content on each of their domains, these sites would continue to receive the type-in traffic they already get.
Additionally, they would start to attract search engine traffic as well, which would be drawn to the domains due to the unique and relevant content appearing on them.
If domain owners reinvested all the profits from each of their sites into attracting more and more traffic (through PPC ads and other means), eventually the balance of power could shift from the search engines to these vertical sites.
How?
Increasing numbers of end users who are looking for information about, say, Antarctica will no longer enter "Antarctica" into Google but simply type Antarctica.com into their browser's address bar.
Initially, the balance of power would only shift for that one keyphrase, but if repeated over enough popular domains, end users would realize in increasing numbers that visiting a domain directly is often the most accurate way of finding relevant information about the keyword(s) contained in the domain.
Traffic to these domains would skyrocket and reinforce itself over and over again. At some point, a conglomerate of domainers could set up its own search engine and advertising network, and there is nothing that Google could do about it.
However, Frank points out that none of this actually has to happen for a massive shift to occur.
All it would take is for investors to finally understand the real secret of Google's initial success (excellent search results and cooperation with syndication partners), as well as the disruptive potential of domains to attract, inform, entertain and monetize their visitors all by themselves - without Google's involvement on either side of the equation.
As soon as investors "get" that, there are two possible outcomes:
- Values of domains will skyrocket and domainers will be bought out by Google, Yahoo and/or Microsoft to the tune of billions of dollars.
- Google, which is currently overvalued because investors do not see any alternative, will lose some of its market capitalization.
Sounds like a plan? Frank is not sure whether he actually wants to go for it:
If it's so simple, why not try to out-Google Google? [...] Why bother when your cup already overfloweth.. Many domain owners are content with revenues from Google or Yahoo so it's difficult to marshall the interests of all six parties to roll-out a uniform implementation. Still, as a Google stock holder — keeping a disruptive technology at bay by keeping its masters disagreeable is no foundation for $450+ per share.
The Daily Domainer first reported on the initial signs of domainers developing their own content networks two months ago. Back then, it was all about the "Death of Domain Parking". But Frank Schilling has taken this vision to the next level. What do our readers think: Can domainers give Google a run for its money?
I think it can and will be done, but only as massive user generated tagging/organizing sites further develop. Imagine each domain as a defined term in wikipedia, the trick is to partner in a way with a social network or groups of social networks where 10's of millions of people are adding content to your domains, organizing data, adding photos and features across all the domains. As social networks develop and are tied together in unique ways, the users will be creating and building the absolute best website on each topic, if you get there first, Google will have to show your domain as the # 1 result in the SERPS. So can the top 6 domain networks strike a deal with myspace, and FaceBook and the likes? I'd like to help him try.
What a lousy idea! Utterly laughable…
Hey, Chris, actually the head of Demand Media, was the former head of Myspace. If I'm not mistaken Demand Media is in the top 3 in the world for domain portfolios ( I could be wrong). Demand Media is developing a social network platform for their domains as we speak.
LOL @ #2
Just another thought on social search, check out this article:
http://searchengineland.com/070403-040029.php
Anything is possible but instead of trying to out-google Google, why not out-beat Defeat?. Take it to the next level but give the people the option to choose what works for them. Frank can give me a call and we can discuss things.
Could it happen? I suppose, but not likely. My brother works for a major computer manufacturer in R & D. I keep hearing about something where a user will say what he wants and can be as specific as he wants, like a "pink cow in podunkville". It sounds to me like that technology can't really be that helpful for domain names.
If users are lazy (and we all know they are), who is going to type in more than they need. It doesn't happen now.
Although I wish them well, I think that there are one hell of a lot of dreamers out there fantasizing about getting rich on domain names. Like everything else, there are a few who make money and the majority who don't. There is incredible ease of entry into this "business" if you will. Any simpleton with a credit card thinks he is an entrepreneur. Another underlying factor is that the "business" has, for whatever reason, a somewhat sleazy reputation.
(Email to a friend about this article)
thanks for that Robert.
Interesting and feasible idea. However, I don't think it'll happen until domainers feel they're losing too much by having google in the middle.
Also, in order to do this, domainers would need an intelligence and strategic thinking that I doubt that they posses. Of course there are very sharp minds in that industry, but in order for this to work, they all should work together and be willing to sacrifice the short term for the long term.
You also have to bear in mind GOogle's strategy as this occurs. Google wouldn't see their main business go away just like that. They'd put up a big fight, with more money behind it (cash, right now, not the "potential" of a domain) that any domainer can put on the table.
So, yes, interesting idea. Will it happen, I am not sure.
..
Another point I forgot to ad here is that if I am not mistaken, the suggestion here is to do one wiki per domain name? Who exactly would builg this content? If anybody expect users to do this, they're underestimating the time and effort that building communities take. Building a wikipedia is not as easy as it seems. And let's remember that many wikipedians do it to share knowledge, not for money.
How comfortable or interested would users be in building these projects for a big virtual land owner even if they're promise a piece of the cake in return? How long before the news of the value of what they're building really reach the market spread by digg and the like?
From my study in social networks, I can tell you that most people who do this kind of things don't do it for the money. Many don't need that money in the first place. So unless you have another powerful "what is in it for me" answer to that question…well…all said.
Regards,
Javier
Trendirama.com
I think its only a question of when and not if domains can be Myspace'd in general, allowing social search and collaborative development of any parked domain.
If you have bought a .tv domain in the last 2 weeks, then you can easily see how your .tv domain becomes viral almost overnight as visitors seamlessly sign up and invite their friends. Now just imagine if Demand Media does the same for dot com's! Whoever implements this system first is going to make a killing!…hopefully it will be me.
I put a generic network in place in 1998 as the world's first generic network - as a strategy and recorded it all. You can own thousands of domains and it won't give you the edge you think - you only have to own a hand full of key generics to render these players useless. Thousands of names sounds good. I have been tracking search engines since the mid 90' and have had dominance in them with generic sites for years. I have no doubt the key search engines are aware of the power of generic domains and the significance that they have as the net grows. You can check with the archive sites on domains, however, the archives do not have many early sites as most of the archives didn't get established till 1999 and do not have accurate records of early sites. So it was important to record details.
The domain was and still is the power of the net.