OPENSRS: julio 2010

viernes, 30 de julio de 2010

Holiday Hours: Civic Holiday, August 2

Posted: 30 Jul 2010 07:58 AM PDT

Monday, August 2nd is civic holiday in Ontario (Simcoe Day) and Tucows HQ here in Toronto will be operating on holiday hours.

The photo is courtesy of Stefan Lins. Thanks for making your photo available under a Creative Commons license!

Here’s a list of departments along with any special holiday hours for Monday, August 2nd, 2010:

Department	Hours
Technical Support	Regular hours
Payments	Closed
Compliance	Closed

We wish everyone a safe and enjoyable holiday!

jueves, 29 de julio de 2010

Ken Schafer talks “transparency in action” with Lenny Rachitsky plus 1 more

Ken Schafer talks “transparency in action” with Lenny Rachitsky

Posted: 29 Jul 2010 12:17 AM PDT

Yesterday, our very own Ken Schafer talked with Lenny Rachitsky from Transparent Uptime about the benefits, efforts and challenges behind the implementation of operational transparency at OpenSRS.

Being transparent with your customers is an important part of customer service these days. From the interview:

“The days of hiding are over. You now have a choice of whether you want to tell the story or have others misrepresent the story on your behalf. It seems scary to admit you have problems but you gain so much by being open and honest that the stress of taking a new approach to communications is easily outweighed.” –Ken Schafer

Although we have a lot more work ahead of us, we’re proud of our transparency efforts here at OpenSRS. Visit Transparent Uptime for the full interview.

To see OpenSRS Status live view, visit http://status.opensrs.com.

Transferring Domains made Easier

Posted: 28 Jul 2010 12:29 PM PDT

We hear all the time from domain registrants and resellers alike, that transferring a domain name from one registrar to another is too complex. What should be a fairly straight forward process can be complicated by different interfaces at different registrars.

We want to make it easier for your customers to transfer their domains from other registrars to you. To help you out, we took a complete look at the domain transfer processes of the top ten competitor registrars — 1&1, Go Daddy, Joker, MelbourneIT, Moniker, Namecat, Namecheap, Network Solutions, Register.com and Web.com.

Screencasts for Resellers

Using that research, we’ve created a series of screencasts (and also PDF versions with screenshots) that will help registrants successfully complete their transfers to you.

The OpenSRS screencast series: “Preparing your Domain to Transfer” includes step-by-step documentation, with accompanying screenshots and videos for each of the top ten registrars. Here’s the screencast for GoDaddy as an example:

Maximize your Transfers-In

Using these tools, you can assist your customers in ensuring a successful domain transfer. Your customers will learn the 4 basic steps required to prepare a domain for transfer:

Ensuring WHOIS contact information is correct
Making required WHOIS privacy changes
Unlocking the domain so it can be transferred
Obtaining the transfer authorization code for the domain

All of the content is white-labeled and ready for you to add your own Reseller branding to share with your customers.

Available for Download Today

To download the complete set in PDF, QuickTime or Flash video format go to our Transfers-In marketing resources downloads page.

sábado, 24 de julio de 2010

Some ideas on marketing .CO

Posted: 23 Jul 2010 10:22 AM PDT

If you’re read this blog over the past few days, you’ve probably already gathered that we’re bullish about .CO. The numbers so far have been astounding. And Google’s decision to treat .CO as an international (generic) TLD goes even further to position it as a viable alternative to .com. So now we’d like offer a few thoughts on how you might be able to effectively market .CO based on what we have seen with other new TLDs and what we have seen from some of the first resellers out of the gate.

On Your Site

The easiest thing you can do is add some messaging to your homepage (or the beginning of your domain search path) to let users know that .CO domain names are now available through your service. But success will mostly likely be driven by how you integrate .CO into your search results. Customers in the online world are a finicky bunch. Button placement, colors, menus and user interface all play a critical role in determining how much of a consumer’s hard-earned money you will earn. We mocked up a sample search result page to give you an idea where we think you could see results.

Identify .CO domain names as “NEW.” It may also be wise to have a help button a registrant can click on in order to learn about .CO and why it’s a great choice for their business. They key is to reinforce (.com-like) universality and credibility.

Place available .CO domain names at or near the top to grab a registrant’s attention and encourage them to act. (It is actually always a good rule to give better real estate to results that are available than result that are not.) If .CO is buried too low or even behind a “more options” link, the customer might never even consider it.

