| Q | Why NobleOak? |
| A | NobleOak.com is a website whose goal is to provide business information and services of the highest quality giving your business the vitality, durability, and longevity required to reach its maximum potential!
Noble: 1 a : possessing outstanding qualities : ILLUSTRIOUS b : FAMOUS, NOTABLE
2 a : possessing very high or excellent qualities or properties b : very good or excellent
Oak: 1 a : any of a genus (Quercus) of trees or shrubs of the beech family that produce acorns; also : any of various plants related to or resembling the oaks b : the tough hard durable wood of an oak tree c : known for their durability, vitality, and longevity (white oaks can grow up to 450 years old)
(source: Merriam-Webster's Dictionary) |
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| Q | What is a domain name? |
| A | A domain name is simply a unique internet address that allows people to find a particular website. For example typing www.NobleOak.com into your browser address field will bring you to the NobleOak Corporation website.
The way that this is accomplished is through the Domain Name System (DNS) servers. www.NobleOak.com is translated into a numeric Internet Protocol (IP) address that your computer can understand and locate.
Domain name searches are free. Search for your domain name now. |
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| Q | How much does it cost to register a domain name? |
| A | Registering a domain for one year costs $9.95. A multi-year registration drives the price to as low as $7.95/year. See our complete pricing here. You can also compare our prices with other registrars.
Domain name searches are free!
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| Q | How do I purchase a domain name? |
| A | 80% of online users do not know how to buy a domain name and you are about to leave that group.
You can conduct a free domain name search on NobleOak.com in the box to the upper right hand corner of this page or click here. Once you find a domain name that is available, you can purchase it through the online shopping cart. It is as simple as that. |
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| Q | Can you tell me more about the whole domain name infrastructure? |
| A | Each Top Level Domain (TLD) such as .com or .net is the responsibility of a single company called a registry whose sole function is to maintain a record of every domain name in that TLD. You cannot buy a domain name directly from a registry.
That is where NobleOak.com enters the picture.
NobleOak.com is an intermediary for you, the customer, and the registry. We maintain relationships with each registry in order to offer you .com, .net, .org, .biz, .info, .ws, and .us domain names. |
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| Q | All the best domain names seem to be taken - can you help me find a related and available domain name? |
| A | We can also help you to find variations of any word or domain name using our Advanced Domain Name Search tool. After you submit a domain name for a regular search, scroll down on the search results page and click on the DynaGen Advanced Search to help you find a suitable domain name. We will intelligently return multiple results for many related variations thereby expediting your search for the perfect domain name. Your many many choices may surprise and even delight you.
Another option is to backorder a domain name. |
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| Q | Can I backorder an expiring domain name? |
| A | Our partnership with Snapnames allows you to place an order on an existing but already registered domain name. This is called a backorder.
The domain name prospecting phase of the internet is coming to a close signalled by the 750,000 names expiring every month. Backorder your desired domain name here.
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| Q | Can you share some tips and strategies on web site design? |
| A | Take a look at our Expert Advice for web site design musings. |
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| Q | How do I select a corporate legal structure in Canada? |
| A | There are advantages and disadvantages to each corporate legal structure. Incorporating is a wise move if your business has potentially high levels of risk and liability. Alternately, you should consider a sole proprietorship or partnership if you are a home based business with little or no risk.
Learn more about Canadian legal structures here. |
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| Q | How do I select a corporate legal structure in the United States? |
| A | We recommend American Incorporators as a great source of information about Incorporating, Limited Liability Companies (LLC), and answers to FAQs such as 'Why is Delaware the preferred state for Incorporation?". |
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| Q | How do I apply for a trademark? |
| A | If your company requires protection in the form of a trademark for a unique product, name, or marketing tag line you can apply for a trademark at TradeName.com |
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| Q | How can I bootstrap my business or start it with no money down? |
| A | The rule today (and maybe it should always be thus) is, if you have cashflow, you will get financed, not the other way round.
There really are no 'no money down startups'; there are only those with little money down. In reality every business requires some investment. What we are talking about is starting a business with an amount of money that is really the minimum with respect to the size of the opportunity. Mark McCormack started world leading sports management business (IMG, International Management Group) with $500, his law degree and Arnold Palmer as his first client.
