miss spelt domain name sharks

[Jchudleigh]

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Hi all

Thanks for all your advice - As I am new to affiliate marketing it is very helpful to see what is considered acceptable and not acceptable.

As a novice it seemed to me that it was just plain dishonest as they are profiting from peoples honest mistakes on search keywords at Laura Ashley's cost- but as most of you pointed out, this is a missed opportunity by Laura Ashley so just accept the situation as it is.

Not too keen to hear what the guy will want for the domain name though.

Thanks again
Joel

[Utterfly]

As a novice it seemed to me that it was just plain dishonest as they are profiting from peoples honest mistakes on search keywords at Laura Ashley's

well, even though I'm on a domainers side, shouldn't give you such advice.. =) but to tell you the truth, obtain this domain via UDRP without much complications.. Just look at the previous cases and hire a good solicitor to run it for you..

[splashy]

personally - all's fair in love and war - and internet marketing .

If the company hasn't forseen the impact of the internet and covered the bases its their lookout if someone else picks up the odd domain name. If you are still getting the sales whats the problem ?

[bapages]

Why not terminate there affiliation?

[ParisEngLtd]

If you just start terminating affiliations because your affiliates picked up on something you missed you are going to rapidly end up with none !!!!
Your affiliates are like a huge sales force making the company money, would you sack a salesman who found a new angle to make you yet more money??


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[bapages]

Personally yes if the salesman was obtaining customers looking for us and accidentally walked into next door by error. Within a moment the customer would realise his error and in most cases go to the correct store next door, without the salesman directing him and claiming the commission.

This is no different to me with typo's, the customer inadvertently types the wrong address but unless registered most times search engines will give a 'do you mean message' if a web site does not exist.

[nim-b]

For anyone interested, here is the nominet page on domain name disputes Domain names and trade marks and a specific one on the tesco case Tesco v Elogicom Ltd

As has been said before, misspellings are a far more difficult case than any url containing a trademarked name (like the tesco case), as technically they don't contain the trademark only a misspelling. I do think merchants have more of a case with urls such as wwwlauraashley.co.uk etc as these contain the trademark.

To be honest, like others on this forum I'm amazed noone at Laura Ashley thought of buying that domain before, its a really obvious one.

If you want to crack down on this kind of activity (and I'm not sure if that's the best thing to do), I would change your affiliate t&cs to something clear, but make sure you notify all affiliates and give them time to stop current activity.

[Helen]

Joel

I used to work on the Laura Ashley affiliate program way back when David Selby was in charge. Might I suggest you contact the affiliate in question as you need to get the past history on the relationship! Before you jump in head first and try to get the domain back you should really understand the actual setup as your company have been down this road a few times ( i know as i ran the account).

I think you are being very harsh on your statement that "It's just plain dishonest as they are profiting from peoples honest mistakes". Talking to the affiliate about the history will help make things clear for you.

There are simple techniques in working with (not against) such affiliates, if you want to know how then happy to give you some consultancy. I have been down the road with many large companies for misspelt domain retrieval - all I can say is make contact before you jump in with trying to get the domain back and spending a large amount of money on lawyers letters.

All the best in your new role
Helen

[BASILF]

Why not terminate there affiliation?

I would do this now and wait to see what happens. This is blatent passing off and you control the situation.

[drivetowin]

I would do this now and wait to see what happens. This is blatent passing off and you control the situation.

And lose all of the traffic...............or worse still see it sent to a competitor.

If I was Laura Ashley I would be far happier to receive that traffic via an affiliate than not receive the traffic at all.

[Helen]

Joel needs to go back to the affiliate to get the full picture...simply terminating the relationship could result in loss of sales and possibly diverted to a competitor. Joel needs to talk to the affiliate in question, at the same time they need to know their legal position on the domain and then take it from there.

[BASILF]

And lose all of the traffic...............or worse still see it sent to a competitor.

If I was Laura Ashley I would be far happier to receive that traffic via an affiliate than not receive the traffic at all.

The domain is listed in the search engines so it is taking traffic away from the main site.

[kier]

And lose all of the traffic...............or worse still see it sent to a competitor.

If I was Laura Ashley I would be far happier to receive that traffic via an affiliate than not receive the traffic at all.

Its probably not an either/or situation though. If you're looking for Laura Ashley and you get redirected somewhere else I imagine plenty of people would realise they made a mistake and either type the correct URL or use another method to navigate to the site. It may very well be that if the affiliate was suspended from the program , regardless of where they sent the traffic, that Laura Ashley might be better off overall as a decent percentage of it would still find them and they wouldn't have to pay commission on it.

In this instance I'd want to know if the affiliates was adding any extra value as well or if all their traffic is basically coming from people mistyping the URL.

[sgpratley]

In this instance I'd want to know if the affiliates was adding any extra value as well or if all their traffic is basically coming from people mistyping the URL.

In this case I'd say yes as they are indirectly generating US sales ( have a look at the page they've set up).

It's easy enough with hindsight for a merchant to say "we could have done that", but the fact remains that they didn't, and letting affiliates come up with ingenious ideas , then nicking them is not a good way to progress a programme.

Anyway, having been on both ends of domain disputes I can definitely recommend counting to ten, and picking up the phone for a constructive conversation as the first move.

[kier]

You can choose to go to the US site through other ways so I don't see how that is adding value really? I agree affiliates are great for coming up with good ideas. Whether registering domain misspellings could really be seen as ingenious in this day and age is another matter altogether.