discuss How to register new gTLD names in 2019 (and actually sell them).

[Brands.International]

How to register new gTLD names in 2019
(and actually sell them).

This is written particularly for new domain investors - I hope it will save you some money
It is only my personal opinion, and I might be wrong (of course). So here we go:
​

1. Register 1 word domain name, in most cases try to avoid 2 word domain names ​

Example of 1 word domain name: holy.life. Example of 2 word domain name: myholy.life or ourholy.life.
Why? Because chances of selling 2 word domain name in new gTLD space is very small (consult namebio.com). Do not think you can outsmart someone with your word1word2.gTLD combo...in most cases you will not outsmart anyone, and usually you will be dropping such names after 1 year. There are exceptions from this rule of course, but safest bet is to simply avoid it, particularly when you just start with domain investing.

2. Register names with not many alternatives in new gTLD space​

This simply means, that end users can not find alternatives for your name in other new gTLD extension, for reg fee.(use uniregistry.com to check that). Particularly when you ignore point no.1 and register 2 word domain name, you will usually find that your string exists in dozens of other new gTLD extensions...and is available to be registered by anyone for reg fee. This subsequently means you will have no leverage when it comes to negotiations with end users.To learn exactly what "alternatives in new gTLD space" means, read this new gTLD appraisal thread here.

3. Register names with large pools of potential end users.​

You can have perfect new gTLD name, but if there are only few suitable end users who can use your name, it will usually take long time to sell it. If you register name where millions of potential end users exist (so something pretty broad and generic), you will be getting much more offers, and you will be able to close much more sales.

4. To be first is not always better...sometimes it is better to be second.​

When registering new gTLD names, consider this: when extension is brand new, there is almost zero awareness about it among end users (unless there is a huge marketing campaign for it you know about).
It can take years for awareness to be created. This also means that for many extensions there is almost 0 aftermarket in early times. Usually only fellow domain investors. This is natural - if something is very new, almost no one knows about it. So if you want to be first to get best names, fine, but budget for your investments accordingly - it is not wise to expect that you will buy something totally new for USD 10, and you will be able to flip it to end user for USD 10k. It happens, but rarely. There are many experienced new gTLD domain investors, who simply wait for drops after 1st year and pick up some very nice names. But this wisdom comes with years of investing experience and is not something what can be intuitively understood, at least from what I see.

5. Make sure renewals of your domain names are sustainable.​

Second most important thing in new gTLD domain investment (after quality of the name) - make sure you understand renewal fees for your domain names. In order for you to be in a long term game, renewal fees of your domain names must be sustainable (aka low). Otherwise you will be dropping almost all of your names after 1 year, and all your effort will be wasted.

6. Make proper landers for your names​

Do not just let your domain names without proper landing pages. Do not be lazy and immediately prepare landers for them. Imo best option is undeveloped.com atm, but many good alternatives are available as well.
Some old school domainers are used to the fact that they were contacted by people who found their contact details in WHOIS database - this is not possible anymore, as due to GDPR legislation most records from WHOIS database are now masked. This also means that when you have new gTLD domain name, your details will be masked in most cases (again, there are few exceptions from this rule, but do not rely on them),. Buyers thus have no way how to contact you. Clear landing pages are a must in 2019.

7. Do not follow the herd.​

Just because all people at Namepros are registering .panda (just an example), it does not mean you also need to register .panda...Most people are not profitable and are actually loosing lot of money - so if you will do the same thing as most people, you will have the same results as most people....

When you follow the herd, it is not only that competition is huge, but you will end up registering nonsense word1 word2 names, in times where there is no aftermarket created yet, when you do not know if there are some renewal promotions in future, when major domain selling sites not yet support that extension, and when there is no awareness yet among end users. Likely result of your action: you will drop your names prior first renewal round. This is happening since 2014 in many forms and shapes, still it seems like most people like to repeat those mistakes happily again and again.

