Telnames .tels are IN - Telnic .tels are OUT ?

There's quite a few mentions about Telnames (single page) .tels in the various articles about local search, mobile listings, etc. posted by TelTalk today.

But nothing about Telnic (multi page) subdomain-based .tels !

The obvious conclusion - the Telnames single page video / image gallery / coupon / background image .tel as shown by http://YourBusiness.tel is the only version of .tel that will be marketed and promoted from now on !

So where does that leave those who have spent hundreds of hours on the design, population and marketing of subdomain-based Telnic .tels ?

With obsolete domains that no-one will want - unless they transfer it to Telnames at over twice the annual cost (£14.95 = $23.46 according to XE.com today) of a Telnic registrar (approx $10).

Is that the right way to treat loyal forum members who have stuck by .tel for the last 3.5 years ?

At the very least you would expect Telnames to offer us the opportunity to transfer to Telnames at the current Telnic registrar rate of say $10 a year (for as many years as we are prepared to pay upfront for now).

Will Telnames reward forum members loyalty - or would they prefer software developers, domain investors and power users (with their server hungry requirement for multiple subdomains) to simply go away ?

What do you think ?

http://MikeSeaton.tel

Telnames is repeating the same mistake as Telnic before:
- They trust on worth of mouth only.
- They advertise on low-cost level. (Frankly spoken it’s a joke to have only a cost-free blog and a Pinterest site – and doing not any other marketing!)
This way the product won’t be able to draw a lot of attention!
So don’t expect a high number of registrations for Telnames for the next few years!
In 2009 speculators pushed .tel above the level of 200.000 registrations right from the start.
But these speculators are invested already and continue reducing their portfolio of .tels even more. So from this side no help can be expected anymore!
Of course satisfied customers will recommend their .tels and also visitors will like it, so with the years a few thousand people will register their .tel, too!
But this won’t be enough to fight against all the continuing drops from speculators.
Since Telnic / Telnames offer nothing for free and strictly avoid cost intensive marketing, there are only the following possibilities to get successful:
- The help by a heavy partner (who knows how to market a product)
- The implementation of .tel into a well-known service
- Starting to develop .tel properly

I like and populate mi .tels, but...

Why to pay for a single page from Telnames when we can have the same result using services as DooID.me, About.me and similar for free and with more customization?

Looks for example at this site http://dooid.me/socialspace . Isn't like a Telpage? Background, vCard, QRcode, images, zero euro...

For ordinary people, non involved in Internet, there is no difference between
my_name.tel
dooid.me/my_name
about.me/my_name

... and then there are the other domains. An .it costs 5 euros.

We are not obliged to pass on Telpages. For now the old .tels are still there.
And then... there is a lot of life in the universe.

silvano wrote:For ordinary people, non involved in Internet, there is no difference between
my_name.tel
dooid.me/my_name
about.me/my_name

Or www.facebook.com/my_name which is FREE and instantly recognisable worldwide.

It's easy to get rid of the ugly URL Facebook gives you as standard and join the ranks of the multinationals with www.facebook.com/mycompany
- see http://www.teltalk.org/t388-i-ve-given-in-to-facebook for details of how I created https://www.facebook.com/Domains123 in just a few minutes.

When will Telnic/Telnames realise that the "average Joe" just isn't worried about the potential loss of control that not having your own domain name could give you ?

.Tel needs to make a compelling case for people to use it worldwide now
- such as Telnames giving away FREE 1-YEAR .TEL REGISTRATIONS FOR THE FIRST MILLION REGISTRANTS !

I hope they don't fall into the trap of thinking they can just plod along and that one day the world will suddenly wake up and discover .Tel domains !

Business on the internet these days just doesn't work like that !

http://MikeSeaton.tel

mikeseaton wrote:I hope they don't fall into the trap of thinking they can just plod along and that one day the world will suddenly wake up and discover .Tel domains !

Business on the internet these days just doesn't work like that !

