The Evolution of Go Daddy (in pictures)

Go Daddy, the Scottsdale, Arizona based company, is by far the world's most popular domain name registrar dominating all other ICANN-accredited registrars due to competitive pricing and shrewd and sometime controversial publicity methods. 

Go Daddy was originally named Jomax Technologies, and it wasn't until late 1999 that it became an ICANN-accredited registrar.  The first domain registered by a customer at Go Daddy was GhettoJustice.com. 

I thought it would be cool to chronicle the evolution of the Go Daddy main web page from 1999-2008 to see how Go Daddy changed their marketing campaigns with the growing popularity of domaining.  All picture and date information provided courtesy of Archive.org.

Enjoy the pictorial timeline!

November 27, 1999

This is the first and original website design.  Go Daddy did not sell domain names yet so the website only offered web site development services and hosting.  For $89, you could purchase the WebSite Complete 2.5 Deluxe Edition.  

May 10, 2000

This was the first major design change for the main web page.  The emphasis was creating  your own website with no experience required.  A Real Estate Edition of their services was introduced.  Notice the lack of sexy girls integrated into the design. 

May 7, 2001

Hey, now we have some color!  A one-year .com registration was $8.95 and a 10-year was only $6.95/yr.  Crazy cheap back then!

November 27, 2001

The domain extensions .biz and .info are introduced and private email accounts cost $11. The design looks scattered and odd.  Get ready for a storm of links and buttons.

June 2, 2002

Another confusing and complicated design with a plethora of links.  It's funny how fully-dressed the female on the front page is.  Don't worry, this will change soon. 

February 7, 2003

It's been 4 years since the original website design and private registrations are going for $9 with Go Daddy offering Federal Copyright Protection for $59.95. Starting to look more and more cluttered.

December 31, 2003

There's a sale for $7.95 .com registrations instead of the regular $8.95 price.  Awards show Registrar of the Year for 2002 and 2003.  

July 1, 2004

Major design change with emphasis on the free extras you get with each new domain registration.  Hosting is now only $3.95  and Traffic Blazer is $29.95/yr. 

  

December 31, 2004

The new look of this Go Daddy main page is by far the best and easiest to navigate.  CEO Bob Parsons begins his blog and links it on the front page. 

 

November 23, 2005

It's 2005 and customers wanting to purchase Domain Privacy now pay $4.95 (was $9).  Radio Go Daddy is introduced.

March 6, 2006

Price drop on private domain registrations to $1.99.  50GB hosting is now only $6.95.  Lots of tabs, links and buttons. 

December 30, 2006

Go Daddy girl, Danica Patrick, makes and appearance and after almost 7 years, Go Daddy begins to show signs of sticking to this template design.  The Domain Name Aftermarket Auctions are integrated into the front page to drive traffic to them. 

Today 2008

And this is where we are today. This screen shot was taken on March 28,2008. Go Daddy has come a long way since their original first design in 1999. Their prices have consistently dropped and more and more services were added on a regular basis. Seems Go Daddy has also taken a liking to featuring some sort of female on their front page and inundating website visitors with a ton of links and buttons. I personally like the web design of 2004 since it seems far less complicated and cluttered. Either way, Go Daddy has shown that they have their finger on the pulse of the domain industry by frequently altering and changing their website to accommodate the changing of the domain industry. I wonder what Bob Parsons has up his sleeve for their next website design concept. We'll just have to wait and see.

Happy Domaining.

-Rudy

GoDaddy Promo Code Not Required

Want to know how to save $2 to $3 off Go Daddy instantly without any coupons or promotion codes... every time?

Check out this quick short video courtesy of JackBorn.com explaining a couple of tips that anyone registering a domain  name at Go Daddy should be aware of .  Watch the video. Save a few bucks.

New Go Daddy Girl: Elliot Spitzer's Escort?

Everyone knows that Go Daddy's CEO Bob Parsons sure loves controversy.

Is it any surprise that Elliot Spitzer's hooker/escort is a potential new Go Daddy girl?

Check out the video blog here and find out.

Japanese Ads Downplay URLs, Encourage Searches

There seems to be a new advertising trend emerging in Japan that domainers need to be aware of. Marketing companies of some major corporations are beginning to encourage potential customers to "search" for their company name and products instead of directing them to type in a specific URL website name. Is SEO ultimately going to trump direct web navigation?

A recent post at Boing Boing highlights how a recent visitor to Japan noticed obvious advertising using recommended search terms instead of the traditional direct URL promotions. AOL has been using this method with their highly-publicized "Search Keyword: ABC" campaign.