You need to find your niche/extensions/areas of expertise and go from there. The most lucrative way is still to buy new gTLD names from fellow domain investors, but almost no one is doing it, except few people. Typical newbie new gTLD domain "investor" will rather spend USD 10 on 200 bad names and will not sell even 1 of them, prior dropping them all, then to pay USD 2000 for 1 great name which can sell for great profit. Which leads to:

8. Get 2-3 good names instead of 200-300 bad names (which you will drop anyway).​

Buy only quality new gTLD names, as only highest quality sells in 2019. And you know that you have great new gTLD domain name, if you have a good feeling renewing it 9 years in advance.This should be always your test: am I confident enought for this name, so I have no problem to pay years in advance for it's renewal fees? Now to critics which would tell you that you are blocking unnecessarily your capital by paying renewals in advance, I would like to remind:
a) renew your name years in advance if there is a great renewal promotion (you can save sometimes 90% of total cost, as some renewal promotions for new gTLDs are simply amazing)
b) when you renew your new gTLD name 9 years in advance, it tells your potential buyers something about your commitment....in my experience, it is much easier to negotiate if your name is renewed like that.

Buyers are not stupid: they will check everything possible about you and your names, and in most cases they are simply waiting if the name does not expire/if you do not drop it . But when we are in 2019 and your name is renewed until 2027, this waiting game is simply over for them, and they need to approach you if they want the name. But to play this game, you really need to have good new gTLD names.

9. Get to social media and make lot of connections.
​

Do not be a secret seller. Have your portfolio clearly visible to anyone, and go to Twitter, Linkedin, Instagram, Youtube and Facebook at least. People with most success have great online presence, and professionally looking marketplaces.

10. Price your domain names as a pro, do not be a chicken
​

Look, if you price your domains with $120 price tag (for example), this will result in following: you will sell your best domains quickly for low price (and when you report it, fellow domain investors will say Congrats congrats, congrats, and you will feel great as super-seller), but at the same time you will be left with portfolio of bad domain names, which no one wants even for this low price tag. This is sure way to poor financial status and poverty. You do not want that. New gTLD names are very unique, as they are are pure phrases without any suffix, and are therefore also geo neutral. They have great value, and this value grows in time.
If you have great new gTLD name, renew it for years in advance, and do not let it go for cheap - as one day you might retire on it...

11. Bonus point - do not listen to "voices of past" with "only .com is an good investment" mantra
​

This is already past us and so not 2019 - luckily we see this nonsense less and less ...

What is your opinion when it comes to new gTLDs registrations ? ​

 

[BrandEntrance.com]

Show attachment 127519 Do you mean like the above from today? Search for -- domain name phrase -- no punctuation, and first on page one is a .win site I know well. At least from Canada. I must get around to updating the info on that page. From an old man with no SEO skills.

Or type --- CES show --- and you get a .tech at top of page 1.

Or type --- NamesCon Global --- and of course a .global is at top page 1.

Or type --- Alphabet investor relations --- and an .xyz leads page 1.

But really whether something is there or not is mainly about content, and reliability, and not about domain names.

Most long term web reliable sites have been on .com a long time, so most Google page 1 are from them.

Bob

Not here Bob. That's because you visit your site a lot.

I get .coms on every search term you gave me.

Every one. Not a single nTLD on any page.

 

[Bob Hawkes]

Not here Bob. That's because you visit your site a lot.

I get .coms on every search term you gave me.

Every one. Not a single nTLD on any page.

I specifically checked it with computers I never used but of course Google regionalize and your results are different. Are you really telling me CES show does not yield their .tech on page 1?

 

[BrandEntrance.com]

I specifically checked it with computers I never used but of course Google regionalize and your results are different. Are you really telling me CES show does not yield their .tech on page 1?

Ja.

I am a google searcher and I am NOT getting the results you think I should be getting. All I get are .com domains just like the majority of the planet.

You can all fantasize about how it should be etc but it's how it is that interests me.

Domain Parking etc is also rubbish. People get pissed off when if they land on a parking page and press the back button. Go to the next link etc.

Airconditioning.whatever. Nobody is going there without having gotten a business card and already having had some work done.

