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mole
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GoDaddy.com: Bob Parsons, CEO
Q. Why the Super Bowl spot?
A. Why not?
Look, the reason is this: Our advertising has pretty much all been online. Right now, we get five million visitors a month to our sites. Forty-seven percent are driven there by online advertising; the rest are referrals. We have the best value proposition of any registrar: price, features, support and supporting products. We didn't understand why everybody doesn't do business with us. We commissioned some market research six months ago, took a hard look at people who aren't doing business with us, and concluded that they aren't aware of us. So what better way to enter [an awareness campaign] than to use the Super Bowl? The Super Bowl's not a one-shot ad for us. We'll follow up with a campaign that spends a million a month, mostly in TV, radio and print. We're already doing print right now in USA Today and other papers. TV and radio are going to wait for the Super Bowl to kick off.
Q. What's your online marketing strategy?
A. We do online advertising now very aggressively. It's primarily with the search engines and other, more viable types. We're doing that [now], and we've been doing that.
Q. Brand Autopsy took you to task for choosing to run this ad, and you jumped right into the discussion. Why'd you get personally involved?
A. They were comparing us to Pets.com. They assumed that because we decided to advertise on the Super Bowl, we're going to go the way of the other dotcoms. I thought, why not jump in and try to set the record straight? And what better guy to do that than me?
Q. Do you monitor blogs daily?
A. We have a very keen eye on what's happening on the Internet that pertains to us. We have a fulltime department doing news research. We have a group monitoring chat rooms and forums. :evil: Quite often we don't respond, and then there are times when we need to get involved and set the record straight.
Q. What's the creative for the Super Bowl spot?
A. Everybody asks that question. I'll tell you what I told a woman from the Daily News. She asked, "Will the ad feature any celebrities?" I said, "I can't tell you that." She asked, "Will it be humorous?" I said, "I can't comment". Then she asked, "Will it feature any animals?" I said, "That depends on your definition of animal."
http://www.clickz.com/features/q_and_a/article.php/3450291
http://brandautopsy.typepad.com/brandautopsy/2004/12/no_godaddy_no.html
Hi folks,
My name is Bob Parsons. I'm the President and Founder of GoDaddy.com.
Hope you don't mind if I chime on in here. After reading your comments I just couldn't resist the temptation.
First I appreciate everyone's concern about Go Daddy making a mistake by advertising on the SuperBowl.
Second, I want to assure everyone that being a SuperBowl advertiser is not a make or break deal for us.
There's probably a few things you might not know about Go Daddy and I thought maybe this might be a good time to point them out. Here they are:
1. GoDaddy is the world leader in domain registrations. We've been profitable since Oct 2001 and expect sales in 2005 (without the SuperBowl) of close to $200 million. The earlier dot coms that busted after advertising on the SuperBowl were never viable to begin with.
2. GoDaddy has no debt and I'm the only investor. After paying for the ad we have very significant cash balances. The lion's share of the cash Go Daddy generates always has been reinvested back into the company to develop new product, improve our systems, provide better support etc.
3. GoDaddy is the one of the very few companies that develops every bit of the technology that it sells. Presently we have 30 full time development teams (all here in the USA). So because we have no licensing fees to pay, our prices are lower than our competitors and our margins are good. Let's us provide good support(all based here in the USA) for our customers.
4. I promise that the ad will not say "who's your GoDaddy?"
5. GoDaddy registers a new domain name about every 7 seconds. Our market share is between 20 to 25%.
6. We believe we have the best value proposition in our industry but many prospective customers just don't know about us. We've decided to try reaching them using traditional media (radio, tv and print).
7. The SuperBowl ad will *not* be a one shot deal. It's just the beginning. It's going to be followed up by an extensive advertising campaign.
8. The money we're using for the SuperBowl Ad and the followup campaign will not in any way take away from what we spend on developing our products, improving our systems and supporting our customers.
9. Either way the SuperBowl ad works out, the company will be just fine. We're paying for the ad using cash surpluses generated this year (most companies would simply pay this money out to the owners --- not me --- I'd rather have a SuperBowl ad). Our product development will continue as it is, and our support will stay sharp.
10. I agree that our home page could be a little prettier, but it works. So you know the old saying about if it ain't broke....
