Today, going global is more than making Web content accessible from any place, anytime. If your ISP needs to provide clients with a regional presence on a worldwide scale, Speednames has a registry solution for you.

by Jeff Goldman [June 18, 2001]

Banking on the increasing popularity of country code Top Level Domains (ccTLDs), Speednames is using its global perspective to offer a range of affiliate and partnership programs aimed at making it easier for ISPs to offer their customers pretty much every single TLD imaginable.

The company was founded in early 1999 by Nikolaj Nyholm and Mickey Beyer Clausen, and was ICANN-accredited in October of that year. Speednames was first incorporated in New York City, but it soon moved on to bigger things. The company still maintains an office in New York, but most of its operations are now run from its other offices in Copenhagen, Munich, and Singapore.

Martin Roll, Speednames vice president of global marketing and public relations, explains that the founders created the company specifically to explore the opportunities presented by ccTLDs. "They wanted to expand the scope of the current offerings at the time," Roll said. "The major opportunity that they saw was to migrate into an integrated ccTLD offering."

A world of opportunities
Speednames' pair of partnership programs cover pretty much all the bases. The registrar offers both a co-branded turnkey solution and a fully private labeled partnership program, allowing for some additional choices within each option.

The simpler of the two, the Co-Branded Solution, provides the partner with a link to a web site that lists both Speednames' and the partner's logos. Customers who go to the co-branded site can register and manage domains just as if they were at Speednames' own site. Speednames handles all aspects of the customer relationship, including registration and billing. The partner then receives a commission, which increases with volume, for each domain registered.

Roll notes that the Co-Branded Solution has been best for companies that want to keep things as simple as possible.

"The Co-Branded Solution is mainly aimed at portals or portal-like web sites, where the owner/operator wishes to generate revenue from the visitors, but not handle the customer relationship or host the domain names," he said.

End-user pricing for the Co-Branded Solution is currently fixed to match Speednames' relatively high retail rates, at $49 per domain for two years' registration. However, Roll does anticipate that in the future, the offering will be adjusted to allow partners to select their own retail prices for their customers.

The second option, the OEM Solution, allows the ISP to take ownership of the customer relationship. Speednames' SpeedNIC registration solution allows the ISP to process domains using either an API or email templates. The ISP then handles all aspects of registration and billing, and can charge the customer whatever they like. Bulk rates charged to the ISP vary with volume.

Setup fees for both the Co-Branded Solution and the OEM Solution vary widely depending on the registration volume the partner anticipates. High-volume partners can expect to have the fee waived, while lower-volume partners can negotiate a balance between volume minimums and setup fees.

Global vantage point
Few of Speednames' 100 or so partners are US-based—the fact that it's hard to pin down any specific dollar amounts for Speednames' partner programs is an indication of how new they are to the US market. Still, Roll is quick to assuage any fears that an American company might have of getting lost in such a global enterprise.

Roll said that Speednames is currently in the process of implementing a major push to attract US companies.

"The US has until now been very focused around the three generic TLDs, and not so much on the worldwide offerings in country-code TLDs," he said. "In that pitch, we are very strong."

If a US company has any concerns about getting involved with Speednames, Roll adds, the registrar will actively work to accommodate them in every way possible.

"Being a true global player with offices around the world, Speednames is able to offer services to clients in various time zones throughout the world, and special support arrangements are available," Roll said.

Speednames has also been heavily involved in supporting the new .name domains. Through a partnership with Global Name Registry, Speednames is providing much of the digital identity technology that will be key to the use of the new TLD.

The company has designed and is deploying a digital identity system, which will support the use of the .name level domains as a central repository for all of an individual's personal data and information.

In the growing crowd of new registrars, there are a number of aspects of Speednames' offering that make it truly unique. With a focus on the opportunities available with ccTLDs, key involvement in one of the most popular new TLDs, full implementation of multilingual domains, and even a home page in ten different languages, Speednames stands to truly bring a international flair to any partner's offering.

— End

         

Online resources:
	Registrar Directory
	Registrar Directory: Quick-Reference Chart
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