new gtlds Headless.Domainer in a Topless.Bar

[betthelot]

Now I got your attention. I'm going to burst some myths about the new gTLDs. Its been nearly 2 years since the launch and what have we learnt.

The Registries (UniRegister, Rightside, Donuts, Tucows, Mind + Machines......)

1. ALL of them over estimated demand.
Remember, Mind+Machines saying in 2013, dot COM will be dead in 10 years. Their share price has halved since early 2014.
Frank Shilling said dot COM is going to be like AM radio in 20 years. Does anyone still believe that. Said in DNJ after the first year that he had been over enthusiastic about demand.
Donuts said renewals would be 80%, didnt happen, so they stopped giving out the data.
Rightside, again stock price has halved since early 2014. This month they said, to calm investors, that they will be spending $2million dollars on marketing to make up for the lag in lower than expected registrations.
Tucows Colin said they will get 1,000,000 registrations in first year. Was nearer 300,000. Great company, great marketing but way over estimated demand.
And Verisign stock, the registry for good old .com has increased 50% since the launch of the new gTLDs!

2. The Registries PROPAGANDA. (biased or misleading information)
@DanielNegari gave away names to inflate registration numbers and now is selling them at a loss, for 40 cents at some registrars. Anyone can sell a $10 bill for $9. Of course hes looking to make money on the renewals. All ccc.xyz have been brought out. Who the hell is going to buy 6j3.xyz on the aftermarket. Only one person, a headless.domainer in a topless.bar.

Frank Shilling the Evangelist of the new gTLDs. Smart guy but Im here for the domainer, so I will call him out.
Remember the build up to the launching of the new gTLDs, he was going to make all of the dot link names available at the basic registration price. So you domainers can get an amazing name at reg fee. Didn't happen. The good names he either reserved or registered them himself, to be sold at a premium. 360˚about turn or just misleading?
This is important Frank always says this
Big brands placed their internet presence on .com as it meant commerce, smaller brands and companies followed them into .com
Now we are going to see the same thing to the right of the dot , as big brands leads the way with smaller brands and other companies to follow leading to tens of thousands of new gTLDs.
Its a certainty.
Its Not Going To Happen. BMW will use .BMW and the much touted FOX NEWS will use NEWS.FOX. So what, it means nothing to us domainers. When the public see News.Fox, first they wont remember if its Fox.News or News.Fox and just go to FoxNews.com. They certainly are not going to be thinking this means there is a .online or a .link or a .xyz as I am from the next generation. Now the public see youtu.be or no_url_shorteners and just think its a clever hack but will still go to youtube.com and no_url_shorteners (Yes they had to changed their destination home page from the Lebanon ccTLD .ly to .com in 2011).
This is domainers number 1 hurdle when it comes to selling these new gTLDs, other than to headless.domainers, convincing a business to go with Furniture.Shop when there is a competitor on FurnitureShop.com.
number 2 hurdle is convincing them to put their online presence in the hands of an unknown, untrusted and unestablished TLD.
number 3 hurdle is telling them not to worry about emails going to [email protected] rather than [email protected].
BMW and FOX are fine they got the .com.
These are the 3 reasons why there has been little or no aftermarket sales by domainers to End Users.

3. Confusion - Imagine an enduser seeing .photography, .photo, .photos, .pics, .pictures, .camera .digital, or because he believes he is a genius goes for photography.guru or is it .ninja.
Its overwhelming and confusing so hes sticks with .com because that's what he knows and trust.
No no, lets say that he is that elusive enduser and likes the look of wedding.pics and you being the skilled salesman has got him over the 3 hurdles above. What is he going to offer, with so many options available $1000, why should he offer more. Then you hit him with the bombshell the renewals are $200 a year on this beauty.

4. Fools Gold - As the Evangelists keep saying they look good, they look natural. Yes to us domainers they do but to the general public they look like a hack, a shortner, a tinyURL, they will automatically believe you have the .com. Its ingrained in the public psyche. They dont look at them and think great I dont need to type .com, they really dont care.
This is going to be the hardest and I say an impossible task, is getting the general public to stop thinking only of .com or ccTLD and see and understand the new gTLDs, if you cant do that, businesses will shun the new gTLDs and keep using .coms. They only look good to us.

No doubt there will be domainers that make money from these new gTLDs but most will lose money. I see on here awful names and the charge into .xyz or .top but outside NNN.xyz or Keyword.xyz or LLL.xyz there is virtual no chance of an enduser sale and you are relying on the headless.domainer in a topless.bar.

