This post is written with great thanks and gratitude for event coordinators at Fabulous, as well as all of the contributing sponsors, live auction holders and of course the buyers that made the TRAFFIC Down Under 2008 a success.  Here are the results of all .au domains sold during the event:

Aftermarket Auction-
Jeweller.com.au $9,200 = $14,667 AUD
MensClothing.com.au $4,000 = $6,377 AUD
JobListings.com.au $3,000 = $4,784 AUD
Jackets.com.au $3,000 = $4,784 AUD
Pollution.com.au $3,000 = $4,784 AUD
Plans.com.au $2,700 = $4,306 AUD
Camp.com.au $2,600 = $4,147 AUD
Branding.com.au $2,500 = $3,990 AUD
SurfingLessons.com.au $2,200 = $3,511 AUD
Athletic.com.au $2,000 = $3,194 AUD
Broadcasting.com.au $2,000 = $3,194 AUD
CDs.com.au $2,000 = $3,194 AUD
Laughter.com.au $2,000 = $3,194 AUD
Enter.com.au $2,000 = $3,194 AUD
JetSkiing.com.au $2,000 = $3,194 AUD
Hunting.com.au $1,850 = $2,954 AUD
Parasailing.com.au $1,700 = $2,713 AUD
Essays.com.au $1,600 = $2,554 AUD
Undergraduate.com.au $1,500 = $2,395 AUD
Shout.com.au $1,000 = $1,594 AUD
Bake.com.au $800 = $1,278 AUD
Rules.com.au $700 = $1,118 AUD
Knit.com.au $700 = $1,118 AUD
Authentication.com.au $500 = $798 AUD
Barbecuing.com.au $500 = $798 AUD
DirtBiking.com.au $500 = $798 AUD
Toons.com.au $500 = $798 AUD
Rick Latona Auction-
History.com.au $8,500 = $13,574 AUD
StockExchange.com.au $7,500 = $11,972 AUD
Snowboards.com.au $6,000 = $9,577 AUD
Friend.com.au $3,500 = $5,586 AUD
WW.com.au $2,250 = $3,591 AUD
Instruments.com.au $2,200 = $3,511 AUD
Campsites.com.au $1,300 = $2,074 AUD
Adopt.com.au $400 = $638 AUD

Summary and vision:

I think that it would really benefit the .au industry as well as some forward thinking domainers Worldwide to take a good look at what I just disclosed.  “Yay James- you’ve displayed what we’ve read already on heaps of blogs, community and domainer resource websites!”  Well, I actually sat up last night anticipating the U.S. congress not passing the auto bailout of the “Big 3″ in America and I believe that domainers in the days to come have a very unique and quite possibly the largest opportunity that this industry has ever seen.  I converted the live currency exchange for the USD into AUD to better show the value of what I’m about to share with you.

The blokes in the UK laugh at the USD and the blokes in the States laugh at the AUD.  Hell, take a look across the markets on a global scale.  Every market is down across the board and I’m wondering if the fire sale is actually going to hold off now until after new year.  The reason that I’m stating the obvious is because there is an elephant in the room and it’s staring you right in the face, or possibly writing to you in this blog if you will.

Have a look at the following domains:

Shout.com.au  -  Bake.com.au  -  Adopt.com.au

I think that these 3 names in particular were the biggest steals of the event.

Snowboards.com.au  -  SurfLessons.com.au  -  Branding.com.au  -  Plans.com.au

I think that these 4 names were very nice buys as I predicted that they would all go for about 10% more each respectively.

With all of this said, when you start talking about the changing face of the domain industry, you would possibly want to have a look at the .au extension and want to form a strategic alliance with a company here in Australia in which to make a secure investment.  The Aussie dollar has tumbled to roughly .65USD and the grim news of Holden (GM based manufacturer here in Australia) confirming production cutbacks of 15,000 units is sure to keep pace with wildly unstable markets globally.  I can share with you that our company business model is going to be released in January.  If you would like to take a look at the way we are developing 7,000 domains by July 2009, then by all means, send me a comment or an email.  I’d be happy to speak to the right people about what we’re doing and when your investment would of course be considered risk, to look at what just happened at TRAFFIC and to know that the AUD will be back on track within the next 2 to 3 years- a chance to have exponential growth within your own investment of a portfolio looks to be like it could be an extremely smart and profitable deal.

