opinion Domain Name Investors Make Predictions For 2023

The more accurately we can predict the future, the better position we are in as domain investors. With that in mind, I sought views on: How Do You Think 2023 Will Be In Domain Investing?

That discussion thread included a poll on overall optimism or pessimism about domain name investment in 2023. In addition, it sought responses (up to 3 each) on the following:

• What TLDs do you think will be much stronger in 2023?
• Which TLDs will be much weaker in 2023?
• What sectors or niches will have a great 2023?
• What sectors or niches will have a poor 2023?
• Do you think top, middle or lower end of retail market will do best in 2023?

This article summarizes the responses. Thank you to all who participated.

Investors Remain Optimistic

Despite a somewhat muted final half of 2022, most investors remain bullish on prospects for the year ahead. At time of writing, just over 200 had voted in a NamePros poll, with 38.1% believing 2023 will be much better than 2022, and another 15.7% saw the year ahead as somewhat better. Just over 12% felt the year ahead will be much worse than 2022.

I asked a similar question in a Twitter poll. In the Twitter poll, 43.2% of the 44 respondents feeling that 2023 will be stronger than 2022, and only 6.8% seeing the year ahead as much weaker.

TLDs On Rise

I asked investors to predict which extensions would have a stronger 2023 than 2022. Note that I was looking for changes, not a statement of overall strength. Few doubt that .com will remain the dominant extension for many years, but will it get even stronger?

I went through the responses, both here and from Twitter, tallying the number of times each extension was mentioned. Investors were most positive about .com, .ai, .org and .xyz . I show below all TLDs that received 2 or more votes.

Other extension mentioned a single time include .app, .cc, .cloud, HNS, .in, .link, .network, .to, .today, and .vc.

TLDs That May Decline

I also asked investors to pick up to three TLDs that they felt may decline in 2023. Again, this was looking at relative trends, not overall importance of that TLD in the market. The most mentioned as likely to decline were .xyz, .co, and .com.

It should be stressed that some of the same extensions were in both the stronger and weaker lists, reflecting diversity in views. Many extensions received a single vote in the weaker poll.

Will The Strength Be In Country Codes?

While stressing that he was commenting on overall domain strength, and not specifically the aftermarket, @jmcc offered reflections on what he sees for the quarters ahead. He monthly tracks a large number of TLDs, and produces the HosterStats site, so has a strong base for his opinions.

The .COM is going to have a rough few quarters in 2023 because some of the discounted regs used to lessen the impact of Covid registrations washing out of the zone in 2022 will be up for renewal and most will drop. This will lead to a spike in deletions in Q1/early Q2 possibly above the normal Ghost of Christmas Past drop. A lot of low-end/highly speculative .COM regs will be dropped.

The .ORG has been outperforming .NET. It helps that it has little of the baggage of .NET and it resembles the ccTLDs in terms of renewals.

The .BIZ and .INFO have been struggling throughout 2022 and things may not improve for them. The increased renewal fees have seen businesses reconsidering their .BIZ and .INFO registrations.

The big threat to .COM will not come from the new gTLDs or the talks about a new round of gTLDs. It quite clearly will come from the ccTLDs. From 2019 to 2022, the momentum in the market shifted to the ccTLDs and many ccTLDs now get double, or more, the number of new registrations each month than .COM in their countries. That increasing inward focus in ccTLDs will affect the resale price of domain names in those ccTLDs. The problem is that newbie domainers not understanding that ccTLD sales and naming dynamics are different will lose money by applying the old .COM rules on pricing to ccTLDs.

It is important to add that he is talking about the traditional national country codes, not the repurposed generic ones.

Repurposed ccTLDs (.tv, .io, .co, .cc, .ai) will be caught between a rock and a hard place if the worst of a market shift happens between .COM and the ccTLDs.

Strong Sectors

I asked investors to predict sectors that will be strong in the year ahead. Not surprisingly, artificial intelligence was most mentioned, with web3, finance, energy, health and biotech also popular.

In addition to the sectors shown on the graph, others mentioned as likely to be strong in 2023 included advanced materials, automation, cannabis, climate, electric vehicle, insurance, property, science, smart devices and travel. Clearly there is some overlap between certain sectors.

Weak Sectors

The most mentioned weak sectors were meta, NFTs, real estate, luxury items and crypto.

A number of other sectors were mentioned a single time.

Best Performing Part Of Market

Based on a relatively small number of responses, 6 saw the lower end as the best performer, 5 felt it would be the top end, and 4 selected middle. However, 3 felt the lower end would be the weakest performer, so signifient diversity in opinion.

