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Webnames.ca, sponsor of The New Ventures BC Competition, would like to congratulate the top 10 Finalists recently announced for the 2010 competition.
The Top 10 in alphabetical order by company name are as follows:
These companies will go through Round 4 Oral Presentations on September 9th and 10th followed by a media training workshop on September 15th.
Join NVBC September 23rd at the Awards Ceremony at SFU Segal Centre where $300,000 in prize packages will be awarded. REGISTER HERE.
Are you an experienced professional with Board of Directors experience? Do you want to have a positive impact on the .CA domain?
If you missed Malcolm Gladwell's presentation at Vancouver's F5 EXPO on April 7th, here's a chance to participate in a second screening.
Many people disagreed with Gladwell's perspective on social media. His mile wide and inch deep philosophy may be accurate, but he failed to look at the benefits of a mile wide network for business transactions. Stressing the need for deep relationships, Gladwell feels these are essential for revolutions. Are weak ties enough to drive your business forward?
On Thursday, April 29th social media enthusiasts and Gladwell fans will gather at Ceilis Irish Pub for a screening of Malcolm Gladwell's presentation, followed by an interactive debate/discussion on the future of social media and what it means to business.
Here are the event details:
Cost: $20 or $22 at the door. Includes light appies and drink.
When: Thurs April 29th
Where: Ceilis Irish Pub 670 Smithe St. (Granville & Smithe)
Details: http://f5series.f5-expo.com
Can't attend in person? Sign up to watch the debate via live stream from anywhere in the world (and chat with your fellow online attendees). Online version of the event takes place on Mingleverse.com. Register here: http://mingleverse.com/mingles/1172!
As the province's largest and most prestigious awards night, the Technology Impact Awards Dinner celebrates the achievements of BC's most innovative and dynamic technology companies.
Over 700 senior representatives of the technology and business community will attend this impressive night of awards and recognition.
Plan to join in the celebration! This event will be a great networking opportunity.
Date: June 8, 2010
Location: Vancouver Convention Centre
Time: 5:30pm - 9:30pm
Tickets: $175 for early bird pricing; $225 after May 28th
Buy tickets online now or call 604-683-6159 for more information.
Learn more about the Technology Impact Awards.
As a sponsor of the New Ventures BC 2010 Competition, Webnames.ca can refer up to 5 technology companies to attend the seminar series for free (does not include entry fee for NVBC Competition). And we want to refer you! [Learn more about the competetion]
Simply Tweet this post on Twitter or email to marketing@webnames.ca to be eligible to take part! Late comers welcome.
Details about the Seminar Series
The 10-week seminar and networking series starts April 6, 2010 and features 9 seminars and 1 networking event on business topics for tech start-ups.
The first of nine seminars:
Assessing the Opportunity - Tuesday, April 6th, 7:00pm.
Featuring Bob de Wit, Executive Director of New Ventures BC and Elisabeth Maurer, President LightIntegra Technology.
Future topics include:
• The Business Plan,
• Perfecting your Pitch
• Social Media for Start-ups,
• Corporate Structure,
• Dialing for Dollars, and more.
The cost for all nine seminars is just $100 per team or individual, which is transferable to the $200 competition entry fee for the teams which decide to enter the competition.
The fee to attend any individual seminar is $20 per team or individual. Students with valid I.D. cards plus competition volunteers/sponsors may attend seminars for free.
If you're an early-stage entrepreneur with a new technology business idea, join the seminar! For details visit http://www.newventuresbc.com, call 604-725-5740, or email contact@newventuresbc.com.
For those wishing to register for the New Ventures BC Competition with a chance to win $300,000 in prizes, see our previous blog post. Deadline is April 19, 2010.
Webnames.ca wants you to know about an incredible opportunity that we are proud to sponsor: The New Ventures BC Competition.
New Ventures BC is one of North America's largest technology business-idea competitions.
The five-month, four-round competition includes a unique mix of business education, networking and mentoring.
It's like a boot camp for business start-ups. Participants will:
The 10th annual New Ventures BC (NVBC) competition deadline is April 19 and offers B.C. technology entrepreneurs and inventors a chance to win $300,000 in prize packages.
"Our goal is to help very early-stage entrepreneurs to acquire the business skills they need to get their technology to market," says Bob de Wit, executive director for NVBC. "And we're succeeding. To date, 33 previous competition winners have raised more than $67 million to finance their business ideas."
The competition is open to any B.C. resident, team or business with an innovative technology product or service that has not yet secured material financing.
Previous competition winners include 2001 winner AirG, now the world's largest inter-operator mobile community with 40 million unique users worldwide, and 2008 winner Saltworks Technology, which has raised more than $1 million and is now selling its innovative, energy-efficient water desalination technology around the world.