Congratulations again to Aftermarket.com and Rick Latona, the domainer of the year, for a very successful auction event and for that I say thank you.

Go the .au!

When you have your eye on the prize, or your end goal if you will, it’s quite easy to be distracted whilst you’re traveling at a quick rate of speed.  I’m just making a very short post here to share the 3 words in the title.  I would advise you to start “protecting your assets” now.  Not next week, not next month and certainly not next year.  Looking into this global crisis and trying to speculate what the best could be and the worst could be is quite meaningless in my opinion because both are not good.

1.  Seek finance advice from your professional and learn how to save your super.

2.  If you are self employed and rely on website traffic along with any affiliation and/or ppc program, start saving an extra 20% per month in November.

3.  Watch what is happening in the United States.  Pay attention to the ASX of course, but pay close attention to what the Yen is doing along with the DOW.

4.  If you are a small domain portfolio holder and you have anything registered overseas in any currency other than AUD you would be smart to renew immediately.  Losing 40% in less than a business quarter is not good for any company in any market- I don’t care how big or small you are.  I just renewed all of our .com and .net domains and paid $16 to do it as opposed to $9 only 3 months ago.

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YES I am still alive.

NO I did not fall off the face of the Earth.

I’ve been working very diligently on 3 very important projects and have completed our circle of friends, or strategic alliances, if you will.

There are some things that have been in process for over 3 months now and they’ll become public very soon.

Have a great day-

James

The .au domain industry is in the upstart of something really, really great.  I’ve read so many different takes on the domain industry over the last 3 years and watched what it has evolved into to date.  One thing is “full proof” and “guaranteed” to be true about it-  evolution is in constant motion and it is changing all of the time by way of growing limb off of limb off of limb.  The domain industry is a tree- the roots are continuously growing and seeking moisture whilst the trunk, branches and leaves are seeking the same as well as sunlight.  However, with this said- have a look at 2 fig trees side by side.  One will be a tad shade bigger than the other with a few more branches, a few more leaves and bit more fruit.  They are the same, but different.

There are several reasons that people don’t like the .au.  I’ll share the most amazing one now here in this blog post-  are you ready for this… it’s a shocker, but it’s the most COMMON answer given to me by experts in the industry and I’m not talking about people that say that they’re experts, I’m deadset saying that these people are millionaires and pacesetting individuals- the anwer:  Australia just simply doesn’t have enough people in it.

Okay- I get this completely and it’s based on type-in traffic.  However, what I don’t get is how these people can see the big picture in speculation of names, values, traffic and etc to make further investments for their portfolios from a historical stand point based upon what’s been true to date, but how come they cannot see the same vision on something that is developed and ONLINE??  Does the internet have some magical boundary border around the island of Australia that I’m unaware of and someone’s secretly hiding that information from me?

Texas has roughly the same amount of people as the entire Country of Australia in the population of appoximately 22 million people.  Does that mean that the .au extension would be worth equivalent or less than say, a .tx domain if it were to be traded?  How can you compare that?  The .com domain extension will forever and always will be the ultimate extension on the internet.  However, it’s not always the first pulled in the same prefix when searched in the engines.

I have just got through reading a book that I will share with anyone here that is serious about the domain industry and especially the .au domain industry.  You must read The Domain Game by David Kesmodel.  The book is more like a fictional story that somehow got extended to David from my mind.  I got the most bizarre and yet amazing feeling when reading the book.  Each page unfolded another chapter, not a page, but a chapter into the world of connection with characters that our industry owes one giant debt of gratitude to in my opinion.  To be able to read and have a full understanding of what creativity has been brought about by some of the most brilliant men and women was simply amazing.

I’ll write more on the book in an opinion blog and actually even go so far as to say that if you purchase the book from David and you don’t get anything from it- I’ll buy it from you if you’d let me use your name in a new section of this blog titled “The people that just don’t get it”.  Yeh… it’s that good!

Back to the domain industry here in Australia- I think that our company, from what I’ve learned through networking, affiliation and research, is a stand alone company that is spearheading an entirely new take on what the term “domaining” is defined as by most people.  I’ve spoke with board members from ASX companies that are uneducated when it comes to online branding.  I’ve spoken with a marketing director of one company that told me that they weren’t concerned with cobranding via alternative domain development because it was a waste of time and money.  I will keep tabs on this person and their board of directors listing because I have a feeling that they will not be there in 3 years and it won’t be because they’ve received a better offer elsewhere I would suspect.

