advice Choice for startup .io .xyz or .pro

[sandyhere]

I have a start up plan for an online service. As usual legacy extensions have already been taken. I want to keep name short hence will prefer any of above extensions.
What you feel which one will be best for long term. I have costly option of buying .com in aftermarket but this is beyond discussion for present thread.
My assessment
.io is popular among startups, .xyz is booming rapidly and cheap to try, .pro also appears nice option.
Please give your views in comparison.
Thanks pals.

 

[techname]

Try to get a .com or .xyz. I would think carefully about using a country code like .io, despite the fact that Google treats it as a generic. At the end of the day, it stands for Indian Ocean, not in/out. There are also certain restrictions on its use.

 

[bytedo]

Out of those extensions you specified I would suggest you go for .io. It is already associated with innovative disruptive firms.More so if your planned venture is in the area of finance, tech, ecommerce. entertainment etc

 

[coolool]

5L.com is good for business.

 

[BrandChimp]

.pro can be a bit cheesy
.io great for tech app or software
.xyz good for anything

 

[Constantin S]

.io without doubt.

 

[BrandChimp]

dot co, cheaper, more recognized, short, makes sense

.co risky domain will loose good traffic. Trust me I've made money parking .com domains that where similar to .co sites

 

[BrandChimp]

dot co, cheaper, more recognized, short, makes sense

.pro and .xyz are about $10/year

.co more like $25+

 

[Jurgen Wolf]

.com is some kin(d/g) of religion in American mind... so nothing new in such advice...

 

[Recons.Com]

What does religion have to do with the market adoption?

If the consumers know .com, expect .com, type .com, judge by .com, why would any company waste resources (marketing money, time explaining etc.) trying to go against this adoption, all while gifting its traffic to .com or .cctld, while potentially also losing valuable email inquiries etc?

 

[Jurgen Wolf]

OK, just one example: try to sell any .com to Polish-enduser... and write your results...

 

[imadoer]

personally i would need a gun stuck to my head to use one of these as my extension for my site.

i guess i would go with .io

 

[ivey]

I am not sold on .xyz. Just doesn't come off as professional or serious. .io seems to be getting traction but only time will tell..to see if it picks up among common folks. I would just save and get a .com. However if i had no other choice I would easily choose .io over that kids play extension.

 

[Jurgen Wolf]

Accordingly PL-endusers: .EU is 2nd choice for them, not .com

 

[RU]

what about a .com?

 

[Recons.Com]

.PRO in Russia is very popular among endusers incl. BIG-endusers...

I highly doubt that.

.su (Soviet Union) and .com are the second choice names there.

See the first pages here:

http://top100.rambler.ru/navi/?theme=49

it is all .ru, .su, .com...

 

[Jurgen Wolf]

But no doubts for me... because I regularly work with .PRO-WHOIS and visit them...
Also saw via TV-ads...

 

[Recons.Com]

But no doubts for me... because I regularly work with .PRO-WHOIS and visit them...
Also seeing via TV-ads...

Sure. If you say so. Also, it probably has to be Chinese premium letters .pro for Russia, right? What about dashes? Do they like dashes?

 

[Jurgen Wolf]

No, this is like tender.pro or multivarka.pro and tons of other keywords...

 

[AuctionBio]

io is better among all mentioned, I think this is becoming popular and very soon this will be more popular after net

 

[AuctionBio]

Just because we know what .io means, doesnt mean all your customers will even recognize it or even trust it. I was doing work for Lithuanian man. He wants site to rent the basement weekly. I have nice .com for that. I want to buy he says. Go for .ca was my reply, very local market.
.what... all he knew was .com
All these extensions are very confusing.

That is why com will dominate for ever as for as domains are concerned

 

[usernamex]

I have a start up plan for an online service . . .
. . . I have costly option of buying .com in aftermarket but this is beyond discussion for present thread.

I am most partial to IO, I hold many and I am a geek so I am biased.

Let's pretend your great IO name is x9qv dot IO. Is there x9qv[descriptiveword] dot com and you could buy both? Or BUYx9qv, GETx9qv dot com or some variation? Then you could redirect the two word dot com to ease lay people into the IO. Then later when it takes off upgrade to the expensive already taken x9qv dot com

If it is a service that most people will access online through a link or downloading an app then I think it matters less and you could just get the IO

 

[inland]

I have a start up plan for an online service. As usual legacy extensions have already been taken. I want to keep name short hence will prefer any of above extensions.
What you feel which one will be best for long term. I have costly option of buying .com in aftermarket but this is beyond discussion for present thread.
My assessment
.io is popular among startups, .xyz is booming rapidly and cheap to try, .pro also appears nice option.
Please give your views in comparison.
Thanks pals.

All three might work fine. Here is what I would do:

1) Register or obtain all three for 1 year.
2) Make a list of 7 domain names with a mix of TLD's.
3) Read the list to a prospective customer for the online service.
4) Ask them to right down the first three names that they remember.
5) Set up a landing page for each of the three.
6) Push some traffic to each page with a free downloadable PDF.
7) See which one gets the most downloads or optin's.
8) Speak the domain names out load into a recorder or ask someone to do it.
9) Play it back and see what sounds the best.
10) Register the .com with the TLD at the end of the name.
11) Use the TLD that makes the most sense.

I made a list of 15 names that I registered and will do part of the above.

Good question, by the way.

 

[deez007]

I think .io would be a good move. - perhaps by all 3 and point them to the .io domain.

So you can use all 3 extensions for different marketing drives.... like XYZ might work better in the Asian market... so u can use the .xyz domain for ur marketing effort in the Asian market... and then use the .pro as well for perhaps a market segment where it might work better in... even if you use country specific domains for ur marketing in those countries ...with them all pointing back to the main .io domain.

 

[Recons.Com]

Make sure that the name for your startup isn't trademarked somewhere already or you may end up losing the domain.

My choice would be .xyz unless your startup name can be included in the extension like pitch.black (sorry, can't think of anything better).

Also, a name doesn't mean much and it won't matter if your startup is successful. Just look at "Yahoo" or "Google"...hardly great names

Brandon

Yahoo was a fantastic dictionary word/exclamation.
2
yahoo
play
interjection ya·hoo \yä-ˈhü\
Simple Definition of yahoo

• —used to express excitement or joy
  

Google is easily pronounceable and they made sure to link it to actual word and narrative.

googol
play
noun goo·gol \ˈgü-ˌgȯl\
Popularity: Bottom 30% of words
Definition of googol

1. : the figure 1 followed by 100 zeros equal to 10100
   

 

[Frank Demitri]

@sandyhere I believe you should avoid .xyz as verisign is already in a legal battle with xyz. The xyz team is basically domainers. There has been a lot of negative going on right now for xyz and if you see ntld stats most of their domains are parked so there is no real buying going on i guess. .PRO is a good choice and i think it will make you look like a pro in your business. By the way where are you buying it from I just saw it on dotintra website for $2.99 with $15 renewal and I think it is a great deal, havent seen cheaper so far so will revert once I find the answers.

Personally, I think you should by .gdn (global domain name), its a generic extension and comes with free email blasting as told by the support of dotintra which is good for any new startup...They are pretty cheap too.

Let me know what you think.