domains Dubai and domain names

[Arpit131]

Dubai is the business hub of the middle east and is known for its luxury lifestyle, ultramodern architecture and nightlife.
Being in the domain industry, you just can't ignore the urls even if they are mentioned on buildings. Here are some of the my observations about domain names used in this part of the world, in the last two days that I have been here:

1) .COMs dominate the market here over .ae extension, which I thought would be more popular here. Pharmacy shops, hospitals and private practitioners such as dentist, gynaecologist, orthopaedics etc. mostly use .COMs, as I could see a lot of URLs on buildings and hospitals. So, there is an opportunity for geo domain investors to look into this market.

2) There are a lot of tourists here. Therefore, english is a well known language among common people, though they prefer to speak in Arabic and occasionally, Hindi. English keywords sounds totally fine for the businesses here.

3) Cab and tourism companies are plentiful and popular, and therefore, people owning rental domain names related to this geography have a good chance of getting a fantastic price if they approach the right buyer.

4) People are crazy about cars. You can literally find every high end cars on the streets of Dubai. Sports cars are very popular. A lot of car enthusiasts who visit Dubai go for renting high end cars. Therefore, if you have domain names like Exotic cars, or any other related names, you can get a good price for those, selling it to these service providers in Dubai.

5) There are exhibitions happening throughout the year in Dubai. Owning geo domain names in those category may also help fetch some good price.

6) People are filthy rich here. If they want something, they want it!! Any price, and they will take it. Money is not a matter.

Here are some of the domain names that I came across as advertisements and could recall :

a) During my research about the place, I came across the website VisitDubai.com ranked higher than Dubai.com.
b) Self storage provider TheBoxMe.com.
c) Emirates.com, in the flight.
d) MaiDubaiWater.com, the drinking water service.
e) OSN.com, the television entertainment.
f) TheDubaiMall.com, which is the largest mall in the world by total area.

So, I guess investing in .COM domain names related to this area makes sense. Although I haven't personally sold any domain name to someone from Dubai or Middle East for that matter, but I sure am going to give it a try. Perhaps, people who have had first hand experience buying or selling domain names from/to businesses in Middle East may share their experience and let us know what works and what not.


P.S. The brand name H & M, which is a well known brand, has a showroom in Dubai Mall. One of the glass walls of the shop reads www.H&M.com(I couldn't take the photograph). That makes me wonder if people are actually aware of the domain names. Even big brands such as these which uses HM.com, are making such mistakes('&' is not even a valid character for domain names).


Please share your views, advice, experiences and criticisms, if you have any, related to this.

Thanks!!

 

[Shams]

It is not going to affect the new projects initiations. The Dubai Expo is coming in 2020 and the prices will rise again.

It long way to 2020. the current market situation is unstable. the market will be more affected by the end of 2017. when the VAT will apply in UAE and GCC countries but we also cannot neglect that dubai always rise with new boost as these crisis already hit once before in 2008. whatsoever the real estate and domaining are both different worlds.

 

[Ricardo M]

how many inquiries you have got till today. if surprisingly you have inquiries on that domain,. How many are above 1000/-AED (272$) .

I had someone from Europe offering 4000 dollars. After a deposit of 10% he had let it go. I also live in Dubai and i have some contact with the biggest property site here if you know what i mean. I'm a RE broker myself and in my 4th year so related to this name i got loads of contacts to offer it too. I just brought it this week on the market

 

[Ricardo M]

I own

SuperCityDubai.Com
DubaiTechPark.com
DubaiSafariPark.Com

Only got few enquiries for DubaiSafariPark.com

The safari park opens this year. You got a great potential with this in my opinion. Very marketing friendly.

 

[Ravish Kapila]

The safari park opens this year. You got a great potential with this in my opinion. Very marketing friendly.

Yea got an email 2 weeks ago for DubaiSafariPark.com found out the guy who emailed me works in Dubai Municipality so emailed him with price , haven't got any reply yet may be due to Ramadaan Holiday I think.

