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Some thoughts on the .CO extension - portfolio experiment

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Since October I've been running a massive .co investment test. Dumped some 5-fig on the TLD, not exact math yet but in that range.

Here is what I observed.

- I did have a bunch of sales since then. However, for some weird reason, in March / April it just stopped It's getting 2 months now since I haven't sold about any. What the heck. It's not like I've sold the good ones and that's it. I haven't changed pricing. Or at least haven't increased any.

There's something else going in the market right now, something I can't fathom. Yet.

- I sold a bunch at $199/299 and also some $499. I haven't yet sold any .CO for more than $750. I believe though you can definitely sell a great .co for $2500 and more, and some NP-ers here had, of course. Side note I have mostly 2-words but also a few 1-word. I will renew a small % of them.

- I'm looking at the distribution of sales and it's totally random.

I've expected the top quality domains to sell first, for example those which are registered in almost any tld imaginable and the ones everyone would definitely sell for 4-fig. They didn't. The most I've sold some names which might also be sold below 1k even as .coms. (Edit: most of what I sold are registered in 2..3 of the top 10 tlds or so; the ones that I have which are registered in all of that... never sold. Weird.)

My conclusions so far from this experiment are as follows.

- The beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Not everyone will go for a .co.

In fact, surprisingly perhaps, less competitive domains have sold in my case. I'd say that better brands/ companies are still avoiding .CO. At least this is my observation based on the portfolio I have. I see SMB's going hard for them, as a .com replacement.

- It is yet very early for .CO, although there is definitely a positive trend here. But I would not advise anyone getting into a significant investment like I did, chances are it won't bring much yield.

I'm personally gonna be in profit on this tld, but overall it's lower than my .coms and even my few .orgs for example. I will only renew a few of them. The other will be discounted and then left to expire ($22+ renewal is not attractive).

Anyway, I still got far better results with .co though in comparison with other tlds. Have some .contact and a lot of .xyz, sales been quite meh on those. Unsure if I'll get my investment back on those, but it was an assumed risk. .CO was decent.

- If you buy some .CO, do it scarcely and cherry pick a lot. Buy the ones you will definitely want to renew and also the kind that you would price 2k+ and keep there. Top quality names.

- For my xxx range sales, the best sales were ones matching an everyday business. For example something like "PestRemoval" .co would be good. Whatever fits an everyday SMB. More special names didn't sell - at all. No AR, VR, or whatever. No crypto etc etc. But again someone else would have a different experience depending on portfolio. I got luck with "shop" names + some niche word that is rather common.

- I doubt pricing xxx range is going to bring good return overall. So skip any of that, domains that don't qualify for higher price; stick to 4-fig names and only those. Renew if you afford /think you should, but keep that small, its costly overall. Otherwise, keep watching what expires and get them cheap for one year, no renewals.

That's about it. Good luck and please share your experience too. Thanks!
 
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I'm also trying an experiment with .co I don't have many but will be adding more over the course of the next week or two.

Made a basic site today, to house them - here

I've never dabbled in .co but as long as they are on promo, I'd imagine it would be hard to loose money. But you never know.

Thanks for sharing your experience/advice
 
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I'm also trying an experiment with .co I don't have many but will be adding more over the course of the next week or two.

Made a basic site today, to house them - here

I've never dabbled in .co but as long as they are on promo, I'd imagine it would be hard to loose money. But you never know.

Thanks for sharing your experience/advice

Nice names! Although for some reason I saw better results personally, with more down to earth names.

So I'd bet on printandcolor for example, rather than on pixelforce. Good luck
 
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- It is yet very early for .CO,
.Co has been around for a while. I don't like them either. Never had any good results with them. I even have a better experience with the newer .app.

Right now, I think I have about one or two .Co domains left in my portfolio. I doubt I will be adding to that.
 
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.Co has been around for a while. I don't like them either. Never had any good results with them. I even have a better experience with the newer .app.

Right now, I think I have about one or two .Co domains left in my portfolio. I doubt I will be adding to that.

I obviously know it's been around for quite a while. Yet it's early for consistent sales results as it's a hit and miss as far as I can observe. That's what I meant.
 
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Just Recently Purchased Some .CO Domains to Experiment But I Guess .CO Market is flat For Now. The result is not as expected but Hope things get turn around.