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| Q | What are some sources of bootstrap capital? |
| A | 1. Soft Capital: Mom, Dad and rich Uncle Buck-- a 'friends and family' financing round either formally or informally organized
2. Home equity loan
3. SBL (Small Business Loan)-- GOC Program or other government sponsored sources of start-up capital
4. Future customers or clients
5. Future suppliers
6. Strategic partners
7. Micro capital lending and grant programs
8. Rights fees (for example, Molson's purchase of pouring rights for the Corel Centre)
9. Patent or other IP licensing fees
10. Consulting
11. Partners
12. Debentures
13. Financial leasing
14. Receivables factoring
15. Vendor financing (30, 60, 90 days or more)
16. Sponsors
17. Trading activity
18. Credit cards
19. Business Plan Competitions
20. Extracting upfront value from your lease for office space
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| Q | What is 'Guerrilla Marketing'? |
| A | Essentially 'Guerrilla Marketing' is where you substitute brains for simply spending more marketing dollars.
More about 'Guerrilla Marketiing' here. |
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| Q | Why is 'Guerrilla Marketing' so important for the small business owner? |
| A | With any new business, controlling expenses is vital to your success. Scarce marketing dollars need to be spent wisely for the maximum Return On Investment (ROI).
Web sites by and of themselves don't work very well in a world of 60,000,000 domain names sold and 40,000,000 + web sites. Sure, there are always Google searches and lots of other search engines too but with paid search engine optimization rampant in the industry, the larger sites are buying their way to the top of the returned search results.
That is why, it is possible that the web may not be the democratizing force in the global economy that many people hoped for. It may be that there is only room for one eBay, one Amazon, ... that the web could be a force for monopoly rather than competitive markets.
The cost of developing a really good web site presentation layer, a solid backend, acquiring the bandwidth, establishing the order fulfillment side of the operation and doing all of this at very high levels of reliability in the murky world of the web while resisiting hackers and denial of service attacks of all types is huge.
So for smaller operators they have only one shot at it-- they need to have the ability to effectively market their web sites in RL (Real Life). Without this, they are doomed no matter how good their products, services, presentation or technology are.
They need effective, inexpensive marketing-- guerrilla marketing, if you will.
More about 'Guerrilla Marketiing' here. |
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| Q | Can you provide examples of 'Guerrilla Marketing'? |
| A | The following examples are simply meant to get you thinking - realize that your efforts are still bound by local laws which should be adhered to at all times.
Example 1 - A local high tech company doesn't have the marketing budget to put inserts into the local newspaper for distribution to their target market. Early one morning, the founders go out with abundant pocket change and they open the paper boxes and insert their marketing brochure; then close up the boxes and wait for the phone to ring. Note: illegal
Example 2 - In the early days of a local business publication, they dress up an employee in an outrageous costume and he goes about town putting money into parking meters before the parking police can ticket the vehicle. They call up the local radio and TV stations and get blanket coverage. The Mayor denounces the practice but citizens feel good about the new good samariatan in town and the paper presumably too.
Example 3 - A local tech company puts up hundreds of $2 placards along the main drag where techies tend to go advertising their web site and for recruitment purposes too. They put them up on a Friday night after the city workers go home and they remain up for five days before the City has the signs removed. Note: illegal
Example 4 - A local Subway franchisee takes over a loser of a location. Every day at 10:30 am he sneaks over to the megamall parking lot and puts $1 off sub coupons under the windshield of 500 cars. He also visits every local office within three kilometres between 11:00 am and noon weekdays over an 18 month period. He brings in a huge platter of finely cut subs and a bunch of $1 off coupons. He talks his way past the recepitonists and gets into even highly secure buildings and hands out free food and coupons by the bucket load. Within two years that location alone is making over 100 grand for him and his family.
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| Q | How do I write a Business Plan? |
| A | There are a number of resources that provide fantastic information about writing business plans. In keeping with our philosophy of not reinventing the wheel, we recommend the following links to get you started on your business plan:
Business Plan Basics
General Business Planning
Essential Elements of a Good Business Plan
Preparing Your Business Plan
A Sample Business Plan
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| Q | What is the next step in getting my web site up now that I have purchased NobleOak hosting? |
| A | You are almost there! The next thing you need to do is create a file called 'home.html' and FTP it to your domain address listed in the hosting confirmation e-mail that you received when you purchased the hosting package. You need an FTP client side program such as the excellent and free WS_FTP LE program by Ipswitch. |
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