 

[Kate]

the whole point of gtld's was provide some viable name options to end users who don't have budget to participate in .com. There IS a big market for "end users" making use of gtlds or cctld.

Well that is the official, intended purpose. But any observer who knows the industry well knows that of course this is a sham.
The primary goal is to create new revenue streams for the registries and the registrars. This is a deliberate move by Icann which is truly becoming a self-serving, FIFA-like organization.

That doesn't mean there are no opportunities at all, or that you should stay away absolutely. But you need to understand the game you're playing, it is rigged and the odds are stacked against you. If you don't understand that, you will be a victim.

As I expected, new extensions are distracting domainers, and they have a detrimental effect in the sense that they are sucking the disposable income of domainers.
They are now giving all their money to the registries aka the new domainers. I find it sad.

It is no big deal when gambling on a few regs, for example .xyz can be had for $1 a pop I believe, but some acquisitions are more expensive. The small amounts add up. I am trying to figure out how much money NPers are wasting collectively. I have no idea, but I am sure the money could be used toward more productive purchases.
It is scary to see domainers buying names in unproven extensions in EAP or getting involved in buyouts that we know are futile, dabbling in extensions that were dismissed as junk until very recently, fighting over scraps... but this is not always about new extensions here, it is about the Chinese craze, the .xyz hysteria mobi-style etc. They all amount to pipe dreams for the most part.

New extensions are being released almost every month now, and domainers are quick to move on to the next and quickly forget about yesterday. Not too many sales to report probably.

We have seen it all before, again and again. And no, the game isn't completely different this time.
It's still a fools game, with different players. There was somebody in your seat before.

It is time to revisit the tenets from the prophets of doom:

• dotcom is going to lose steam to the new extensions: you can see for yourself, dotcom has grown as much as all new extensions combined (and in spite of the 'zone stuffing', freebies etc), and the ccTLDs are doing fine. I think it says a lot, registrants are voting with their wallets and the propaganda isn't good enough.
  
• new extensions will be mainstream in a few years time: we are in the third year already, and little progress has been made in terms of global awareness - don't expect overnight changes

Domainers always tend to overestimate end user demand. There is hardly any end user demand for domain names even in .com. What do you expect when you end up with a pile of leftovers in oddball TLDs that nobody is familiar with ? It's the greatest fool theory in action.

 

[brindle123]

There are soo many new people in this business all propping each other up on hopes of making lots of money in the nGTLD's. Yes there is some money to be made but how many sales are to end users vs. selling to other domainers?

So many pointless and confusing extensions only help to prevent the general public, end user, companies, and even domainers from using the new gtlds. In most cases everyone goes back to the dot com and just finds a brandible domain to use rather than paying high renewals or high initial purchase prices for the new gtlds.

.xyz just looks bad!
.top doesn't make any sense
.club I can see some uses but unless you have the .com you will lose traffic and sales. Ex: wine.club wineclub.com

I personally would spend the money and get the .com before .whatever if I was running a business. I wouldn't want to lose any business to the .com owner. I think it is just too hard for them to build a business around a new gtld without owning the .com also!

I don't think they de-value the .com at all. I think they just make it stronger. Sales might only be hurt by so much money being thrown away in the new gtlds.

wine.club cost $140k
OnlineWineClub.com only cost $2k
They both sound and look good, but a new company doesn't always have $140k to spend on just the domain name.

Don't waste your money on 3 letter/4 letter and 3number/4number domains in every new extension that comes out. Grab one or two that really make sense to invest in. Be selective. Diversify a little but don't go nuts and waste your money.

Sooo many bad domains are being reg'd that make no sense at all with some of these gtlds. Reading what you guys post about what you've reg'd when a new gtld comes out makes me cringe.
Example: poop.cloud Just kidding on that but look at the .cloud thread or other new gltd threads and seriously look at some of these reg's or look at the "Appraisal" section. Some really bad shit.clouds

There can only be so many .cloud companies that start up that don't have a dot com. They won't come running to you to buy your whateverjustbecauseitwasavailable.cloud domain for $xx or $xx,xxx. Get friggin real domainers!

 

[betthelot]

.top is the TLD with the biggest sense of all TLDs in a global long run view.
Time is the answer.

Time is not the answer. Enduser demand is the answer. Dont fall for the Registry's propaganda.