I also conducted a poll on Twitter asking which part of the market investors felt would have the strongest 2023. That poll received 41 responses, with results shown below.

While all portions of the market received support, about 44% felt the middle of the market would perform best.

@JudgeMind offered this comment:

Mid-quality names priced below typical pricing and great quality names will thrive.

The Economy And Domain Names

With massive government debt, high inflation in many countries, conflict and political fragmentation, climate change impacts, disruptions in supply chains, crypto concerns, falling equity value for the tech giants, massive layoffs in some tech sectors, and other disruptions of various types, the world is an uncertain place right now.

How will this impact domain names? Several respondents commented on what they saw happening. @AEProgram sees it this way:

The pandemic drove the revenues up of many companies that offer services for people starting their own business (GoDaddy, Fiverr, Wix, Shopify and many others). The layoffs will do the same. Layoffs will continue and that means more people will try going on their own. Even those not laid off, will start becoming more serious about going on their own.

The crypto and stock market downturn is hurting a lot of people too. A lot of people are realizing that a better route for them to make money is selling a product or service. This is great for domains.

He also went on to comment on some ways domainers could effectively respond.

Offering payment plans for domains will become more important. People have a lot less money then they did a year ago and the recent credit card debt data confirms how bad things are. As domainers we should try to be as flexible as possible with potential buyers right now.

@poweredbyme sees a lengthy economic crisis, with the next few years all worse than the preceding in domain names investment.

We will see the worst economic crisis in history in somewhere between 2025 and 2029.After the seeing worst, we will enter to a new age with largest economic wealth and improvements in all areas of life in history.

A few commented that the coming year may see opportunities for acquisitions by those who have funds to invest, such as this from @.X.:

I think it (2023) will be a buyers market.

What Type Of Names Will Be Sought?

@Mkt Sales Leads offered the following opinion,

The average startup will look for affordable .io, .co, .org and sensible brandable .com names in the $1k to $5k range until the day they get their millions in funding for their unicorn one word .com.

Look Back At Predictions For 2022

I summarized investor Predictions for 2022 in Domain Investing about a year ago. At that time, investors were even more optimistic of the year ahead, with 46.3% predicting 2022 would definitely be stronger than 2021, and another 22.3% feeling it would probably be better.

Respondents felt the economy was the biggest potential concern, and that is even more true today.

Final Thoughts

Keep in mind that some of the results in this article are based on a relatively small number of responses.

Please vote in the associated poll on what TLDs you plan to invest in during 2023. You may vote for up to 4 extensions. If you have major investment plans for something not on the list, mention that in the comments.

You can read the full set of comments from the How Do You Think 2023 Will Be In Domain Investing? NamePros discussion. Thank you once more to all who voted and commented.

Feel free to comment below with your thoughts on any aspect of the year ahead in domain name investing.

As this is my last NamePros Blog article in 2022, I wanted to thank all of you who read and interacted with the articles over the year. I truly appreciate your support, suggestions and interactions. Best wishes for a successful 2023.

Perhaps a fitting way to end this article is this quotation from the late Peter Drucker:

The bеѕt wау tо predict уоur future іѕ tо create it.

Let’s all create something great in 2023.

 

[DNWon]

Thank you Bob and Happy New Year!

One more prediction for myself and probably many others here is that in 2023 I will end up with more domains than in 2022!

 

[Armageddon]

The more accurately we can predict the future, the better position we are in as domain investors. With that in mind, I sought views on: How Do You Think 2023 Will Be In Domain Investing?

That discussion thread included a poll on overall optimism or pessimism about domain name investment in 2023. In addition, it sought responses (up to 3 each) on the following:

• What TLDs do you think will be much stronger in 2023?
• Which TLDs will be much weaker in 2023?
• What sectors or niches will have a great 2023?
• What sectors or niches will have a poor 2023?
• Do you think top, middle or lower end of retail market will do best in 2023?

This article summarizes the responses. Thank you to all who participated.

Investors Remain Optimistic

Despite a somewhat muted final half of 2022, most investors remain bullish on prospects for the year ahead. At time of writing, just over 200 had voted in a NamePros poll, with 38.1% believing 2023 will be much better than 2022, and another 15.7% saw the year ahead as somewhat better. Just over 12% felt the year ahead will be much worse than 2022.
Show attachment 229438
I asked a similar question in a Twitter poll. In the Twitter poll, 43.2% of the 44 respondents feeling that 2023 will be stronger than 2022, and only 6.8% seeing the year ahead as much weaker.

TLDs On Rise

I asked investors to predict which extensions would have a stronger 2023 than 2022. Note that I was looking for changes, not a statement of overall strength. Few doubt that .com will remain the dominant extension for many years, but will it get even stronger?