Prizes to be awarded September 23 include:
* $120,000 BC Innovation Council first-prize package
* $63,000 BC Innovation Council second-prize package
* $37,000 BC Innovation Council third-prize package
* $40,000 BC Hydro Sustainability prize
* $20,000 BC Bioenergy Network prize
* $20,000 BC Innovation Council Economic Impact prize
Competitors can also participate in nine business-education seminars, which start April 6, ahead of the April 19 competition entry deadline.
For more information and to REGISTER, visit www.newventuresbc.com
Happy 1st birthday .TEL! It has been quite a year.
One year ago today (March 24, 2009) .TEL general registration launched to the world and today there are about 275,000 .TEL names registered globally.
Webnames.ca has experienced quite a ride over the last year. Beyond just selling .TEL, "the digital business card that never goes out of date", a lot has been accomplished based on the .TEL platform.
.TEL App for the BlackBerry - Webnames.ca got into mobile application development for the first time in 2009. Hornet is a free .TEL address book application that allows you to look up, store and use .TEL names quickly and easily from your Blackberry Smartphone. Enter a .tel name like webnames.tel and instantly download all of a contact's information to your Blackberry. Any updates or changes will be updated as soon as you refresh the entry, so you'll never lose touch or need to update contact information again. More information is available at HornetHub.com; Hornet can also be downloaded at http://hornet.tel
.TEL Meetup - with 137 entrepreneurial members and six meetups already held, we have developed a great global network of .TEL enthusiasts who meet monthly to talk about the new and exciting developments in .TEL. Speakers have been Skyped in from London and even Beruit and the last meetup was live streamed over the internet. Learn more about, or join the .TEL Meetup group.
.TEL Gift Cards - the first-ever domain retail card has been created so that .TEL names can be sold by brick and mortar retailers across North America. The new retail card lets customers purchase .TEL names, which act as a 'live' digital business card, from stores and shops. The cards can then be activated online at a later date using unique codes printed on the back of the card, making them ideal for retail. CanTalk Wireless Solutions, Blenz Coffee and other retail locations have recently started to offer these cards. Learn more about .TEL gift cards and the .TEL retail card program.
.TEL Reseller Program - Webnames.ca's .TEL Reseller Program helps resellers earn referral income on .TEL domain name sales. The program provides resellers a branded gateway for selling the popular new .TEL domain at great price-points while earning commissions. Resellers can choose between a one time payment of $5.00 per domain per year registered or $1.75 per domain per year for the lifetime of the registration. To learn more about Webnames.ca's .TEL Reseller Program.
.TEL Videos - We had a lot of fun shooting our own .TEL videos.
Watch some of our other .TEL videos, for example, "Need a Locksmith?" and ".TEL for Realtors Interview" on YouTube.
One Vancouver - We built an initiative based on a community of partners and projects in Vancouver around .TEL and provided a forum to feature the local .TEL of the day. More info at One-Vancouver.com.
One San Francisco - Based on the model of One Vancouver, other cities are jumping on board to take advantage of building local communities around .TEL. More info at One-SanFrancisco.com.
.TEL Radio - Blog Talk Radio Host Marilyn Anderson features .TEL experts and early adopters through her internet radio program. Click here to listen to the .TEL program.
Dot Tel Central - Dot Tel Central was launched to provide a place on the internet where everything .Tel could be found. It includes a directory of .TEL's, featured links, and even a dot tel awards. To submit your .TEL http://www.dottelcentral.com/
.TEL Blog Posts - Webnames.ca posted 68 .TEL related blog posts. Read our comprehensive selection of .TEL articles under the .TEL section of this blog.
.TEL Cartoons - Illustrator Scot Ritchie of "The New Yorker" fame drew some .TEL cartoons for Webnames.ca. Check out Scot's terrific cartoon.
MaelleRicker.tel - Webnames.ca sponsored Canadian Snowboard Cross Olympic Gold Medalist Maëlle Ricker and we are thrilled she won Gold at the Vancouver 2010 Olympics. Congratulations Maëlle! See her .TEL http://maellericker.tel
Most of all because of .TEL, we have built long-lasting relationships with numerous people who have become close friends and strategic partners in a number of projects and initiatives.
Happy 1st birthday .TEL...and many more!
Typosquatting is the practice of intentionally registering domain names that are misspellings of website addresses and profiting from it by trying to sell the name, or capitalizing on its traffic through Google ads and/or selling products/services not related to the original brand.
Many large businesses protect their brands by registering possible misspellings of their trademarks and brands but not all of them do an adequate job of it. Smaller businesses typically don't think of such protective measures until it is too late [read our previous article, Cornering the Market for your Brands].
