Julie Wohlberg and Kevin Laird are headed to Miami to cover NamesCon Global, taking place Nov. 11–12, 2026, at Ice Palace Studios. NextNow will provide ongoing coverage from the conference, focusing on what its discussions mean for brands, entrepreneurs and the businesses that help people establish a presence online.
The gathering brings together domain investors, brokers, registrars, registry operators, technologists and service providers. Its relevance extends beyond buying and selling web addresses: domain names sit at the intersection of brand identity, customer discovery and the infrastructure behind digital businesses.
What NamesCon brings together
The organizer’s 2026 themes include digital identity, discovery beyond conventional search, digital-asset monetization and entrepreneurship in the AI era. NamesCon will share its Miami venue with CloudFest Americas, bringing the domain community alongside hosting, cloud and internet-infrastructure businesses.
That combination creates a useful reporting opportunity. A company’s name, website platform, hosting arrangements and customer-acquisition tools are often purchased separately, even though customers experience them together. NextNow’s coverage will examine where those services are converging and what buyers should ask before committing to a new product or provider.
Speakers on the published lineup
GoDaddy CEO Aman Bhutani is announced as a NamesCon keynote speaker, with a presentation examining the company’s transformation around AI-native entrepreneurship. His appearance puts the relationship between domain services and AI-enabled business tools directly on the program.
The published joint NamesCon and CloudFest speaker roster also includes Miriam Schwab, head of WordPress at Elementor; Rachel Sterling, chief marketing officer at Identity Digital; Andee Hill, senior director of GDD accounts at ICANN; and Larry Fischer, a partner at GetYourDomain.com.
Other listed speakers include Gandi CEO Arnaud Franquinet, Name.com’s head of product engineering Katie Wokasch and GoDaddy’s general manager of aftermarket and professional services, Alan Shiflett. The roster spans website creation, domain operations, marketing and the resale market. Listed participation does not imply that every speaker will address every theme, and schedules remain subject to change.
Why business leaders should pay attention
For marketing teams, the practical questions concern recognizability, trust and how customers find a business as discovery tools change. For founders, the questions include choosing an identity that can grow with the company and understanding the services attached to it. For technology leaders, they include control, security and continuity across providers.
The published schedule includes a domain and digital-asset auction on Nov. 11, followed by additional programming on Nov. 12. Auction activity can offer a window into buyer priorities, but individual transactions should not be treated as a forecast of broader domain values or business returns.
Ongoing coverage from Miami
Wohlberg and Laird will follow the conference’s business and technology conversations for NextNow, with ongoing reports from Miami. Coverage will distinguish announcements and sales pitches from independently supported results, and look for concrete implications for customers, operators and brand leaders.
This preview draws on the organizer’s published event information, speaker roster and schedule. Attendance plans are confirmed by NextNow; this article does not report firsthand observations from an event that has not yet taken place.
Sources: NamesCon Global; published speaker roster; schedule at a glance.