I went through the responses, both here and from Twitter, tallying the number of times each extension was mentioned. Investors were most positive about .com, .ai, .org and .xyz . I show below all TLDs that received 2 or more votes.

Show attachment 229439
Other extension mentioned a single time include .app, .cc, .cloud, HNS, .in, .link, .network, .to, .today, and .vc.

TLDs That May Decline

I also asked investors to pick up to three TLDs that they felt may decline in 2023. Again, this was looking at relative trends, not overall importance of that TLD in the market. The most mentioned as likely to decline were .xyz, .co, and .com.
Show attachment 229440
It should be stressed that some of the same extensions were in both the stronger and weaker lists, reflecting diversity in views. Many extensions received a single vote in the weaker poll.

Will The Strength Be In Country Codes?

While stressing that he was commenting on overall domain strength, and not specifically the aftermarket, @jmcc offered reflections on what he sees for the quarters ahead. He monthly tracks a large number of TLDs, and produces the HosterStats site, so has a strong base for his opinions.




It is important to add that he is talking about the traditional national country codes, not the repurposed generic ones.


Strong Sectors

I asked investors to predict sectors that will be strong in the year ahead. Not surprisingly, artificial intelligence was most mentioned, with web3, finance, energy, health and biotech also popular.
Show attachment 229441
In addition to the sectors shown on the graph, others mentioned as likely to be strong in 2023 included advanced materials, automation, cannabis, climate, electric vehicle, insurance, property, science, smart devices and travel. Clearly there is some overlap between certain sectors.

Weak Sectors

The most mentioned weak sectors were meta, NFTs, real estate, luxury items and crypto.

Show attachment 229442
A number of other sectors were mentioned a single time.

Best Performing Part Of Market

Based on a relatively small number of responses, 6 saw the lower end as the best performer, 5 felt it would be the top end, and 4 selected middle. However, 3 felt the lower end would be the weakest performer, so signifient diversity in opinion.

I also conducted a poll on Twitter asking which part of the market investors felt would have the strongest 2023. That poll received 41 responses, with results shown below.

Show attachment 229443
While all portions of the market received support, about 44% felt the middle of the market would perform best.

@JudgeMind offered this comment:


The Economy And Domain Names

With massive government debt, high inflation in many countries, conflict and political fragmentation, climate change impacts, disruptions in supply chains, crypto concerns, falling equity value for the tech giants, massive layoffs in some tech sectors, and other disruptions of various types, the world is an uncertain place right now.

How will this impact domain names? Several respondents commented on what they saw happening. @AEProgram sees it this way:


He also went on to comment on some ways domainers could effectively respond.


@poweredbyme sees a lengthy economic crisis, with the next few years all worse than the preceding in domain names investment.


A few commented that the coming year may see opportunities for acquisitions by those who have funds to invest, such as this from @.X.:


What Type Of Names Will Be Sought?

@Mkt Sales Leads offered the following opinion,


Look Back At Predictions For 2022

I summarized investor Predictions for 2022 in Domain Investing about a year ago. At that time, investors were even more optimistic of the year ahead, with 46.3% predicting 2022 would definitely be stronger than 2021, and another 22.3% feeling it would probably be better.

Respondents felt the economy was the biggest potential concern, and that is even more true today.

Final Thoughts

Keep in mind that some of the results in this article are based on a relatively small number of responses.

Please vote in the associated poll on what TLDs you plan to invest in during 2023. You may vote for up to 4 extensions. If you have major investment plans for something not on the list, mention that in the comments.

You can read the full set of comments from the How Do You Think 2023 Will Be In Domain Investing? NamePros discussion. Thank you once more to all who voted and commented.

Feel free to comment below with your thoughts on any aspect of the year ahead in domain name investing.

As this is my last NamePros Blog article in 2022, I wanted to thank all of you who read and interacted with the articles over the year. I truly appreciate your support, suggestions and interactions. Best wishes for a successful 2023.

Perhaps a fitting way to end this article is this quotation from the late Peter Drucker:

Let’s all create something great in 2023.

Thanks for ( again ) amazing post @Bob Hawkes
.TV not ?

 

[Bob Hawkes]

.TV not ?

