3rd Level Domains

Published 21 December 07 12:09 AM | dickbetts

I got the following question and decided to turn it into a blog.

Hi *** -

I'm curious, how do you see third level domain names playing a role in someone's technology plan?

Happy holidays,
- Brian

Well Brian and everybody else I see 3rd level domain becoming a standard for the real estate industry.  First your website, by having the ability to direct to a 3rd level you can place anything on that site.  It's almost like having a seperate website connected to your main site.  On my site so far I have build 6 3rd level domains to promote products or services which is like a landing page before I send them on outside my site.  If I were a REALTOR I would have a 3rd level for every listing where I would post a flyer about the listing, including a photo array of the inside of the house.

The other reason is the big one, Smartphones are selling 4 to 1 to computers, there are more Smartphones in the world then computers.  On each one of my listing I would have something like http://123mainstreet.DickBetts.comon the sign in the front yard.  All the folks with Smartphones could sit in front of my listing and pull up the flyer about the house and view the photo array.  Once the house is sold I could hang a sold sign and change my 3rd level to give more information about the sale.

My hosting company gives me the ability to track the number of hits per page, so I could feed this information to the seller and also see if my advertising efforts and cost are paying off.  If I just had a listing page then I could not tell which house they were looking at.

Going along with the 3rd level domain is an email address like 123mainstreet@DickBetts.com which I would color code in Outlook to easily track that listing.

There is so much we can do with 3rd level domain, this is only a taste of how I think we all will be using it.

*** Betts

National Speaker

Comments

# connecticut said on December 20, 2007 11:09 PM:

***, how true. I use third level domains for document libraries, training materials, and the like. It's a great way to have a back door for team members to gain access to info and other things. Only issue there is if a member leaves and you have to "re-key"....but that a simple change of the 3rd level entry word. Nice blog, stright to the point.

# zoomjer said on December 20, 2007 11:09 PM:

***,<br><br>  I really like how you're opening my mind up to this new concept.  I never even thought of using email addresses for properties, and not just for people.  I can add this to my marketing plan!<br><br>-Jerry<br>

# dickbetts said on December 20, 2007 11:09 PM:

Fine you owe me beer when I come back!

# The Zolve Team said on December 20, 2007 11:09 PM:

Great post, ***. Very informative. Thank you.<br><br>The Zolve Team

# dickbetts said on December 20, 2007 11:09 PM:

Brad, I want your take on the following response I got on another blog site.

Hi *** - thanks for responding to my original question.  However, I think this is going to be a topic that you and I disagree on.  I don't see third level domains as being a necessity for Realtors.  In regards to your site, you could have displayed the exact same information by using a site structure like "www.dickbetts.com/.../" rather than using a third level domain like "http://epro.dickbetts.com".  A smartphone will be able to access either URL example ... the only real difference is the number of characters that a user would have to type.

In regards to personalizing the URL for an individual listing, the third level domain is only one option.  You could use a unique directory:

 www.dickbetts.com/123MainSt

You could use a unique page:

 www.dickbetts.com/123MainSt.html

Or you could create a unique domain (Listing Domains and others can offer help with this):

  http://www.123MainSt.com/

Each of these methods can be tracked through an analytics tool and you can inform the seller of how much traffic has been generated for their listing.

This is just my opinion and nothing personal, but I think it is a poor use of a Realtors time to learn about third level domains and how to implement them.

Happy holidays,

- Brian

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