Thanks,
Bob Parsons
President & Founder
GoDaddy.com
Q. Why the Super Bowl spot?
A. Why not?
Look, the reason is this: Our advertising has pretty much all been online. Right now, we get five million visitors a month to our sites. Forty-seven percent are driven there by online advertising; the rest are referrals. We have the best value proposition of any registrar: price, features, support and supporting products. We didn't understand why everybody doesn't do business with us. We commissioned some market research six months ago, took a hard look at people who aren't doing business with us, and concluded that they aren't aware of us. So what better way to enter [an awareness campaign] than to use the Super Bowl? The Super Bowl's not a one-shot ad for us. We'll follow up with a campaign that spends a million a month, mostly in TV, radio and print. We're already doing print right now in USA Today and other papers. TV and radio are going to wait for the Super Bowl to kick off.
Q. What's your online marketing strategy?
A. We do online advertising now very aggressively. It's primarily with the search engines and other, more viable types. We're doing that [now], and we've been doing that.
Q. Brand Autopsy took you to task for choosing to run this ad, and you jumped right into the discussion. Why'd you get personally involved?
A. They were comparing us to Pets.com. They assumed that because we decided to advertise on the Super Bowl, we're going to go the way of the other dotcoms. I thought, why not jump in and try to set the record straight? And what better guy to do that than me?
Q. Do you monitor blogs daily?
A. We have a very keen eye on what's happening on the Internet that pertains to us. We have a fulltime department doing news research. We have a group monitoring chat rooms and forums. :evil: Quite often we don't respond, and then there are times when we need to get involved and set the record straight.
Q. What's the creative for the Super Bowl spot?
A. Everybody asks that question. I'll tell you what I told a woman from the Daily News. She asked, "Will the ad feature any celebrities?" I said, "I can't tell you that." She asked, "Will it be humorous?" I said, "I can't comment". Then she asked, "Will it feature any animals?" I said, "That depends on your definition of animal."
http://www.clickz.com/features/q_and_a/article.php/3450291
http://brandautopsy.typepad.com/brandautopsy/2004/12/no_godaddy_no.html
Hi folks,
My name is Bob Parsons. I'm the President and Founder of GoDaddy.com.
Hope you don't mind if I chime on in here. After reading your comments I just couldn't resist the temptation.
First I appreciate everyone's concern about Go Daddy making a mistake by advertising on the SuperBowl.
Second, I want to assure everyone that being a SuperBowl advertiser is not a make or break deal for us.
There's probably a few things you might not know about Go Daddy and I thought maybe this might be a good time to point them out. Here they are:
1. GoDaddy is the world leader in domain registrations. We've been profitable since Oct 2001 and expect sales in 2005 (without the SuperBowl) of close to $200 million. The earlier dot coms that busted after advertising on the SuperBowl were never viable to begin with.
2. GoDaddy has no debt and I'm the only investor. After paying for the ad we have very significant cash balances. The lion's share of the cash Go Daddy generates always has been reinvested back into the company to develop new product, improve our systems, provide better support etc.
3. GoDaddy is the one of the very few companies that develops every bit of the technology that it sells. Presently we have 30 full time development teams (all here in the USA). So because we have no licensing fees to pay, our prices are lower than our competitors and our margins are good. Let's us provide good support(all based here in the USA) for our customers.
4. I promise that the ad will not say "who's your GoDaddy?"
5. GoDaddy registers a new domain name about every 7 seconds. Our market share is between 20 to 25%.
6. We believe we have the best value proposition in our industry but many prospective customers just don't know about us. We've decided to try reaching them using traditional media (radio, tv and print).
7. The SuperBowl ad will *not* be a one shot deal. It's just the beginning. It's going to be followed up by an extensive advertising campaign.
8. The money we're using for the SuperBowl Ad and the followup campaign will not in any way take away from what we spend on developing our products, improving our systems and supporting our customers.
9. Either way the SuperBowl ad works out, the company will be just fine. We're paying for the ad using cash surpluses generated this year (most companies would simply pay this money out to the owners --- not me --- I'd rather have a SuperBowl ad). Our product development will continue as it is, and our support will stay sharp.
10. I agree that our home page could be a little prettier, but it works. So you know the old saying about if it ain't broke....
Thanks,
Bob Parsons
President & Founder
GoDaddy.com