Pacific Octane is buying names.  We’re acquiring websites as well as names and we’re looking to work with positive people and companies that are NOT in the “good ol boys club” of private backhanders and a closed circle of networking companies.  We want to work with talented individuals- we want to work with brave, bold and courageous indviduals that will not look at what was and be satisfied with the outcome and speculate based on statistics— we want people that will look at the past and become excited about the innovative possibility of changes to come in the future.

Time is changing.  The “domain industry” is changing.  The perception of speculation based on factors is changing.  The question remains-  are you changing… are you growing… are you securing your place in the World in which you want to be?

jAMES wESTER

This blog post isn’t anything special really- it’s just something that I thought I’d stop my work progression on a Monday to post up onto the blog.

I have noticed a pattern of people emailing me and there is some underlying irony in almost all “new contact” first emails.  They all want to know what I do on a day to day basis and/or what does my day consist of doing.

My day starts when I lay down to go to sleep at night.  I know that quite possibly sounds a bit out there or really strange to a lot of people.  However, I am a planner and a do’er and in order to be the best prepared for my day of actual work, I begin planning and mapping out my day before I go to sleep the night before.

When I wake up, the first thing I think of is my wife and my baby daughter- wondering if they had a good night sleep.  I’ll ease my head off of my pillow, flip it over to get the cool side up, gently lay my head back down on it (something I’ve been doing since I was about 5) and glance to see if Bella has managed to coax (coax- scream at 3am, 4am, 5am etc) MaryAnn into our bed before the sun comes up- and usually she has!  I count blessings and thank God that they’re healthy, happy and asleep.

I get up- start up my Breville BCM600 from MYER with my freshly ground Jamaica Blue coffee beans.  I turn on the computer and load www.pacificoctane.com so I can look at the home page, click on the Mission Statement link and read it.  I do this because it’s something of a “memory jogger” as to why I am up at 5am working.

I answer about 10 to 15 calls per day.  I read about 100 emails per day.  I reply to about 15 to 20 emails per day.  I read about the domain industry for about 2 hours per day.  I research companies and competition about 2 hours per day.  I talk to 4 to 5 people on msn messenger for approximately 1 hour per day.  I work on our developed websites approximately 4 to 5 hours per day.  I visit our friends websites for an hour or so a day.

When my day is winding down about 5:30pm, I do my best to help my wife with our daughter and sometimes I’m guilty of working through til after 6:00pm and that’s a “no no” because it throws off Bella’s bath time and bubbabottle bedtime, which is about 7:15pm.  I then have dinner, chat with my wife about my day and begin to unwind everything that transpired during my day.  If I had a bad experience, I try to figure out why it was bad- weigh out options and make a mental note of it so hopefully it doesn’t happen again.  If I’ve had a brilliant new experience, I will make notes on how to manifest that experience again and again.  If I’ve met someone new, I wonder how they’ll shape my life and on what level will they be able to help me and I help them.

I watch tv- I’m a big fan of Australian Idol, So You Think You Can Dance, CSI Miami, Rove and the news channels on Austar.

That’s my day!

james

This afternoon I was really happy that Don Potter over at Colourful Cards in Gerringong was able to get the logo that represents our company on many, many different levels.  Not even my beautiful wife could get Bella to take her eyes off the nice glowing flame off the Central Coast of NSW Australia.

I’m sharing this first because I want people to understand, not assume, but truly understand what I am about and what we are doing as a company.  Our logo is a reflection of our mission statement and even goes a bit further if you look closely enough.  Let’s play a game shall we?  You do not scroll down past all of the ***’s that I’m going to slide down the left hand column of this post- and look at our logo- see what you can discover about our company.  You might even come up with something new!  Comment me if you do!

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Guess how many *’s I put?  21-  I like that number

Now- if you look closely, you will notice of course the globe- it’s glowing with Australia squarely in the most visible position.  The flame is igniting the Octane and Australia from the Eastern seaboard of the Central Coast of NSW.  Our font is simple, yet unique, although there is nothing flashy at all about it.  The archs of optimism swirling around in constant motion that are eco green to be environmentally friendly as well as the colour of a signal light when you’re suppose to GO!  Is that the vision that we see?  Do we see the eye looking back at us… with the globe as our pupil and the fire a reflection of something that we’re looking at?