Suggest a two year registration. (This is actually a suggestion for all domain names.) When the default is one year, most customers will register for one year. When the default is two, it is surprising how many customers will register for two years. So, a good suggestion might be to start with a two year offer (perhaps with a discount), but make sure it is very clear how to change the term to one year.

In Other Communications

Besides having your front-end tuned to convert, another important step is to communicate the .CO news directly to your customers. An effective way to do this is through an opt-in email marketing campaign. Assuming you have an email list of customers, here are some suggestions that have produced results for our resellers in past TLD launches:

Don’t assume your customers know about .CO. Sending a simple email about the availability of this new TLD could be enough to drive additional business.

You could perform a batch check on your customers’ current domains and see which .CO equivalents are available. Many customers will want to protect their name across all generic TLDs. For example: “Dear customer, we notice that you have companyxyz.com…we want to advise you that companyxyz.co is now also available….”

If you have the data, you can also look through past unsuccessful domain searches and reach out to customers where the exact-match .CO domain is now available.

In your marketing messages, it might be worthwhile to note that Google (and presumably other search engines) will be treating .CO domain names as generic TLDs. (This addresses fears that a .CO name will only get SEO results in Colombia!). You might also mention that the .CO registry is spending significant marketing dollars to make sure Internet users (your customers’ visitors) will know and respect .CO when they see it.

We will continue to monitor what folks are doing and what seems to be working to share with the network.

Please let us know if you have ideas or questions.

viernes, 23 de julio de 2010

Sysadmin Day: Use our fancy ‘certificate of awesomeness’ to show you care!

Posted: 22 Jul 2010 01:41 PM PDT

Sysadmins have a thankless job.

They keep the file servers serving, the email servers delivering and the accounting servers counting. These heroes of the office network are often paged late at night to deal with a broken application server, spend countless hours writing (and troubleshooting) scripts that automate tasks, and sometimes get called on to restore a files from a backup that some noobie user accidentally deleted more than 3 months ago.

When was the last time your own sysadmin received a pat on the back for a job well done? Where would you be without their countless hours of hard work? At OpenSRS, our sysadmins literally keep the Internet running. Without them, we’d be resolving DNS hostnames with Popsicle sticks (I’m not sure how that would work, but go with me on this.)

Sysadmin Day 2010 is this July 31 (next week!). Since it’s a Saturday, we’re encouraging everybody to celebrate on Friday 30th instead. To help our resellers honour their hardworking admins, we thought we’d take a moment and give you some ideas around how you can show your appreciation, starting with our handy “Certificate of Sysadmin Awesomeness” that you can customize with your own words of appreciation!

The certificate has been designed in MS Word (for PC) and Pages (for OS X). If for some strange reason, you don’t have a program that can open either of these formats, we also have a PDF version that can be filled in by hand.

Download Certificate of Sysadmin Awesomeness (MS Word)	Download Certificate of Sysadmin Awesomeness (Pages for OS X)
Download Certificate of Sysadmin Awesomeness (PDF)

Gift ideas that show your Sysadmin you really care

If you’re feeling extra generous and would like to honour your hardworking sysadmin with something a little more special, Hong Kiat has a great post with a compilation of products that any sysadmin would salivate over. Below are a few pics of my favourite:

jueves, 22 de julio de 2010

Regularjoe.co

Posted: 21 Jul 2010 11:02 AM PDT

We are seeing something exciting today. In the first day of live .CO registrations, our live .CO registrations have already exceeded our pre-order registrations. And they have exceeded our regular daily volume of all other TLDs combined. If you check out the running count of .CO registrations at http://opportunity.co/pigsfly you will see that there are happy domain name buyers and sellers all around the world today.

This is exciting because it means “regular end users” are now choosing .CO. The whole pre-order period proved what we might have already expected, that .CO domains would be hot among businesses that actively protect their brands, individuals that speculate on domains and individuals that just love domains.

The registrations we are seeing now are primarily from end users that are registering one good domain name. Maybe they are improving on an existing .com. Maybe they are coming through the domain name registration process for the first time. But they are typing in a desired domain name, they are delighted to see that it is available, they are (most importantly) not concerned by the relative unfamiliarity of .CO and they are buying it. (By the way, I know the delight of discovering a good available domain name myself because I just registered regularjoe.co a few moments ago.)