 

[betthelot]

www.abc.xyz

www.starship.xyz
www.reall.xyz
www.voter.xyz
www.assemblypoint.xyz
www.sling.xyz
www.carrion.xyz
www.littlelexicon.xyz
www.tempdrop.xyz
www.flystay.xyz
www.axisgroup.xyz

...then I happened to remember companies that changed their .COM etc in 2015 for (10 examples):

www.home.barclays
www.parisfashionweek.buzz
www.toureiffel.paris
www.sport.wales
www.driftaway.coffee
www.lily.camera
www.foxwell.tools
www.jacksonville.attorney
www.festival.melbourne
www.beach.london

Ps. I have sold more than 50 new gTLDs at the aftermarket. It's not that hard.

You prove my point. The two big ones above are home.barclays and abc.xyz.
Home.Barclays didnt change their home page, for their PUBLIC facing website offering services, it is still Barclays.co.uk
abc.xyz didnt change their PUBLIC facing home page - domainers put far too much weight on these, as if its proof there is a tidal shift and a new dawn because some big brands use them in some way. Makes no difference to the public knowledge or acceptance of General new gTLDs. Ofcourse having 13,000,000 registrations you will find some websites. But over 90% are not developed.

Good to hear you have sold 50 new gTLDs, how many to domainers? What did you sell them for. Most Ive heard anyone sell. Even Mike Berkins sold none in first year and then a few this year to domainers and hes got a great portfolio. Notably Godaddy didnt want them when he sold his portfolio.

 

[Kate]

1. ALL of them over estimated demand.

This is true of all TLDs launched since 2000. They have all overestimated demand, and failed by their own pessimistic projections.
Why do they never learn ?

I don't want to start a debate on the mental health of registry operators, but I have noticed that the domain industry has been settled by businessmen lately, who have little experience and understanding of domain names in general and market dynamics (.tel is an interesting example). But it's not like they are all going to lose their shirts you know, they simply run normal companies that are funded by investors. If it doesn't work, they will move on to other ventures.
The investors are convinced they are investing in the future, and while some of the registries may be financially viable, they generally won't be successful, not like they expect.
You see what I mean ? The CEOs are confident, they will get their paychecks no matter what.

Consumer awareness also remains low.
This is not going to change until brands start to massively advertise their URLs.

The problem is that not everybody can have one's own extension.

I know that Barclays and other big corporations have their own extensions, but it still doesn't mean I will want to buy a .whatever, just because some large companies are distancing themselves (not too much) from .com.
It's not likely at all when you have grown up in a dotcom world, or when you live in a country that has a strong national extension (which is certainly the case for the UK, where Barclays is based).
There is a huge difference between a private corpTLD like .barclays and vanity extensions open to the public like .xyz .top etc.

Fools gold ? Yes.

 

[Manik]

Gtlds are not like .coms. You should only register Keyword.Keyword if KeywordKeyword.com is taken (eg: if CreditCare.com is taken, then buy Credit.Care.)

This also can be applied as a URL hack or a link shortener. If you follow these steps, your domain will never lose value.

About that fools gold.. please give it time. I visit a famous domain hack website, "Dnpric.es" from time to time. Not once in my lifetime have I typed DNprices.com into the address bar.

All we have to do is incept in the mind of public. It'll just take few years. Like .info or .biz.

 

[domainsoup]

Good read.

The real question is if we see companies moving to .[their company name]

login.facebook
search.google
etc

If that doesn't happen and those simply redirect to the .com, then Frank is wrong.

And regarding the "charge to .xyz" I think there is a big trust issue. People are associating .xyz with spam.

Bank.com = Trust
Bank.xyz = Phishing

 

[betthelot]

The real question is if we see companies moving to .[their company name]

login.facebook
search.google
etc

If that doesn't happen and those simply redirect to the .com, then Frank is wrong.

And regarding the "charge to .xyz" I think there is a big trust issue. People are associating .xyz with spam.

Bank.com = Trust
Bank.xyz = Phishing

Good point about phishing. Could lose a lot of goodwill.
My point is that Facebook Google can use .google because they have the .com BUT importantly it makes NO difference to domainers. It doesnt mean people will suddenly get the new gTLDs and want them, as the Registries want you to believe. Public will be none the wiser. Its all propaganda. I did this thread as I see so many getting blinded by the this coming of a new future, when you need to step back and look at it from a business point of view not a domainer. So much crap getting registered, so much money being lost on here.

 

[Fancy.domains]

Hello,

No doubt .COM is king, but I heard that some pretty big company started using:

www.abc.xyz

...and also other ones are using this strange extension (10 examples):

www.starship.xyz
www.reall.xyz
www.voter.xyz
www.assemblypoint.xyz
www.sling.xyz
www.carrion.xyz
www.littlelexicon.xyz
www.tempdrop.xyz
www.flystay.xyz
www.axisgroup.xyz

...then I happened to remember companies that changed their .COM etc in 2015 for (10 examples):

www.home.barclays
www.parisfashionweek.buzz
www.toureiffel.paris
www.sport.wales
www.driftaway.coffee
www.lily.camera
www.foxwell.tools
www.jacksonville.attorney
www.festival.melbourne
www.beach.london

Obviously just a few examples...