 

[Arpit131]

You forgot to mention the Real Estate business. With so many agencies and developments there is also a large interest in strong names... It's also for sale if you are interested

Absolutely. Thanks for mentioning the real estate business. I could see a lot of construction going on, one of the main contributors being the Emaar Group.
The construction business is huge in Dubai, and even though the prices fluctuate(decline recently according to a comment in the post), which is natural, the wealthy people are investing in real estates in Dubai.
Also, a lot of people are registering their companies as LLC(Limited Liability Company) and building a business there.

You have forgot to mention one obvious thing about Dubai... Dubai Diamonds...

Dubai gold is more famous than diamonds, as far as I know. Gold is on a bit of a cheaper side as compared to other asian countries.

 

[Arpit131]

There haven't been that many insane reported Dubai domain sales compared to all the hype about it... tried reaching out to Dubai companies with no success or when they did respond, didn't offer much.. hope it changes in the coming times

I just checked namebio.com after you brought the topic up. There aren't many sales reported. The best I could see if DubaiEscorts.com for $46,000 and not many recent sales.
Thanks for sharing your experience.

Dubai is a fabulous city indeed but if you are talking about domaining.NOPE ....
in case i'm unclear Nooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Just by Seeing Huge Buildings and Parks. you cannot assume you can make good sale here. Most local companies here prefer .AE extension and other companies just choose the name which is available. multinational companies who launch their new brands. They usually use suffix or prefix or .AE etc.

That was a good insight. Thanks a lot. This is the purpose of the post; to know what others have experienced so far and invest accordingly; or rather not invest according to you!

Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum has a large collection of high end vehicles. If he owned Highendvehicles.com he could showcase his collection and share with the world.

If you sell Highendvehicles.com to him for 1 million dollars I will give you $200,000 commission, I will also throw in middleeasternblog.com for free

Haha..Thanks for the direct brokerage offer ;P
I think he would be more interested in Cars.com etc. looking at his fleet of cars!

'H & M' have promoted this brand since 1968, way before domain names were invented. Although the '&' is not allowed in domain names it was proberly to late to change their name either for contractual and/or branding reasons.

You can find similar oddities in other company names like Mercedes-Benz who have keep there '-' since 1926.

They didn't need to change the name. They already own HM.com. Just need to print it right on their showroom. Especially when you own such a fantastic name!

After reading the above statement, do you think we can sell domain names in Dubai? It is a waste of time and money to invest in Dubai related domain names. And one who owns big businesses in Dubai are mostly Indians, and my experience is that it is very difficult to get a big price for domain names from Indians.

That was the reason this point was mentioned to discuss. It was a big negative and made me reconsider. However, let's wait for someone to turn up with some success story related to this, maybe.

So far, the reviews about investments are mostly negative. Thanks for your input.

Btw, I know a lot of Indians who pay the right price for domain names, provided they are willing to buy the name that you are willing to sell! For people and businesses, anywhere across the globe, you need to pitch your products the right way and show the value behind those, to the users. Only then do they value it right!!

 

[Abdullah Abdullah]

Trying to sell any domain names in ME is worthless 99% of the time. I have tried before and saw that people or companies simply believe what they currently have or what they can easily reg cause the main believe here is if the company is Big , and even if you have bad domain name, then people will HAVE to learn it in a way or another

 

[TRY]

I'm reminded about how the brick and mortars in 90's chose not to embrace the internet, and look what happened to many of them. Dubai today gets a small percentage of its revenue from oil, most of it from tourism and real estate. 2 industries where online marketing is essential. Just sayin

 

[TRY]

Arpit131 P.S.....And one who owns big businesses in Dubai are mostly Indians, and my experience is that it is very difficult to get a big price for domain names from Indians.

Good think I own indiannewsletter.com, I can easily target and market to them, ..someday....here's something to think about, China for example controls the internet and if they don't want you to market to the Chinese in china they will block you, BUT they can't stop you from marketing to the Chinese when they are accessing the internet from other countries.

 

[Ricardo M]

But as discussed. The most valuable domain is horse.ae which has been sold for more than a million. Now it's rare to sell a domain here as even most of the brokerage offices don't reply.