A recently published paper available at Benedelman.org, Measuring the Perpetrators and Funders of Typosquatting, by Tyler Moore and Benjamin Edelman from Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences describes how pervasive typosquatting is and who exactly benefits from it:
At least 938 000 typosquatting domains target the top 3264 .COM sites, and we [the authors] crawl more than 285 000 of these domains to analyze their revenue sources. We find that 80% are supported by pay-per-click ads, often advertising the correctly spelled domain and its competitors. Another 20% include static redirection to other sites.
Further analysis by the authors indicates:
57% of typo sites include Google pay-per-click ads. Combining our observations with financial reports and others' estimates, we conclude that Google's revenue from typosquatting on the top 100,000 sites is $497 million per year.
Benjamin Edelman summarizes his findings on a recent blog on Circle ID.
Whether the numbers are accurate or not, what the paper highlights is that "typosquatting" is a real problem for companies and brand owners.
Webnames.ca's Corporate and Managed Services Division can help with a comprehensive account review to ensure your brand is properly protected. Contact our Corporate and Managed Services department by corporate@webnames.ca or toll free 1-866-470-6820 to schedule a review or to request a our recent whitepaper on the topic.
I've been a judge of the Small Business BC Business Plan Contest for a number of years and the 2010 Awards are now bigger and better.
Entrepreneurs are still encouraged to submit a business plan in either the Business Concept Category or the Business Growth Category; however the 7th annual Successful You - Small Business Awards now includes 2 new categories which are nomination based.
The four award categories are:
1). Business Concept Award - business plan required
2). Business Growth Award - business plan required
3). Business Champion Award - nomination based
4). Company of the Year Award - nomination based
Last year's event award winners came from across British Columbia.
It is free to enter and all business plan submissions are completely confidential. This is an opportunity to win prestigious national, regional and local media exposure.
Click here for:
BUSINESS PLAN (or) NOMINATION ONLINE SUBMISSION FORM
APPLICATION & NOMINATION DEADLINE: MARCH 31st, 2010.
Good luck to all applicants and nominees. I encourage everyone to forward this great opportunity along to other entrepreneurs, entrepreneurial organizations and new businesses.
Here's a quick summary of some of the new features in .TEL:
1. Logo/Picture - you can now upload a logo or picture by referencing the website location (URL) of the image you want to use.
The easiest way I found to achieve this is by referencing my twitter avatar. (right click on your Twitter avatar, click on properties and copy the URL). Paste it into your .TEL where it asks for the "URL".
You can do this with any image on the internet including your logo on your website.
Other way is to click on the option to set up a Gravatar and you put your image of choice up associated with your email and it will automatically be associated with your email on any future blog sites, etc.
Give these a try and any problems, feel free to call the Webnames.ca team at 1-866-221-7878 or locally at 604-633-1142.
2. Better Looking Icons - you will notice that the icons for Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn are now showing up rather than in the past, they all showed as "web". This makes for a much nicer look and feel to the page.
3. Colour Themes - You can go and change the colours on your .TEL page. Changing the colours isn't as intuitive as picking a template but experiment a little bit and have some fun to make a more customized look and feel for your .TEL!
4. V-Card - the mapping seems to be improved and seems to be working well.
5. Search Function - at the top right hand corner of every .TEL you can do a search within the specific .tel you are looking for or across all .TEL's in the world. Put in a search term like "webnames" for instance and you will get all the .TEL's with references to "webnames"
6. Print - there is now a quick print button so you can print out the digital business card if you want to kill more trees ;) 
For those who think green is in, don't forget to download Hornet.tel for Blackberry or "Superbook" for iPhone if you want to take .TEL names with you and be fully mobile. I have tested Hornet and all works fine with the new changes. iPhone should be working well too.
Hope this helps! Come join us at our next local Dot-TEL Meetup: http://meetup.com/dottel
With any new technology, people need proof of concept and to see real life examples working. I decided a few months ago to track what I was doing with my own .TEL updates for http://cybele.tel and see what effect they would have on how my rank in Google.
My .TEL is now in 5th (see screenshot below) on page 1 of Google (out of 24 pages and 240 true references and 47,800 results to search term "Cybele Negris"). Perhaps more impressive is that it is also in 9th position on page 1 of Google for the search term "Cybele".
Here's How I Did It:
1. Enter Keywords, Description, Map - When I first updated my .TEL name cybele.tel I put very little information on it. I had my website, email address, phone number, a few key words and a map of my location. Since my .TEL name was quite new as well, I found my .TEL on page 7 a few weeks later using my name "cybele negris" as a search term. Not bad. It was a start given how new the name was.