And also lately i haven't seen any .co domains high sales being recorded , Been While.
 
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Just Recently Purchased Some .CO Domains to Experiment But I Guess .CO Market is flat For Now. The result is not as expected but Hope things get turn around.

And also lately i haven't seen any .co domains high sales being recorded , Been While.

Thanks. Hopefully it will turn around soon. But I'm alright even if results are weak, have good earnings from other tlds, especially .com.

Significant sales fluctuations from one part of year to another are common with domains, or year to year. In general you should have a larger and diversified portfolio and a pool of cash to enjoy consistent revenue.
 
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On further thought, I think a better approach is to do more targeted investment.

Like buying a .co that you can outbound for example. Or, even better, purchasing great .co's for significantly more than register fee (valuable ones) and holding them for longer (few years) to sell full retail.

You might get them for a better price right now, I guess.
 
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Domain sales and sales in many businesses that get their sales from inbound come in waves.

If you looked at your portfolio and needed to guess what name sells next you cant, same with the timing.
 
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If you looked at your portfolio and needed to guess what name sells next you cant, same with the timing.

True. Domaining can be a strange business, especially when dealing in low grade/average names. It's usually the ones you don't expect to sell that do.
 
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do you think some great typo will work with dot co?
Like example - pijja.co byke.co vizit.co tabel.co?
 
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one more thing,
I just checked namebio,
methods of the big sales past year of more than 1000 USD what's my sedo.

all other Marketplace might be half of the sales in sedo.

what might be the reason?
Does sedo of European customers appreciate dotco more than others?
 
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one more thing,
I just checked namebio,
methods of the big sales past year of more than 1000 USD what's my sedo.

all other Marketplace might be half of the sales in sedo.

what might be the reason?
Does sedo of European customers appreciate dotco more than others?

Most domainers do not buy many dot co's. Some of the ones that buy a lot of them might park at sedo and that is why there are more sales there.
 
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do you think some great typo will work with dot co?
Like example - pijja.co byke.co vizit.co tabel.co?

I don't think so.

Most domainers do not buy many dot co's. Some of the ones that buy a lot of them might park at sedo and that is why there are more sales there.

I got more sales at Afternic, but some at Sedo too. It also matches more or less my .com sales ratio accross these platforms as well.

There are reasons I do such experiments, trading cash for time. I usually at least make back my money. With .co's I just realized I will be in profit significantly in the second year and later, as there are some gems that will definitely be renewed.
 
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I don't think so.



I got more sales at Afternic, but some at Sedo too. It also matches more or less my .com sales ratio accross these platforms as well.

There are reasons I do such experiments, trading cash for time. I usually at least make back my money. With .co's I just realized I will be in profit significantly in the second year and later, as there are some gems that will definitely be renewed.
Where do you park?
 
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The biggest issue with .co is it’s so close to .com. I always wonder what the leakage is in traffic and emails. Seems too much of a business risk. It may work for really memorable hacks like lo.co but otherwise I’m not sure it’s worth the risk.
 
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The biggest issue with .co is it’s so close to .com. I always wonder what the leakage is in traffic and emails. Seems too much of a business risk. It may work for really memorable hacks like lo.co but otherwise I’m not sure it’s worth the risk.
Rick Schwartz addressed this recently in an interview, he gave the overture example and the huge leak
 
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What percentage of your .co sales have been via Afternic Fast Transfer vs. not?
 
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What percentage of your .co sales have been via Afternic Fast Transfer vs. not?

Edit: Corrected, thought it was about Sedo. Sorry don't have that info, will have to do a check. However about everything I sell is specified as a Fast transfer sale.
 
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Rick Schwartz addressed this recently in an interview, he gave the overture example and the huge leak

Interesting.

However there are still enough buyers, in fact the usage of the .co TLD is on the rise lately.
 
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i have sold a few dot cos the largest sale was $250.
currently i have 0 dot cos because it becomes a new dot me tld.
 
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In 3F range you can sell any good name in any normal TLD.
 
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one more thing,
I just checked namebio,
methods of the big sales past year of more than 1000 USD what's my sedo.

all other Marketplace might be half of the sales in sedo.

what might be the reason?
Does sedo of European customers appreciate dotco more than others?
Because most non-hidden reports are coming from Sedo official feed.
Afternic/GD and DAN don't report anything.
The only one reason here.
 
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