...and, again, I have nothing against the king! He will be the king for a long time.

Ps. I have sold more than 50 new gTLDs at the aftermarket. It's not that hard.

 

[Fancy.domains]

Kohasamui is no doubt a superstar seller and could probably sell ice to an eskimo.

I just list my names as landing pages and then add them to the most common market places. Then I sit and wait. So no superstar seller skills needed.

BUT, what I do, is that I, apart from following the trends, focus on snapping good (but cheap) names that drops. That is the only "secret" to my relative success so far.

 

[DomainVP]

Nice write up @betthelot

Every time I see the 'new domain' debate I feel like looking for $20 4L.coms , because I feel like its 2013.

My take on it all: New extensions are great for cheap throwaway campaigns, and .COMs are great for establishing your brand presence online. It's how I predicted they would be used, and that's how they are being used today.

Any business that puts their main public facing initiative on anything but a .COM is a .dope .

 

[betthelot]

Enduser demand comes with time, so time is the answer at the end
Don't fall for any propaganda.
.top doesn't need 'propaganda' because 'striving to top' is a natural human disposition.

Im going to try and get you to listen to reason, one more time. If you still blindly believe 'its a matter of time' either your part of the .top registry or there is no hope for you.

I will use Frank Schilling to prove my point and stop the perpetual myth that just because he says it, its gospel and therefore his disciples keep blindly following him to the promise land.

First Year: there was going to be enormous demand and domainers are going to make a fortune. This is what he said in early 2014 at the start of the launch...
Regarding new gTLDs, there is so much demand for good names right now, 2014 is going to be like throwing a drum of jet fuel on a roaring bonfire
It’s going to be a crazy year, anyone in this space in 2014 is definitely NOT the year you want to be sitting on the sidelines.
Fortunes turn and are made in a second and this year fortune will favor those who participate. This coming year (more than any in the history of the domain name business).

Second Year: OK now 2015, is going to be the year .anything blooms and domainers will make big money. This is what he said in early 2015 after a disappointing uptake in 2014.
.... most surprising was the slower uptake of new gTLDs. Skeptics created an anticlimactic buzzkill vibe and we were surprised that the consuming public and other registrars were not standing there eagerly to take the baton and run forward with the same zeal.
That is going to absolutely change in 2015 because the price of new gTLDs is so laughably low and the reward is so high. 2015 and 2016 are going to be the years of dot anything and the bloom is going to be more and more as retailers wake up to “better” names. Hardly anything has happened yet. Bigger growth and uptick in values like from $0 gaining overnight to $5,000 in the resale market.

Third Year: OK now 2016 and Frank is lot quieter about growth and value and how much domainers will profit. Now his position is its just a matter of time (unspecified, just open ended). This is what he twitted, when his 2015 forecast clearly wasn't happening.

First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win

What has Gandhi got to do with investing in domains

He will make money because hes smarter than you or me. He knows to keep domainers renewing their names he needs them to believe its only a matter of time. But note in years 1 and 2 it was demand from endusers and that domainers will make a fortune, thats what would make you renew. So why now renew, oh yes believing the propaganda "its just a matter of time". Registry wins and domainers lose.

 

[brindle123]

Ok sorry everyone. I got off on a tangent. Good luck kingof.top with your domains too!

I was just in the .ws thread and it seems like there is some funny things going on with the new roll out of the 2-3character .ws pricing. This all just leads to problems for us domainers.

I just read on there site for us to make an offer on the domain we like! That's weird, I thought they would come out with some kind of standard pricing. There might be an auction going on also. Don't know what to think of all this crap going on. Back to bashing the other gtlds.

 

[Traveler]

it's just a perfect extension for the web precence of the company / brand.

Not for English speaking people, the word "top" comes in front of what you are talking about. To have it at the end or as an extension makes little sense and makes people confused.

 

[garptrader]

New TLDs do offer choice to low-budget domain buyers who were not going to pay $XXXX for a .COM domain anyway. However, I frequently see new TLD domainers pricing their domains mid $XXXX to even five figures. In ten years in this industry I have never had a sale even approaching five figures so these folks are dreaming. Why would the registrars be selling this $%^#@! for $1/registration if it was really worth five figures?

