Google Starts Holding Company and Uses ABC.XYZ

Posted on August 10, 2015 by Joe Alagna

Huge Win for the New Generic Top Level Domain, .xyz

abcxyz

Google made a big announcement today that will certainly benefit the world of new generic Top Level Domains (gTLDs). They have started a new holding company called “Alphabet” and are hosting it at ABC.xyz. The new .xyz domain name was started by Daniel Negari, a Beverly Hills domain name entrepreneur (He does a lot of other stuff too). Daniel’s marketing of the new .xyz domain name has had its critics but overall, has been ingenious. He has done several amazing things:

– leveraged contacts from his large affiliate business (likely including Google)
– positioned .xyz to be thought of as the largest new gTLD in the space (This was accomplished mostly through a controversial special arrangement with Web.com but certainly helped to accomplish its purpose
– used his existing .com domain (xyz.com) to allow .xyz registrants to be secure that their users wouldn’t be redirected accidentally to .com domains. To see what I mean, type in abc.xyz.com. You’ll see that it still goes to the abc.xyz domain name. Very few new gTLD applicants thought of this and it is very smart.
– leveraged the news media to get as much publicity as possible for his new gTLD.
– positioned .xyz as the domain name for millennials as in generation xzy.

There are a few other things they have done very well to have taken a string that many considered not all that great to become one of the most successful new gTLDs in the world. Getting Google on board with ABC.XYZ is a huge win.

Whatever you think of the new domain ending, .xyz, anyone could learn a lot about marketing by studying what .xyz is doing to make it a commercial success.

Read the story… | Source: Google

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Remembering My Dad Today

Posted on June 7, 2015 by Joe Alagna

Today is the 71st anniversary of D-Day, when over 4000 allied soldiers landed on Normandy Beach to free France from the Germans.  My dad landed on Utah Beach about a month later and fought through France until he was injured and shipped out in November that same year.  Here are a few pictures that I gathered from his Army records and a Platoon yearbook that I found.

Casper-Alagna-Army-Positions-WWII

Casper-Alagna-France-Movements-DuringWWII

In later years, after he retired, my dad used to write short op-ed articles for the local newspaper.  I found this one today.  It’s fond memories:

dads-article-sample

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24 Hour Fitness – Carlsbad, CA Review

Posted on March 5, 2015 by Joe Alagna

I’ve been going to 24 Hour Fitness centers for YEARs now.  I really like being a member.  I’ve been going now to the one in Carlsbad, CA for about two years.  It’s a flagship club because they have an executive office right upstairs from it.  I stop there on the way to work in Carlsbad at least three mornings per week.

I was motivated today to post my personal review of the club because they seem to have decided that all programming in the locker rooms should be set to sports alone.  Me and a few other regulars were disappointed to see that because the little time while changing is the only time we get to catch up on a little news in the AM before going in to work.  I kind of enjoy seeing a little news there each morning.  They used to have one TV set to sports and another regularly set to news. Come on guys, not everyone wishing to stay healthy is that interested in sports!

Anyway, I’m there a lot.  This incident got me thinking and I have decided to do a little review on what happens at the 24 Hour Fitness that is Good, Mediocre, Bad, and Ugly.

  • Receptionists – Good – Really sweet and friendly when you come in.
  • Personal Trainers – Good – They have a great bunch of regular trainers that seem to know their stuff and are helpful with questions (I don’t actually train with one but they’re always friendly about answering a question or two for me if I have one).
  • Equipment – Good – Most of the stuff there is in good shape and well maintained. There’s also enough of it to go around so you can get on a machine when you want to.
  • Pool – Good – I swim almost every time I go and the pool is well maintained.
  • Showers – Good – They always work well and are kept clean every morning.
  • Towels – Bad – I wish they had more paper towel dispensers, especially in the locker rooms.
  • Cleaning Crew – Great – I’d hate to think of what that place would be like without them.
  • Running Path – Great – I’m not sure if this was planned or not but my favorite feature around this club is the dirt path running behind it.  I run 1.2 miles (most of it on that path) as often as possible. This is a great feature by this club.

24 hour fitness, CarlsbadWell, besides that TV thing, I guess that my review is really good.  No one paid me or anything.  Honestly, the only complaints I generally have, I can’t voice because I’m not always sure who’s doing it.  I’m talking about other members who leave detritus around the sinks and showers or who work out without a towel.  That can sometimes be disgusting. (Thanks again for the great cleaning crew).  Keep up the good work.

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“Native Advertising” – Is This New?

Posted on February 25, 2015 by Joe Alagna

Forbes Magazine recently published an ad on it’s cover. This act has started a discussion on the ethics of “native advertising”, a practice where publishers show ads that look the same as articles. An American Marketing Association writer, wrote about the ad and the ethics involved here.

I’m a marketer and a fan of content marketing, but aside from questions of ethics, is the more practical aspect of this discussion which is, “Will consumers lash back?”

I don’t recall where I read it, but I read a long and thorough discussion on this topic years ago. The study concluded that publications who disguise advertising as content eventually lose reader trust. There is a natural human tendency to distrust a publication that drops the distinction between ads and editorial.

This doesn’t mean that advertisers have no right to publish informational articles (and today, to share that content via blogs and other online outlets) but human nature doesn’t change. “Independent” publishing outlets, whether they be print or digital will get their just rewards and if history proves anything, it will be a loss of trust.

It’s my view that publishers who show ads that appear to be independent will eventually lose the trust of readers who will go elsewhere for independently-produced content.

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