We are strongly encouraged and I know we will be strongly encouraging all of you to get on board and enjoy the ride.

dotCO-Jul21-Status

miércoles, 21 de julio de 2010

.CO General Availability Launch Update

Posted: 20 Jul 2010 11:13 AM PDT

At 18:00 UTC (2:PM EDT), the .CO registry began accepting domain name registrations from approved registrars. If you have queued .CO domain names, these orders are being sent to the registry as quickly as possible.

Registrant details will use Tucows details temporarily

The .CO registry permits a set number of active connections per registrar, so our development team has streamlined the process as much as possible to make the most efficient use of these connections in order to register as many names as possible, in the fastest possible manner.

One of the ways we’re optimizing the queue and to maximize the number of successful General Availability orders, we will be attempting to secure the name first, and then, if we are successful, we’ll assign the proper contact information. The temporary contact will use Tucows contact information. DO NOT PANIC if you or your customers see Tucows listed as the registrant – be patient, and the proper information will be added to the record soon after.

Resellers using Storefront

If you’re a reseller using Storefront, .CO will be enabled shortly. You will need to enable it and setup pricing first before your customers will have it as a registration option however. See the section on ‘Enabling or Disabling TLDs’ in the Storefront Reseller User Guide for more information.

A reminder on pricing

Wholesale pricing can be found on our Domain Service page, under pricing, but here’s a quick reminder about .CO pricing:

2nd level registrations (ie. example.co) are $25 per year,
3rd level registrations (ie. example.com.co) $13 per year.

Status updates for .CO

We maintain a System Status tool for all services we offer and the .CO registry has been added to the ccTLD section. You can access these status updates via web, email subscription and RSS. For any performance and availability related incidents we experience during the queued registration period, or afterward, this status page is your best resource for realtime information monitoring of all OpenSRS services.

If you’re a Twitter user, you can also find our updates at: @OpenSRSStatus

miércoles, 14 de julio de 2010

Our Reseller-Friendly Approach to Sub-Resellers

Posted: 13 Jul 2010 06:08 AM PDT

OpenSRS Sub-Reseller Diagram

Last month we talked about the OpenSRS approach to wholesale domain name pricing and why we feel it’s the most transparent and reseller-friendly model in the industry. We've taken the same approach with our Sub-resellers program.

The OpenSRS Sub-resellers feature allows you to set up your own network of domain name resellers using our back-end. The popularity of Sub-resellers since its launch last year has confirmed for us just how valuable this can be. It has also reinforced how important it is to our resellers that they manage these relationships.

We built the Sub-resellers functionality with input from our existing resellers, and took a different approach than our competitors by giving full control to our resellers. Here are a few of the features that we believe make ours the most reseller-friendly sub-reseller program in the industry:

Flexible pricing editor.

Unlike some other options out there, our Sub-resellers pricing editor provides you with complete control over pricing. Whether you decide to price a group of TLDs at $12.99, or want to make sure you earn $2 on every sale, the decision is yours. You pick the price your sub-reseller pays. We provide you with the ability to create as many different pricing plans as you like, and the tools to view and manage pricing for your sub-resellers.

Branding options that put the spotlight on YOU.

We’ve placed a great deal of importance on branding. The Sub-resellers feature provides the capability to fully brand the experience to the needs of your brand and your customers. Email communication, logos, system messages, control panels and related interfaces have all been designed to be reseller friendly – to let you put your company and brand in front of your sub-reseller.

Sub-resellers is free and designed for your business.

Sub-reseller accounts can be created in seconds, either manually, or via the API. With no extra account setup costs, and multiple account funding options, it's a simple way to rapidly grow your network. We'll even manage the account funding on your behalf. There are no additional charges for this feature, and as an OpenSRS reseller it's already enabled for your account.

I've only just scratched the surface of what's possible with the Sub-resellers feature and we're amazed at what some of our resellers have already accomplished in such a short period of time. The Sub-resellers option helps our resellers leverage the power of an alternate sales channel to increase sales, and to strengthen the relationships they have with their customers.

I hope this provides you with yet another example of our strong commitment to building the world's most reseller friendly Domain Name Service on the planet and I encourage you to learn more about our capabilities.

See it in action at HostingCon 2010

If you're going to be at HostingCon 2010 next week in Austin, TX, and you want to see more, you can request a meeting or just drop by our booth (link to hostingcon event page). If you aren't going to be in the area, then we also have a half-hour webinar that walks through Sub-resellers and talks about different ways to setup and manage your own sub-resellers network.

martes, 13 de julio de 2010

Rejected .CO Sunrise Names Now Available in Landrush

Posted: 12 Jul 2010 10:00 AM PDT

We’re in the Landrush phase of the .CO domain extension launch and for those looking for some great domains, CO Internet S.A.S., the registry operator for the .CO domain extension, has just published a list of domains that were originally put in as Sunrise applications, but that were eventually rejected.