Sorry for leaving that out. I have now added it at the end. The poll is set up so people can change votes, so if people already voted but would have included .tv feel free to revote. Thank you for pointing this out.
-Bob

 

[ThatNameGuy]

Thanks Bob....it's only because of my limited restriction that I can't vote for .LINK, however i see someone else already has Since noticing the takeover back in May I've spent 700 hours and about $10,000 accumulated 1,500 .link domains. One of them happens to Seniors.link, and since you and are both seniors I thought you and other senior domainers might enjoy this from America;

In order to save the economy, the Secretary of Homeland Security will announce next month that the Immigration and Customs Enforcement will start deporting seniors, instead of illegals, in order to lower Social Security and Medicare costs. A major study concluded that older people are easier to catch, offer less resistance, and—most importantly—will not remember how to get back home.

Be sure to send this notice to your relatives and friends so they'll know what happened to you! . . .

I started to cry when I thought of you . . . then it dawned on me -- I'll see you on the bus.

Happy New Year ALL!!!

 

[nametrekker]

Thanks, Bob, for your super analysis.

I believe single keyword .AI domains will continue to fetch high prices, as well-funded tech startups rebrand as AI companies similar to what happened with the cloud computing surge with companies rebranding to ___cloud.com and cloud__.com between 2008-2018

I'm curious to see what happens to .tv now that GD runs the extension. (will GD alot marketing spend on .TV?)

Sectors that will grow in 2023

1) Sportsbetting - record yr in 2022 and a behemoth FANATICS.COM will launch sportsbetting in January...sportsbetting now legal in 30 USA states

2) Healthcare, particularly telemedicine, and genomics

3) Energy...& Evs, Phevs, ecars, etc

4) Deep AI companies/apps/technologies...

5) Stream/Gaming/Esports/Sports

just my 2cents...

I'd love to see WEB3, W3 surge in 2023, as I have many web3 domains, but I believe this sector may take time to reach critical mass

 

[bmugford]

In order to save the economy, the Secretary of Homeland Security will announce next month that the Immigration and Customs Enforcement will start deporting seniors, instead of illegals, in order to lower Social Security and Medicare costs. A major study concluded that older people are easier to catch, offer less resistance, and—most importantly—will not remember how to get back home.

Be sure to send this notice to your relatives and friends so they'll know what happened to you! . . .

I started to cry when I thought of you . . . then it dawned on me -- I'll see you on the bus.

Umm..what? That has to be parody.

It is the type of thing you would read in The Onion and some gullible people would spread it as news.

Brad

 

[bmugford]

I think the good domains in 2022 will continue to be good domains in 2023.

Brad

 

[Bob Hawkes]

I added a few more TLDs at bottom of list including .me (an oversite), as well as .club, .art and a few others that some may include in their top 4.

 

[Bob Hawkes]

Sportsbetting - record yr in 2022

Healthcare, particularly telemedicine, and genomics

Thanks for the reflections, @nametrekker – all very well supported. I hate if we will see even more sportsbetting (it seems every ad when I watch sports is that), but you are probably right we will. Healthcare, especially the niches you note, will continue to be strong, I think.

I'm curious to see what happens to .tv now that GD runs the extension. (will GD alot marketing spend on .TV?)

Even though I did the .tv article a few weeks ago, and mentioned GD registry now in charge, the question whether they will do a bunch of advertising that could totally change the climate for the extension. We will need to wait and see.

I think 2023 will be a very interesting year in domain investing, even if it is turbulent in some aspects.

Thanks again.

-Bob

 

[nametrekker]

I concur, Bob. I love sports, but i don't gamble - the games often are too intense, without the added factor of "skin in the game".

I read a statistic from a reliable source - over 25% of university students in the usa joined mobile apps to wager on sports in 2022 - mind boggling . And this explains the ongoing sales of gambling domains.

A 3 word .com with key words "soccer". "live", "bet" sold on, I believe GD, for 10 K USD this past week.

.TV - if GD puts in the marketing and .TV sites become popular, it could become a viable extension. Kevin Durant launched BOARDROOM.TV - sports site - this yr.

I know predictions are often pure speculation, but I believe sportsbetting and healthcare domains should remain popular.

I predicted META domains would become popular about this time last yr and I had some good sales the first half of 2022, and maybe only one 4 figure sale the second half (commensurate with the downward spiral of META mrkt cap)

Happy New Year, Bob!

 

[nametrekker]

Umm..what? That has to be parody.

It is the type of thing you would read in The Onion and some gullible people would spread it as news.

Brad

I hope it's parody too. Reminds me of the 1970s SciFi film "SOYLENT GREEN" putting seniors not out to pasture, but sliced and diced for human consumption

 

[Bob Hawkes]

Hi @ThatNameGuy - I am not surprised that someone voted for .link, and I did remember your strong interest in the extension. With reasonable renewals, at least for non-premium, and some good names available, and a pretty generic meaning that allows lots of flexibility in use, has some things going for it. Will have to see how the new management at the registry handle the TLD.