I have a few personal thoughts on this. At first glance, I seemed to understand that with the lack of "good" domain names available for companies, relying on keyword SEO was not only probably smart, but pretty much inevitable as a marketing campaign to compete with those generic domain names. But after some consideration, I started to realize that if a company decides to spend tons of money to advertise a specific search term as their primary method of attracting website visitors, the always changing search engine algorithms and blackhat SEO methods could possible skew the search results, letting other sites relevant to the advertised search term to pop up first and benefit from the intended traffic. The company would basically be advertising for another company. Bad business indeed.

Keep your eyes open on how this could effect longer keyword phrase domain registrations and such.

Selling Domain Names on Ebay = Risk

Yesterday, I had some time to spare so I decided to check out the domain name auctions going on over at Ebay. I must admit, it has been some time since I last checked out that marketplace since I vowed awhile back not to sell/buy any domains there due to escalating scams and such.

While searching, I noticed a few things that haven't changed since the last time I visited Ebay:

1. Crappy domains with one good keyword selling for upwards of $15 million dollars.

2. Few decent domains with a "buy it now" price upwards of $5 million dollars.

3. And a plethora of typo/hacks promising "high-traffic and clicks".

4. All of the above had no bids.

Believe me when I say I literally sat there in front of my Mac screen and laughed.

Is the Ebay marketplace dead for domain names?

Is anyone actually buying these "premium" domains for those obscene amounts of money?

Is www.forsalebyownerok.com actually worth the $21,000,000 (that's million!) asking price?

The answer is "no" to all 3 questions.

The Ebay domain marketplace is not dead, no one is buying those crazy priced domains and there wasn't one domain currently in auction even remotely close to being valued anywhere near $21 million.

The reason I say the Ebay domain marketplace is not dead is because there about 4000 active domain auctions in progress. Other than that, it's dead to me. But just because it isn't dead doesn't mean it isn't risky.

Over at Dot Com Domain Names, Craig recently posted an article about not being able to reap the true value of a domain name during a 10-day Ebay auction because you simply don’t get enough traffic from the right buyer during such a confined period of time. I tend to agree.

Other than a few LLLL.com's, most domain auctions have zero bids and ridiculous asking prices. The few LLLL.com's that are being sold are selling for a little less than what they would probably get over at a domaining forum or Sedo. So why are people still selling their premium domains over at Ebay. Who knows. Maybe they are feel if they can sell a used "haunted" toaster for 10K then they could sell a crappy domain for $1 million.

Either way, Ebay is not a place I suggest to sell your domain names. I see it as a place to basically pawn off your not-so-great domains to a unsuspecting chump or to undersell your great domains due to a limited customer base and timeframe.

Do yourself a favor and either list them for sale at a reputable marketplace or simply stop buying worthless domains. Both will save you time and money.

Also check out this post at Fka200 about the recent and controversial COQL.com auction that ended over at Ebay.

Stay informed.

-Rudy

Domain Tool of the Week: Nameish

Stop wasting time thinking of domain names for your project!

Ever racked your brains trying to come up with a killer name for a forum, project, business, blog or idea? Sure, we all have.

What if I told you there's a tool out there that aims to simplify that process by offering you a quick and easy way to find a suitable name that represents your idea so that you may continue on to the bigger tasks at hand? Never fear, Nameish.com is here.

Nameish was created by Jason Hines of Devtwo Creative Software.

Here's his description of this cool domainer tool:

"Nameish is an attempt to help ease the creative hurdle in finding a good brand/domain for your web application. Often when a developer has a good name for a project, they can spend quite a bit of time simply thinking of the right name for it. As we know, proper branding of your project is critical and not all of us have the resources of a marketing team at their disposal."

How Nameish works:

Nameish finds suitable names based on the following logistical steps:
-Synonyms
-Thesaurus suggestions
-Web 2.0" naming suggestions, such as Flickr and del.icio.us
(From these results, you are able to quickly lookup the domain for availability.)

Another cool thing about this tools is that it shows the most recent searches queried by other domainers to help spark even more ideas for you. More features are set to come.

See more at Nameish.com.

And don't forget to subscribe to be informed of the latest domainer tools as they unfold onto the domain scene. Austin baby stores

Enjoy!

-Rudy

wedding news

GoDaddy won't register domain names with 'godaddy' in them

Something may be up over at Go Daddy.

There's a forum post floating around the anti-Go Daddy site, No Dadddy, that explains any domainer trying to register a domain name with "godaddy" in it will get a message that says "unavailable" -- even if it has offensive or gibberish words in it.

I tried it out and confirmed the same thing.  

After trying to register TestGodaddyTest.com, I received the "unavailable" error. Then headed on over to a couple of other registrars and it was available to be registered.  

We'll keep our eyes open and see what plays out. 

Check back.

-Rudy