Yeh-  I’m very proud of our lead graphics person that is in charge of our development logos on this job.

This showing of our new logo that you will be seeing more of around as you scroll through and click around from different domaining websites is to really express the thanks and appreciation to a person.  That person is Don Potter from Gerringong.  I had called around after going to my normal printer that told me “Ahh hell James- I can’t match that colour.”  I called 7 printers in our Illawarra area and even visited one at the spur of the moment whilst heading home from a meeting in Wollongong.  They said “Naa mate we can’t help you.”

I looked in the Yellow Pages and called Don’s shop.  He answered the phone and said “Let me get to work on it.  I think that there’s something we can do with it.”  I hung up the phone and was so estatic I told my wife “Holy shit!  Somebody is as passionate about service as I am and he’s going to do some work for me to come up with the proper CMYK colour coding for the logo!”

Well, about 2 hours later, I got the phone call- “James, do you have time to come down and have a look- I’ve got several options for you to look at and I could email them to you, but the colours will print differently and I want to be spot on in showing you what you’re getting.”  I couldn’t believe it.  Someone actually cared enough to not be lazy and then tell me that I had to drive 20ks to go and approve or disapprove something that was for my company.

The greens- nope.  They didn’t match.  They weren’t even really remotely close to the awesome colour of the signwriting that’s on the back screen that he did match spot on today.  So what did I do?  I paid more for a better product and way, way better service.  If we would meet one day, you would get a business card from me and the swirls are silver.  Why didn’t I really care if the colour was perfect… because the service and pride in which the quality of our cards were made are second to none and it was quite irrelevant.  I admire Don Potter and his coworker Andrew for the amount of time and effort that they put into their clients.  I was thinking “Yeh, this bloke probably thinks that he can get a quib out of me so he’s being extra sweet!” LOL- but nope… The compassion, caring, understanding and not only the willingness to do an outstanding job, but the determination to have it done properly is rarely found and it’s there in Gerringong NSW Australia with Don Potter.

My many, many thanks to him on our new business relationship as well as a new friendship.  I sincerely appreciate the job that he did not only for our business cards, but this extra special job as well.

Oh yeh… back to our logo- doesn’t it ROCK! 

James

Pacific Octane CEO James Wester has pushed the button and it’s all systems go into the virtual property world of .au domains as the company acquires NameSeek.com.au

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Sydney, NSW Australia - “Several site improvements were made at NameSeek.com.au last week and members are already sending praise. We believe that the site is excellent. In the coming weeks, we plan to increase security measures and personal identification verifications before listing any domain over $100. We protect our customers,” said James Wester.
According to ZDNet.com.au, “The Australian Domain Name Administrator (auDA) announced the changes … allowing domain names to be traded freely between interested parties, after a decision to loosen regulation surrounding domain transfer was agreed on by the agency’s board in December last year.
Prior to the changes, the sale and transfer of domain names in Australia couldn’t happen unless in a “whole-of-business” capacity, meaning that it was not possible for a business to sell its domain name without selling off the entire business.”
At the forefront of these changes is Australian entrepreneur James Wester, CEO of Pacific Octane. The .au domain virtual property land grab is in full swing and the newly appointed CEO of Pacific Octane isn’t talking about it, he’s right up front taking action, spending money and positioning his company as the industry leader as well as one of webs new breed of virtual trailblazers. Since the auDA policy changes as of June 2008, Wester has been seeking advice and private consultation to expand the growth and improve the value of the Pacific Octane portfolio.
“We did the first public case study in Australia for domain names that were already proven valuable in the .com market. We’re currently working with over 6 leading companies in Australia to not only expand the growth of our .au domain portfolio, but to increase our brand as well through website development.”
After being called an idealist and attacked as a tall poppy, Wester’s focus and action is driving him towards the company goal of owning and operating 10,000 domains and websites by June 2010.
“The naysayers can talk as much as they want. I am an idealist. I am a very passionate person that dreams daily when I’m working and I rarely dream at night when I’m asleep. When you have experts like David Lye of NetFleet.com.au chatting to you and encouraging the focus and direction in which you’re heading, I’m not worried about what other people or companies are saying at all. While they talk, we take action and leave them in the dust,” said Wester.
“You also have to admire industry leaders like NetFleet.com.au. That’s why we can announce now publicly that Pacific Octane Pty Ltd has acquired NameSeek.com.au, an aftermarket specialist listings website.
“Daniel Felice of NameSeek.com.au will take over as the manager of the existing website as well as coordinate the launch of our new premium .au domain listing website. I’m very excited that we were able to acquire the website as well as Daniel’s talent. It’s great for our company and we will keep our fingers on the pulse of the market at all times. The website currently has over 2,600 .au domains listed for sale and within the month we’re anticipating over 4,500 .au domains! So I’m stoked to have been able to acquire the NameSeek.com.au website,” Wester said.
For more information on the acquisition by Pacific Octane:
Contact details:
James Wester CEO Pacific Octane Pty Ltd
W: www.pacificoctane.com
E: james.wester@pacificoctane.com
M: 04 01 725 885