That's exactly what is happening right now. Certainly Telnic want to see first what is happening after introduction of Telnames and the 3 new templates. Next year they will be surprised no growth will have happened at all (even this is already visible right now)!

Rambo wrote:That's exactly what is happening right now. Certainly Telnic want to see first what is happening after introduction of Telnames and the 3 new templates. Next year they will be surprised no growth will have happened at all (even this is already visible right now)!

Albert Einstein defined INSANITY as Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results !

http://MikeSeaton.tel

[quote="mikeseaton"]

Rambo wrote:
Albert Einstein defined INSANITY as Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results ! http://MikeSeaton.tel

..
That quote can also be applied to domain investors who invest in every new TLD hoping to flip it, not directed at you or anyone here, I'm just saying many did try to flip without caring about anything other than it being a new opportunity to make a quick buck on someone else's dream, but I'm guessing many didn't invest due to doing research and realizing theres not much you can do with a .tel on the surface aka what was offered clearly was not enough to paint a pretty picture for someone they wanted to market it to.
..
I mean it sure takes effort and skill to flip a .tel because you have to find someone who understands your point of view on what .tel does, and 99% of the buyers I guess are looking at their own dream of what their website will be and .tel don't fit into theres as they all ready have enough perhaps on another site they want to relocate to a purchased sedo domain to manage or via a free blog etc and don't recognize the loss.
..
So realistically it's a small dreams market which is why .tel targets startups who need a quick setup and fast contact to start pulling in clients, so it should be and so should development be for as those people will if becoming a success will keep the .tel and in the long term will drive .tel to success and public recognition.
..
very late here and im tired so if you read what I said while editing sorry as it didn't make much sense

@fustachio

That is the important point.
Everybody is thinking .tel is another service for websites like other TLDs - just with another technology behind it. (Sadly the domain industry thinks even this technology is retarded.)
But who knows .tel was created for complete other reasons? Beside the team of Telnic there are only a handful of people in the whole world who know what .tel is capable of.
I bet even most domain investors bought their .tels without knowing what it is good for.
Unfortunately until today .tel is not used for what it was created for. I hope Telcos will understand one day what great benefits could be generated with it if used for the right purposes.
Without Telcos and phone manufactures .tel cannot find its breakthrough!
BTW since the cell phone market is completely dominated by two companies only, success for .tel isn’t possible without involving Apple and / or Google!

Valid stuff Jens, what concerns me is this conversation (with slight variations) has been going on for what seems like an eternity, first on Telnic's forum and now on TelTalk's.

.Tel certainly generates a lot of discussion by dedicated members of these forums, but unfortunately not by the person who really matters i.e. "Joe Public" !

Will this ever happen - if so how - and when ?

http://MikeSeaton.tel

mikeseaton wrote:Will this ever happen - if so how - and when ?

Three possibilities:
1.) Telnic will speak directly to the management of Apple and / or Google and will convince them about name dialing.
2.) Apple and Google are thinking about a name dialing solution themselves, make a market research for this topic and will found out that .tel is the perfect fit.
3.) A big marketing campaign about name dialing directed to "Joe Public", to SMBs and to CEOs of big companies. Especially business men would love to be dialed with a name instead of a number. The three year old love train video was a great start, but a) didn't reach the right people and b) doesn't make the viewer really understand what is the benefit of owning a .tel (since to non-insiders it looks you can do the same with any TLD if you put your business card on a simple .com).
Until today almost NOBODY knows .tel is working even without the website, because DNS queries are not understood or known by companies, domainers and customers!

And yes, I'm aware Telnic is waiting for critical mass before they will undertake step 1, but critical mass can be hardly reached without step 1. So we are running in circles!

[quote="JH"]

mikeseaton wrote:2.) Apple and Google are thinking about a name dialing solution themselves, make a market research for this topic and will found out that .tel is the perfect fit.

apple and google will knock on the door so eat your nother donut telnic employee you know it they got lost but are coming. get another coffee no panic