 

[Brandables]

Well Dubai is just a city. Even if we expand the horizon, how many Arabic domains have you seen doing well. Apart from a few sales not even one word arabic domains are selling. I have seen many one word Really popular arabic domains for sale on sedo for about $1000-$2000

 

[Kate]

The most valuable domain is horse.ae which has been sold for more than a million.

I don't believe that.
https://www.namepros.com/threads/abudha-bi-domain-name-sold-dh-12-000.814426/

 

[Atta]

But as discussed. The most valuable domain is horse.ae which has been sold for more than a million. Now it's rare to sell a domain here as even most of the brokerage offices don't reply.

This speaks the amount of money Dubai's royals own! Otherwise, it didn't have that much worth. It is listed for sale but it won't sell for 7 figures again.

 

[Haroon Basha]

Trying to sell any domain names in ME is worthless 99% of the time. I have tried before and saw that people or companies simply believe what they currently have or what they can easily reg cause the main believe here is if the company is Big , and even if you have bad domain name, then people will HAVE to learn it in a way or another

Your statement is 100% true. Being a Saudi Resident for than 20 years, I know domain names are not so popular here. If at all, the company needs one, they register any .com name by paying $ 10. Even short Arabic names are selling very cheap. You can sell one thousand domain name in a small country, like Vietnam, but here there are no buyers not even for 10 names daily.

 

[DnSpy]

I own Dubaicity.net. I've got few inquiries over the year. But waiting for good price

 

[Abdullah Abdullah]

And one other thing that you might or might not have noticed is that many Arab or ME companies or people like the .NET more than the .COM.

I know many companies with .NETs than .COMs and I personally made further research on this issue and found out that normally in Arabic , when they are making ads or telling someone about their website they always use the word :
"" Net or Network " which in Arabic means " شبكة "

So you will hear a lot the following

"" موقنعا على شبكة اللانترنت "" Which if you translate literally means Our Website on Internet Network so since .NET is seen as such they always use it that

 

[Shams]

@Abdullah Abdullah Somewhat you are right and you have done excellent research. however The Arabic Word " شبكة " you are quoting, they usually use that for Mobile Network or Wifi Signal/ Network etc.

 

[Abdullah Abdullah]

@Abdullah Abdullah Somewhat you are right and you have done excellent research. however The Arabic Word " شبكة " you are quoting, they usually use that for Mobile Network or Wifi Signal/ Network etc.

exactly and they relate it to the internet. They always say the internet network

I hear it everyday as I live in an Arabic speaking country

search شبكة اللانترنت and you will see what I mean

 

[Shams]

exactly and they relate it to the internet. They always say the internet network

I hear it everyday as I live in an Arabic speaking country

search شبكة اللانترنت and you will see what I mean

I know Abdullah, What you mean. i quoted your point on .Net not on the language. unlike other countries UAE only have 10% nationals and 90% expats approximately and in those 10%, only 0.05-1% holds their own businesses except royal family. So, simple point is" They don't give a damn about domaining or extensions . "

 

[GoKaizen]

The more money a person/company has the less likely they'll buy domain names.

 

[Haroon Basha]

The more money a person/company has the less likely they'll buy domain names.

The statement suits 100% on Middle Eastern countries.

 

[omelet]

I have dubaimediainc.com

 

[Hexapo]

I have Emirfamily.com and Emirateseagles.com

 

[Windpoint]

Hi,

first a big hello to all in this threat. Im a new member and appreciate being here !

Related to dubai and the uae domain discussion I want to point to


visitdubai.top
dubaiescorts.top
دبي.top ............ Dubai
الامارات.top ....... Emirates How do you see the chance of selling them ?


You'll find another 16 arab states IDN's in the "sell IDN" section.Welcome and have a look !
best, Wp

 

[Arpit131]

But as discussed. The most valuable domain is horse.ae which has been sold for more than a million. Now it's rare to sell a domain here as even most of the brokerage offices don't reply.

Horse.ae may have sold for that price because sports betting, horse betting in particular, is very popular in Dubai with people, especially from royal families involved in it. Given the amount of money royal families hold, it wouldn't be a stretch to imagine them paying that amount for this domain name!!

As of now, the website shows that the domain name was purchased for $1.6 million in 2009 and is now being offered for sale.