Hybrid Domainer

Will Anyone Care About The Classification of an Extension in the Future ?

By: RH

In a world of 1000 new tlds is it safe to say that all extensions will be looked at as one specification ?

The public has no idea between a gtld, cctld, repurposed cctld or a sponsored gtld.

There was a good blog post by Morgan Linton on MorganLinton.com (which I am a contributing writer) titled Why I Think Some Of The Hottest New gTLDs Aren’t New To Us. Morgan mentioned .me, .co and .tv which of course are all country codes. Some say don't classify them as new gtlds, others think that it is just the pedantic ramblings of a fool to be worried about the distinction.

Some will point out there is still a risk that the country who was delegated those two letters, can change the rules of the game at any time. I have heard that for years while writing about and consulting in .tv.

I would say that there is some risk and it would be foolish to say there is zero like some have said. Can any small repurposed cc tld take the chance of pissing off the Internet world at large.

In the future this may all be blended into one distinction, its an extension. I certainly don't have the answer, what do you think on the topic ? Will all extensions be looked at the same 5 years from now ?

 

Getting the CC Tld to go along with the .com

By: RH

Getting the Country Code to bolster the .com

I had a potential buyer interested in a domain that was related to the city of Toronto. Let me say upfront that the name was not a premium domain. The buyer said, "Comment: I'm interested in this domain if under $100 to purchase from you." Now like I said this name was not a premium name but I thought it was worth more than $100. I sent him back a reply with a link to a sale of a comparable domain that had the same keyword string but with a different city. I told him I was not looking for that kind of money for the domain, but more than $100.

After I sent the email I said to a friend, "He is going to register the .ca version." I could have had a friend who lives in Canada register the domain as I am not Canadian and would not have met their registration requirement. The name was just not that important to me so I did not do that.

The prospective buyer came back with, "Thanks for getting back to me. Given I'm a Canadian firm, I just bought the .ca version of the exact same domain so that will work just fine. Good luck."

I replied back that I knew he was going to do that and wished him good luck. This is also a case that shows that end users are not always looking to pay big bucks. The guy used an email that was easy to research his company and see the company did a lot of business. Now he did not own the company and it seemed maybe he was going to work for himself.

Now maybe I should have regged the .ca but like I said the name was not that important. I do have an acquaintance that told me that he owned an Indian name in .com that the sales process had stalled. He regged the .in and told the buyer he would throw that in. The deal got done at the price he wanted and the buyer was happy to have the .in along with the .com.

So if you have a domain related to another country get the country code to go along with it. It may help you make more sales and at the very least it takes alternative options away from prospective buyers who without them, may be more willing to negotiate at your pricing expectation.

What the Globe would look like if it were country codes

By: RH

Byte Level Research produced this map which is pretty cool if you are a domainer.

Each ccTLD is sized relative to the population of the country or territory, with the exception of China and India, which were restrained by 30% to fit the layout. At the other end of the spectrum, the smallest type size used reflects those countries with fewer than 10 million residents.

(click to enlarge)

You can purchase a full sized map from the company. (We have no financial interest in the purchase of these maps).

High-quality print, suitable for framing

The map measures 24 inches by 36 inches and is printed on high-quality, 80 lb. uncoated cover stock with a one-inch margin to accommodate most frames.

Purchase here

Some nice .be and .nl sales at Sedo

The Belgium extension did not have one sale make it in the top 100 reported cctld sales last year.

Yesterday sales at Sedo included

relatiegeschenk.be (18,100 EUR) Promotional item looks to be the rough translation to English

meubels.be (8,599 EUR)

The Netherlands had 1 sale in the top 100 last year, that name Kortingen.nl sold for 21,952 Euros well that was almost matched by hoekbank.nl (21,002 EUR) The domain was registered in 2005.

The one letter domain of C.gy sold for $1750 not quite matching the one letter K.to for $40,000. Which sold earlier in the week.

Breakdown of the top cctld sales of 2011

Looking back at 2011 from a sales standpoint, here is the breakdown of the top CCtld sales.

Once again .de led the way with 24 of the top 100 sales reported to Dn Journal for 2011, .Co.uk was number two and .co came in third.

Aktien.de stocks in German led the way at $725,000

Meet.me at $450,000

Beds.co.uk at $130,400

The top ten was not dominated by .de and co.uk. Surprisingly .com.au had two names in the top 10, .ly and .ag each had one.

24.de
14.uk (13.co.uk, 1.org.uk)
10.co
8.me
5.tv
6.eu
4.it
4.com.au
3.ca
3.es
3.fr
2.nl
2.in
2.ly
2se
2.us
1.co.za
1.cc
1.ag
1.pl
1.gr
1.ch

Data courtesy of DN Journal.com

Human rights, vanity domains and CC TLDS

Violet Blue wrote an excellent article on cc tlds and the human rights policies of the underlying country. She talks about how she had her domain VB.ly taken back.

Summary: A country’s global human rights index affects your domain stability. Learn how bit.ly, goo.gl, t.co, Yahoo! and more score in URL integrity.

A country’s global human rights index, and therefore the freedom it affords to its population, is directly proportional to the freedoms that country will allow you to exercise with your cutesy domain registration.

As we’re at a point in internet history where the land rush of TLD extensions is about to explode with choices, it seems to me that a wise girl ought to take a look at just how stable your vanity domain extension is before making a business plan around it.

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/violetblue/url-shoppers-how-stable-is-your-cutesy-vanity-domain/724

Career.co.uk sold for 17,510 British pounds

Some five figure CCltd sales today on SEDO.

Mueller.Asia sold for 10,000 Euros. Looks to have been bought by a German company with the same name. .Asia not a cctld but thought it a worthy sale to mention.

KopierPapier.de sold for 15,000 Euros. Still in transfer with SEDO.

Career.co.uk sold for 17,510 Pounds.  Regged in 2000. Purchased by individual.

.DE and .Co.uk

Its no surprise that .co.uk and .de dominate the weekly cctld sales. Taking a look over the last few years it seems .co.uk has been very steady in the top 100 yearly sales.  .DE has bounced up and down in their dominance. 

2008

.co.uk had 15 of the top 100 reported cctld sales

.de had 23 of the top 100 reported cctld sale

2009

.co.uk had 13 of the top 100 reported cctld sales

.de had 48 of the top 100 reported cctld sales

2010

.co.uk had 16 of the top 100 reported cctld sales

.de had 25 of the top 100 reported cctld sales

 

*Sales data courtesy of www.dnjournal.com