As I sit and filter through the random offers of $10 here and $140 there- I see something very, very appealing: I see a chance to make a difference.  The case study titled Case Study 001 conducted over this last month would be seen by many domainers or people around the World that are familiar with “domaining” as unsuccessful.  The thing about case studies and any form of measured performance is you are opening yourself up to public scrutiny.  I am very aware of this fact and am ready to take the onslought of bloggers, journalists and “professional domainers” opinions as they come.

In the title of this post, I have stated that this case study is the dawn of a new understanding.  I believe in the evolution of understanding.  I believe in the evolution of branding.  I believe in the evolution of marketing.  I believe in the evolution of business in general.  I’ll use Coca-Cola for an example.  When the branding and marketing of Coca-Cola’s most successful product, “Coke”, was looking to become vulnerable to Pepsi, the whizz kids at Coca-Cola sat back, created their brilliant charts loaded with stats and data based on feedback from the public and their existing customers and they created “New Coke”.  It was horrendous.  It was like backwash from a can of Pepsi.  It was so bad, that they actually gained some marketshare on Pepsi by people that were Pepsi drinkers actually having to taste how bad this product actually was in comparison to the “Old Coke”.  Was this one giant step in a 2 phase marketing plan to actually launch “The Original” and rebrand their beverage as the leader in the beverage industry that would later be so popular that when someone ordering a beverage at a cafe would say “Yes I’d like a Coke and make it a Pepsi”.

Why I am bringing this example to light is because I view things differently regarding the .au market.  I believe in development over type in traffic.  I believe in evolving the name sake of a keyword or catch phrase into something of value, not an onslought of negativity in today’s understanding of a current market that is sliding backwards.  When someone has a solution to the .au domain market- please, find me, tell me how much they’re charging to monetise a portfolio and we’ll be your first customer.  However, with this said, we are in the race to do just that.

Our Case Study 001 was taking the top 100 domain names we had that were proven already successful in the .com and even .fr markets and putting them up for offering at only 1% of the sold proven value of any of our .net.au names.  We were close on a couple of offers, but we feel that accepting those offers would’ve jeopardised the integrity of the case study so we have declined all offers.

We will be publishing our case study findings here on this blog as well as the www.pacificoctane.com website within the next 2 weeks.  I do want to give a special thanks to Mr. Greg Ellis, the Business Editor at the Illawarra Mercury for covering our case study story.  I would also like to thank domainshed.com.au for putting together our special page for the conducting of this case study.  I would also like to thank Mr. Alan Gray of www.NewsBlaze.com for picking up the story and classifying it as a top story for the domain industry.

Have a great day and thanks for the read.

I’ve been hearing and reading over the last few weeks that the .com.au domains aren’t valuable and that they are far less valuable to the .com king of extensions because people type in “mysearchthingy.com” or what’s known as ‘type in traffic’.  In speaking with these people and them not only listening to what I have to say, but even acknowledging the mere possibility that some of what I say is possible… I’ve decided to go ahead and prove a point and share a statistics graph of one of our .com.au websites.

So I’ll stand by my research and my theory into our business plan for advancement in the .com.au domain extension as well as the lowly “not worth nothing” .net.au extension as well. 

James Wester