Download the full list (PDF 250kB)

These domains are available for registration right now in the Landrush phase. If you had previously put in applications for Landrush domains only to find them unavailable, you may wish to re-submit the order as the name in question might be on the list of newly available domains.

Landrush Extended

Landrush was extended by the registry and will now close on Friday, July 16th at noon EDT. Landrush is open to everyone – there is a $5.00 non-refundable registration fee, and successful Landrush orders are $220 which includes the first year of registration (all costs shown are in US dollars). In the event that there are multiple applications for the same domain, that domain will go into an auction process where those who had submitted an application for the domain in question will be able to bid against each other for the rights to the domain.

General Availability starts July 20

As mentioned, .CO goes into General Availability on July 20th at 2:00pm EDT. OpenSRS is taking pre-orders for General Availability now and on launch day we’ll be attempting to register as many of those pre-orders as we possibly can on launch day.

For General Availability pre-orders, there are no fees other than the regular $25 one-year registration fee. If the order is successful on launch day, the domain is awarded and your account is charged. If the order isn’t successful, you aren’t charged anything.

Is your Reseller account funded?

For those with General Availability pre-orders in the queue, we will be putting the $25 registration fee for each pre-order on hold this week to ensure that the required funds are available at the time of attempted registration on July 20, 2010. If the registration is successful, you’ll be charged for the registration. If the order is unsuccessful, the hold on the funds will be released and you’ll be charged nothing.

Please ensure that you have adequate funds in your account to cover the full value of the domains you have on pre-order.

More Information

Be sure to visit our .CO launch page where you will find more information about the .CO launch, including a package of marketing materials you can use in your promotion of the .CO extension. You might also want to check out the .CO webinar archive if you didn’t attend, or haven’t seen it yet. And the CO Internet website is also a good source of up-to-date launch information as well.

jueves, 8 de julio de 2010

OpenSRS rated “best bet” for securing a .CO domain name

Posted: 07 Jul 2010 02:50 PM PDT

As general availability for the new .CO fast approaches, Domain Name Wire listed OpenSRS as a “best bet” for registering a .CO domain name based on a hyper-competitive price tag of $25. You can read more about maximizing your chances of getting a .CO domain at the Domain Name Wire.

You can also learn more information (including webinars, launch dates, etc) on our .CO information page.

sábado, 3 de julio de 2010

Using Social Media? Improve Your Listening Skills Using Twitter Search

Posted: 02 Jul 2010 08:01 AM PDT

In an April 2010 survey, we asked our resellers about their social media engagement efforts. A respectable 39% said they were actively using social media tools like Twitter to acquire new customers and 35% were using social media to help them keep customers.

During some informal follow-up conversations with our resellers, we were told that despite their efforts, many of our resellers were waiting to see a return on this investment and that engaging in social media was akin to an eight year old thrown into a swimming pool, with an overzealous father believing that if he yelled “swim! swim!” loud enough, the child would somehow figure it out.

In worse cases, some staff dedicated to the role were complaining of burn-out out due to the sheer amount of realtime information they attempted to absorb while they separated the “wheat from the chaff”.

Like swimming, social media isn’t a one day, jump in the pool and go kind of proposition. But the good news is that Social media does have the shallow end equivalent of the swimming pool: “Listening”.

Using social media to effectively listen

One of the simplest ways to avoid social media burnout is to map out what you want to listen for and then build that into the tools your team is using. For example, a major segment of our wholesale reseller base are webhosts and ISPs (Internet Service Providers).

For webhosts and ISPs, identifying important search keywords like “cloud computing”, “control panel software”, “webhosting company”, “highspeed <citynamehere>” would all be relevant criteria since they would turn up conversations with people talking about these things.

Effective searching = effective listening. It’s not a set-it-and-forget it proposition, but by careful searching, it becomes far easier to find the conversations you’re looking for in order to engage more effectively.

The video below offers a beginning user a quick walkthrough that demonstrates how I use Twitter search, followed by adding these searches to Tweetdeck and Google Reader RSS. It’s saved me a lot of time over the years and I hope it will help you too.