There’s a lot of money in the world of domains, and as such it’s become VERY hard to catch an expiring domain before someone else snatches it up. Had I known this 10 years ago, I would be a RICH man today!

I recently spent over 75 days trying to capture a domain I wanted, and I thought I’d outline my experience in hopes of educating others who are going through this.. There’s a lot of conflicting (and sometimes outdated) information online, but this info is as current as you can get!

Head on over to GoDaddy, and search for the domain you’re interested in. If the domain is already registered, you’ll receive a message that says XXXXXXXXX.com is already taken. (Get info)

Clicking the Get Info link will take you to the domain’s WHOIS page, where you’ll see the Registry Status.

Here’s a chart that illustrates the life cycle of a domain, courtesy of ICANN. (Click the image to enlargen it)

Here’s where life gets interesting. You want to start tracking the domain once it enters the Redemption phase. This lasts for 30 days, after which it’ll go into a 5-day Pending Delete status (if it’s not claimed by original owner). On Day 6, at roughly 2pm EST, the domain will be released and you can try to register it yourself.

If you’re afraid that someone else will grab it before you, you can pay an additional fee to a backordering company (prices start at $60 and go up from there), which don’t guarantee you that you’ll get the domain you’re after, but it’ll give you a fighting chance.

In my case, I was lucky and no one else was going after it. So on Day 81, I was able to register Gold Rush Tickets, and we’ve now begun building a Ticket Broker affiliate site on the TNow affiliate platform.

This is my fourth trip to the Super Bowl, and I’ve never seen a celebration as crazy as this one! Saints fans are going NUTS over their win against the Colts. I’ve gotta say, I was secretly rooting for the Colts, but you can’t deny that the Saints put on an impressive show..

So I’m sitting in my car, and my iPhone buzzes.. It’s an e-mail from my affiliate manager Jon, at 10:06pm on a Sunday, with updated banners for Saints Super Bowl apparel. I forward it to our web guy, and he gets it up on our football site ASAP.

2/8 EDIT: I check our stats this morning, and the banner generated $384 in sales! Finally, an affiliate manager that gets it!

I heard that the NFLShop had an advertisement right after the game ended, and I’m sure that was HUGE for their sales.. But by being proactive and getting updated creatives out AS SOON AS THE GAME ENDED, Jon was able to make sure that they didn’t get left behind.

I’m headed home tomorrow, trying to beat this next snowstorm that’s headed for Jersey. Spring can’t get here soon enough!

Does anyone still submit links to directory sites? Back in 2005, these sites were all the rage, and it was an easy way to get your site indexed, and maybe even a little PR boost if you were lucky. But then Google started whacking directories with PR penalties, and everyone started heading for the hills. It was around that time that I stopped wasting my time with directory submissions.

Now I’m wondering if that was the right move or not. About a month ago, I noticed that a bunch of traffic was coming to our e-commerce site, from a directory site that had us listed on there. Even better, these visitors were making purchases!

It turns out that this was a human-edited niche directory, and they were manually adding sites that they felt best represented the categories listed. Visitors to this directory could tell that it wasn’t a spam-filled cesspool, and because of the this, they were more apt to click on their links.

Iin case you’re wondering, it was a directory of sites that accept Google Checkout. Yes, alternative payment methods are very important, but that’s a topic for another post.

So what’s the moral of the story? If you can find a directory that is well managed and relevant to your particular niche, go ahead and submit your site. You might just be surprised at the results!

ThePlanet announces significant price reductions across the board!

Prices on new server orders are reduced from 7 to 30 percent, while RAM and hard drives are reduced by 50 percent. Couple that with a recent announcement that every new server bundle now includes Symantec business-class antivirus software, 10GB of Storage Cloud, the company’s robust cloud storage solution, and the choice of either Parallels Plesk Panel or cPanel/WebHost Manager (WHM) and you’ve got yourself a real opportunity to consider switching web hosting providers.

“We’re focusing on value and how we deliver even better, more responsive customer experience from every vector of our business,” said The Planet’s Chairman and CEO Douglas J. Erwin. “We want to make The Planet an easier company to do business with across the board, backed by the quality of our data centers, network and an 86 percent customer satisfaction rating. During the course of the year we’re planning additional programs, seminars and education opportunities that will underscore why we’re the uncontested value leader in the industry.”

If you’re a regular ZC reader, you’ll remember me posting about my experience with ThePlanet. If you need a dedicated server, it’s a no brainer – Go with ThePlanet!

I thought this was common sense, but while working on a project today, I went to about 20 different e-commerce sites. Do you know that almost half of them lacked an About Us page? I understand that it’s 2010, but there are still consumers new to online shopping. These people are looking for every reassurance that the site they’re ordering from is legit.

This is why we continue to use trust marks (Verisign, McAfee Secure, etc) at the top of every page. Shoppers feel safer when they see these graphics, even if they don’t really mean much.

In any event, if your site lacks an About Us page, take 15 minutes and add one! 2010 is supposed to be the year of increased conversions – Here’s an easy way to get started!

Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ve probably heard about Shoemoney’s new membership course, the Shoemoney System. After a month of teaser videos, he finally opened up the doors on Tuesday, and absolutely KILLED IT! Within 48 hours, he had sold all 500 spots, at a price of $197/mo (for 12 months). And after the doors closed, he started a waiting list.

Scarcity marketing at it’s finest! You often read about this tactic in marketing books – Make something limited (in time, quantity, etc), and things tend to convert better.

I’ve never been a fan of these “membership sites”, but you can’t argue with the numbers. Assuming he can keep the class at capacity for the whole year, he’ll net nearly $1.2Mil! (Granted, his high-profile affiliates are probably took a nice chunk of the intial $98,500, but I don’t believe they get a piece of the recurring billing.. Smart tactic Jeremy!)

If you’ve got a skill that’s in demand, maybe you should consider starting a course.