Company owns a corporate domain portfolio of several hundred domains. A large, incumbent corporate registrar provided their domain management and registry services. Company also used several retail registrars from legacy relationships acquired over the years by IT, digital marketing and as a result of M&A activity.
Business Challenges
In 2016, Company domain management stakeholders in IT and marketing experienced a number of challenges managing their domain assets. With multiple service vendors, their domain management costs were excessive and several vendors presented control and management problems. Internal processes for ordering, managing and tracking domains were inefficient, requiring manual steps and administrative workarounds. Domain asset management and support was dependent upon time-consuming staff processes combined with external professional services.
The rapid expansion of generic top-level domains (gTLDs) made it apparent to Company leadership that domain management was becoming more complex and total cost of ownership was increasing, in part due to having multiple vendors. Company also recognized that slow, manual and non-integrated domain management processes were impeding business objectives such as brand innovation and customer digital experience.
They determined to find a solution that would offer:
- Vendor consolidation for greater operational efficiency;
- Cost reduction (internal and vendor cost);
- Enhanced business intelligence (to gain competitive advantage in the market.)
Solution and Outcomes
Company’s brand and IT management decided to consolidate their domain portfolio on a single, integrated digital asset management platform that would meet the needs of internal stakeholders: digital marketing, brand management, IT, finance, and IP legal (intellectual property) teams. Company selected Authentic Web Inc. including turnkey project management service to consolidate disparate domain name services to a single platform.
Authentic Web delivered the following:
- Domain portfolio audit to identify redundant/unnecessary domains for elimination.
- Project Management: Transfer and assign domains internally to operating entity ownership by business unit or department.
- Reduction of Total Cost of Ownership through vendor and process rationalization.
- Improve control, security and policies with automated, digital asset management workflow.
- Provide visibility to cross-functional stakeholders with domain asset intelligence.
- IN SUMMARY, Company reduced its total cost of ownership and gained workflow control, visibility and tools to improve efficiency. Assets are secured under one platform and teams are empowered with enterprise tools they need to manage the company’s digital footprint.
Client Perspective
“In early 2016 <Confidential Company> conducted a review of our corporate registrar and domain portfolio management service. From that review, we decided to seek a lower cost, higher performance service and found Authentic Web.
From day one, Authentic Web has provided a premium level of service – from pre-sale support, to domain migration and onboarding, we have found the Authentic Web team to be highly responsive, very well informed, and thoroughly professional. The project management of our migration was first-rate, with a clear plan, status updates, and communication throughout. The Authentic Web platform is easy to use and our IT users and Marketing users alike have found it a considerable step forward. Our relationship with Authentic Web is already strong, built largely on Authentic Web’s willingness to act as a thought partner and strategic guide.”
Head of Global Digital Marketing<