2. Submit your Name to Search Engines:
Google - Add URL page
Yahoo - Add URL page
And to .TEL directories:
Dot TEL Central
Dot TEL Finder
And to have your .TEL featured in the following forums (other locations to come):
One Vancouver
One San Francisco
I submitted to all of the above.
3. Add Social Media Links and Link Back - A few weeks later, I added a link from my .TEL to my Twitter account and my LinkedIn profile.
I then tweeted about my .TEL and added cybele.tel in my LinkedIn profile thereby referencing back to my .TEL.
4. Add Keywords to the Text Header - Besides using the keywords section at the bottom of the page to add directory information or "Free Text" as it is called in .TEL, make sure you put key words in the text header at the top of the page. When I expanded the description in the text header to include my name my .TEL jumped up in rankings.
5. Use, Promote and Publicize your .TEL! - I started to use my .TEL in my email signature in every email I sent. I gave it out to people at events and functions rather than a business card. I had a new batch of business cards printed to feature my .TEL. I started using my .TEL for what it was intended for. Within another few weeks, I saw my .TEL name jump to page 3 of Google.
6. Folders and Subdomains - The biggest and most significant difference that I saw was when I added "folders" or "subdomains" within my .TEL. I set up separate folders for the various board positions I held with a description that included my name (in your case it may be your key word of choice) within each description.
On my .TEL I set up the following folders:
http://forum-for-women-entrepreneurs.cybele.tel/
http://vancouver-economic-development-commission.cybele.tel/
http://small-business-bc.cybele.tel/
http://small-business-roundtable.cybele.tel/
When I did this, my .TEL shot to the first page of Google in 7th spot within a couple weeks.
7. Build Up your Link Backs (Especially from other .TEL's) - Recently I started writing for a collaborative blog, Metro Blenz News Squad (see also http://metroblenznewssquad.tel) and I used "cybele.tel" in each post and the metroblenznewssquad.tel had numerous links pointing back to my .TEL.
Having the other .TEL linking to my name managed to bump me up another 2 spots and now I'm sitting at #5 on page one after 2 weeks.
8. Use the New .TEL Features - I have just added a picture which is a brand new feature launched hours ago.
9. Build out Another .TEL - I will now go build out "cybelenegris.tel" and see what happens. Currently, I've added very little data to this domain and I'm just referring people to cybele.tel.
Follow as many of the above steps as you can and your hard work will pay off!
Even if your .TEL is more "generic" than a personal name, these tips will still help to boost your ranking significantly. It won't happen overnight, but it will happen.
Webnames.ca is proud to promote the BCTIA Technology Impact Awards taking place June 8, 2010 at the Vancouver Convention Centre.
Over 700 senior representatives of the technology and business community will attend this event to recognize the best of BC's technology community.
The Technology Impact Awards is an annual program created to celebrate the successes of BC's technology industry and the companies, people and innovation that continue to put British Columbia on the map.
The deadline for submissions this year is March 17th. Complete details about the prestigious awards program are available on the BCTIA website.
Companies of all sizes and sectors are encouraged to apply. There are 9 award categories in total:
TECHNOLOGY AWARDS
Most Promising Pre-Commercial Technology
Excellence in Product Innovation
Best Application of Technology
COMPANY AWARDS
Most Promising Start-up
Emerging Company of the Year
Company of the Year
PERSONAL RECOGNITION AWARDS
Team of the Year
Community Leadership
Person of the Year
BCTIA Award Recipients from 2009 include:
About BCTIA - Growing our Technology Community
The British Columbia Technology Industry Association is an industry-funded organization supporting the growth of British Columbia's strong knowledge economy. Our network of 2100+ member companies are all sizes and from all technology sectors and collectively employ over 70,000 workers in BC.
The BCTIA delivers programs and services that directly influence the growth and success of our companies. As the voice of the technology industry, the BCTIA is committed to the ongoing growth, sustainability and prosperity of the technology industry and the transformation of British Columbia to a knowledge-based economy.
Learn more about the BCTIA's activities, programs and support for BC's tech community.
Now that Canada has shown the world what we are capable of and we have all experienced the Olympics together and feeling that overwhelming sense of Canadian pride, here's a contest for you to showcase your "online Canadian-ness."
No, you won't win gold but the prizes are pretty good:
1. Grand prize wins a MacBook Pro along with a feature in a future .CA marketing campaign.
2. First runner-up wins a 64GB iPod touch
3. Second runner-up wins a Flip UltraHD camcorder.
All .CA website holders across Canada are invited to make a short video explaining why their .CA website is the best.
Maximum length of videos must be no longer than three minutes.
Entrants upload their videos to YouTube via the online contest entry form, available at http://www.showusyour.ca.