I like your domain name Seniors.link that I could see used in a number of useful ways.

I wish you had omitted the part in bold. With online something will get reshared and somewhere down the line not realize it is parody or whatever. I would rather we keep it out of a NamePros thread, as Brad mentioned.

Bob

 

[ThatNameGuy]

Hi @ThatNameGuy - I am not surprised that someone voted for .link, and I did remember your strong interest in the extension. With reasonable renewals, at least for non-premium, and some good names available, and a pretty generic meaning that allows lots of flexibility in use, has some things going for it. Will have to see how the new management at the registry handle the TLD.

I like your domain name Seniors.link that I could see used in a number of useful ways.

I wish you had omitted the part in bold. With online something will get reshared and somewhere down the line not realize it is parody or whatever. I would rather we keep it out of a NamePros thread, as Brad mentioned.

Bob

Thanks Bob.....you're not the only professional domainer who believes .link has "some things going for it". I really respect your opinion, and especially your "opinion" about Seniors.link.

Also, I see now what you mean about the parody regarding "seniors". I didn't mean to confuse anyone....i just enjoy laughter

Happy New Year my friend

 

[Joe drake]

I dont understand .info with all the drops one word 3l wouldent it make sense for the tld owners to slash by 60% and i wold have no problem keeping all of them and reg more withth3 ongoing sales i stillthink it can become one ouf the top 5 again if these morons drop the price

 

[alcy]

I predict 50percent fewer domainers by end of 23

 

[cooljub]

I wish you had omitted the part in bold. With online something will get reshared and somewhere down the line not realize it is parody or whatever.

Oh come on Bob

...mind you, nothing these days would surprise me

 

[eyedomainous]

Umm..what? That has to be parody.

It is the type of thing you would read in The Onion and some gullible people would spread it as news.

Brad

Parody is often a 'humorous' spin on the ridiculous, but true, news. Such is the case here.

ICE (Homeland Security) has deported thousands of seniors. Veterans, who were enlisted as 'legal residents'. Nonetheless, many... when they applied for VA benefits and it was discovered they were never officially declared citizens, were deported.

As a veteran, who has also been dissuaded, by racists in the service, from accessing my VA benefits I know this battle... and I'm happy to see the 94,000 deported vets may be coming home.

 

[bmugford]

Parody is often a 'humorous' spin on the ridiculous, but true, news. Such is the case here.

ICE (Homeland Security) has deported thousands of seniors. Veterans, who were enlisted as 'legal residents'. Nonetheless, many... when they applied for VA benefits and it was discovered they were never officially declared citizens, were deported.

As a veteran, who has also been dissuaded, by racists in the service, from accessing my VA benefits I know this battle... and I'm happy to see the 94,000 deported vets may be coming home.

Well, that is not exactly the same thing as was posted.

Regardless, anyone who serves honorably in the military should have an automatic path to citizenship IMO.

I don't want to take this thread too far off-topic though.

Brad

 

[eyedomainous]

^ True, its not exact. You would have to change 4 words:
seniors to veterans, 'instead of' to as, and older to Hispanic.

Now I feel obligated to get this thread back on topic.

Glad to see .TV included, because Godaddy made its take-over move for a good reason, it knows where the web is headed. Sales for TV domains in general will increase in the coming years. And, as TV.com domains are out of Godaddy's reach grabbing .TV is the only move they had.

Now they just need to lower the price to be more competitive with TV.com.

 

[robert widener]

Interesting thread

 

[devXC]

.app
.dev
.me

The demand of web and business solutions are increasing. Projects and Applications.

 

[WillW]

I haven't been able to keep up with the new trends but imo .com will always be on top every year 2023 and so on.
Also certain .org names as well.

I read the other day that .art domains did well this year...That was super surprising news to me. I tried looking up some decent random .art names and they are $$$ (registry owned). Maybe they and some other extensions will continue to improve but I honestly don't invest in those names so I don't really care about those extension trends. TBF I don't know enough about them to even give an opinion on them.

Super brandable and non-niche specific brandable names sell pretty well and that will continue.
The names well worth over 5 fig will stay the same. Depends on the economy at times but overall I don't see much of a change.

For me it really just comes down to one thing: if there's a market and a buyer for that name, it will sell. Regardless of the year or extension or niche. Figuring out what names will sell is the real question and even if you do, it still doesn't mean it will sell. Catch22.art

 

[devXC]

My impact was 4, now it's -4 for just sharing my opinion. Lol

.app
.dev
.me

The demand of web and business solutions are increasing. Projects and Applications.

 

[buydomainnames]

COM as my most focus on 2023 , and the second options is .xyz