See below for embedded answers. Keith
-----Original Message----- From: George Kirikos [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Saturday, March 16, 2002 8:33 PM To: Keith Teare; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: RealNames >I'm trying to think of scenarios where a RealNames Keyword would be >useful, especially compared to alternatives such as using a >Pay-per-click search engine, or just a regular domain name. The main scenarios are as follows: 1. You have a well known brand and you would like it as a direct navigation name to your web page - dot and slash free. An example would be "New York Yankees". This has the added benefit of the user not needing to know whether it is .com; .biz or .whatever. 2. You have a global brand and you would like it to point to the appropriate page in each country. An example would be "IBM ThinkPad" pointing to http://commerce.www.ibm.com/cgi-bin/ncommerce/CategoryDisplay?cgrfnbr=20 35724&cntrfnbr=1&cgmenbr=1&cntry=840&lang=en_US in the US and http://commerce-13.www.ibm.com/cgi-bin/ncommerce/CategoryDisplay?cgrfnbr =2637690&cntrfnbr=1&cgmenbr=1&cntry=250&lang=fr_FR&scrfnbr=32 in France. The name remains the same worldwide. The content changes according to the locale that is the default in your browser. 3. You want a simple to remember ID for your home page that you can put on your stationery, business card etc. An example would be "pepe le pue" instead of http://wapper.realnames.com:8080/digicard.htm. I wouldn't compare Keywords with pay-per-click search. The latter is really a traffic buy whereas a Keyword is an identity buy. >For the "Basic Keywords", is there any form of price protection in the >future? e.g. suppose I own the Basic Keyword for "Kirikos" (my >surname), which gets very few searches. 3 years from now, I become >President of the United States or something, and the number of searches >increases a million-fold. Would I still be paying $49/yr? As a better >example, suppose the people who invented the "Segway" people mover or >Microsoft for their XBOX bought a RealNames keyword for their brands >before announcing the new products. Would they be paying $49/yr every >year, or is it usage based in the future? The price remains what it was on the initial purchase. If you promote the Keyword and traffic grows you do not pay more. >If it becomes usage based, then it's not clear to me how the registrant >benefits, since they could have made the choice of buying a better >domain name, and marketing that (and presumably no one else could buy >that keyword later, as it becomes a "premium" keyword). In other words, >is one penalized by one's own success, if creating a new brand that >becomes popular? There are no usage fees with Keywords. We used to have that and stopped doing it about a year ago for the reasons you outline. >Presumably for words which always remain "Basic Keywords" due to >limited usage, their cost per visitor turns out to be high, as there >are a low number of searches for that $50 fee? Wouldn't they have been >better off driving their traffic using a Pay-per-click search engine >such as Overture instead? The cost per visitor for a Basic Keyword is on average about 50 cents based on today's traffic. For a Keyword Plus it is about 25 cents on average. As the traffic goes up the payment remains fixed however. Again, a Keyword is really more of an identity buy [like a domain name] than a traffic buy. Having said that many well known brands buy Keywords for traffic. Xerox made RealNames partner of the Year in 2001 because we drove more revenue than anybody else. We are also the leading affiliate on ibm.com. It is also worth reading this [ http://www.emarketer.com/analysis/marketing/cs_realnames.html]article. Best Keith