 

[garptrader]

There is a HUGE difference between having a few companies use an extension and seeing regular aftermarket sales of that extension on DNJournal. The .TV subforum has cited hundreds of examples of companies using .TV. I have even seen some advertised on television. Selling a .TV domain to an end user is a different story. And .TV has been around for more than fifteen years. It takes a long time for a new extension to gain mass appeal. And we still are not at a point where the masses are willing to pay big dollars for .COM domains.

Undoubtedly with 12 million registrations and perhaps thousands of new TLD investors there will be a few rare cases where people are making money on new TLDs at a portfolio level. Kohasamui is no doubt a superstar seller and could probably sell ice to an eskimo. Most newbies should steer clear of having more than 10% of their portfolio in these extension (even then they should not buy all .XYZ or .LINK).

 

[brandnow]

Best thread I've read all week. Good job.

 

[brindle123]

It'll just take few years. Like .info or .biz.

More like decades. .info and .biz aren't being used by big companies. They are only being passed around in the aftermarket to be sold and resold by domainers. Some of them are just now getting some ROI.

If you reg'd them when they came out, you would have spent plenty on renewal fees until now.

 

[Fancy.domains]

.xyz just looks bad!
.top doesn't make any sense

Still:

http://dnpric.es/?q=.xyz
http://dnpric.es/?q=.top

Not so bad?!

But I agree with you that you need to think before you buy! Especially when a domain is more than $10, $20 or even $50!

 

[jbjbjbjbjbjb]

Interesting thread, agree for the most part and would add the following.

the whole point of gtld's was provide some viable name options to end users who don't have budget to participate in .com. There IS a big market for "end users" making use of gtlds or cctld.

The biggest problem however is the pricing. Registries are inflating value in the .gtlds. Their priority should be to make them available, accessible and reasonably priced. THAT will increase uptake and acceptance (chip/xyz did that right). At the moment they are pricing them as a 'premium' option which they just are not and will not be for the next decade at least. Pricing like this is also the opposite of what the whole point of gtld's was. Just because it's available doesn't make it 'premium'.

This all hurts investment opportunity because people are buying gtld's as "cheap/available alternatives to .com", not as an equivalent product.

IF you have a very strong gtld, i'd suggest keeping it if possible because there are a lot of natural word benefits to them which can apply outside of pure domain name applications. Some examples of that would be things like car.rentals, phone.repairs, audio.sales. Relevance is critical.

lastly, just because it's available doesn't mean its worth anything ;D

 

[domainsoup]

Still:

http://dnpric.es/?q=.xyz
http://dnpric.es/?q=.top

Not so bad?!

But I agree with you that you need to think before you buy! Especially when a domain is more than $10, $20 or even $50!

You know what's depressing?

http://dnpric.es/?q=.work

Good GTLD but 8/12 listed sales are $14 or less! WTF

 

[JB Lions]

You can find even big companies which are using .top
Here are some few examples:

ROLLS-ROYCE
www.rolls-royce.top
https://who.is/whois/rolls-royce.top
Currently they use it as forwarding domain to their .com website.

OTTO
www.otto.top
https://who.is/whois/otto.top
Currently they use it as forwarding domain to their .com website.

ALIBABA
www.hitao.top
https://who.is/whois/hitao.top
Currently they use it as domain for their website.

+++

The .top domains which I have weren't held back because they are german and I was an 'early bird' - that's the reason. If you would know german language you would see how premium my german names are

+++

I wasn't talking about .blackfriday or .tattoo - I talked about .top

Your examples just show part of the struggle. That 2 out of the 3 big companies are just using them as forwarders to their .com. Common practice of buying up their name in different extensions.

As far as Frank and new gltds, and this has been gone over many times. A lot of newbies are pointing to Frank and what he says about new gtlds, want to be like him, admire him etc. And I think he's one of the best, if not best domainer. His opinions on new gltds should be obvious tho since he's selling them, they're going to be positive. He has employees to think about. But he made the chunk of his money primarily selling what? I'm guessing .coms. Anybody active in the Aftermarket knows he still buys .coms all day long. And when DNS releases sales, like this - http://www.dnjournal.com/archive/domainsales/2015/20150218.htm

.com dominant.

 

[DNScholar]

I think both sides of the discussion are right, but correctly it all pan out around 2020.

 

[Kate]

Many blog posts today about the firing of the CEO from Minds and Machines, some insight from the guy that got fired:

I saw that. So while the registries will maybe blame Icann for their hardship, the domainers will blame the registries for not doing enough to promote their extensions. Classic. Reality is again settling in.