 

[BrandEntrance.com]

People google airconditioning whatever and then go forward that way from the results that come up. All .coms

These nTLD threads are really messing with the truth BIG TIME.

 

[Bob Hawkes]

So whether you abbreviate it as ces or type out consumer electronics show, after discounting the paid ads and YouTube promoted videos, the first authentic search is not a .tech? For me their .tech then Wikipedia on .org then a bunch of .com.

 

[BrandEntrance.com]

I specifically checked it with computers I never used but of course Google regionalize and your results are different. Are you really telling me CES show does not yield their .tech on page 1?

Not with my computer Bob.

 

[BrandEntrance.com]

So whether you abbreviate it as ces or type out consumer electronics show, after discounting the paid ads and YouTube promoted videos, the first authentic search is not a .tech? For me their .tech then Wikipedia on .org then a bunch of .com.

That is most likely to do with your specific user profile that google creates based upon your habits. A warm search. (Just making this up)

If I now google candy floss then I guess we would get similar results. A cold search so to speak.

 

[Bob Hawkes]

To further try it I went to Bing which I never use. Again the .tech page is no 1 for Consumer Electronics Show and the .xyz for a search on Alphabet Investor Relations. Which makes sense, those are the sites that have the authority. Are you sure you don't have a .com virus which destroys everything else just for you, James? Out of interest what com do they show you for the Alphabet one?
Bob

Ps Out of interest can you do a search DXC Technology. The company owns the .com but use only the .technology for web. They are huge tens billions per year. Do you only get com when you search that?

 

[BrandEntrance.com]

To further try it I went to Bing which I never use. Again the .tech page is no 1 for Consumer Electronics Show and the .xyz for a search on Alphabet Investor Relations. Which makes sense, those are the sites that have the authority. Are you sure you don't have a .com virus which destroys everything else just for you, James? Out of interest what com do they show you for the Alphabet one?
Bob

Ps Out of interest can you do a search DXC Technology. The company owns the .com but use only the .technology for web. They are huge tens billions per year. Do you only get com when you search that?

Sorry. Late here.

Yes so those two site actually do turn up but I would presume that is due to a heavy spend with google.

CES number 2 spot.

I still believe that the nTLDs are not going to reach the level a .com with good seo will without an incredible investment with google.

I may be wrong. Just my opinion based upon the search results I am getting. Wishful thinking aside.

 

[Bob Hawkes]

but I would presume that is due to a heavy spend with google

Well since Alphabet is the parent company of Google, maybe they don't need to spend much But seriously I don't think it has anything to do with spend but rather just,, to the best of their ability, what Google perceive as the authoritative and informative places for a term. Since the big annual US Consumer Electronics Show has their main site on a .tech, it makes sense that rates high. And since the newsletters and reports to their investors go on abc.xyz, it makes sense that an Alphabet investor relations search go there.

A great domain name can help propel a company up by more people clicking on links (although even that is hard the way Google search now works) for the most part, who is ranked high, is not much about the domain name but about the content that is there. Authoritative major companies are able to have alternate extensions ranked highly. A tiny outfit with almost no web presence could have the identical name, whether .com or new gTLD, and nowhere near top of Google. Most huge companies have been around a long time and their .com that goes way back has lots of credibility.

If people search on things like DXC technology or 30 technology, the relevant company is from everything I have seen on any computer, tablet, phone, with different search engines, from all I have been able to test right at top of page one of Google. These are both major companies that restructured and the new entity operates successfully only on the new gTLD.

The Asgardia space nation is an interesting one as it did have an .org, and now a .space, and still uses both. Every way I could do it the first two listings were .space, the next two .org,, and then a couple of .com. I suspect that varies with region.

Bob

 

[Bob Hawkes]

If you can, please help me understand what the problem exactly is with uniqueness? Why is uniqueness a problem and not a quality?

Sorry for not being clear @lightbear. Yes, a domain name being unique, within reason, is a plus. What I was meaning was that two word .com often have a uniqueness problem in that once you combine two words there are many possibilities, often, since more than one word could equally be added to that word. For example, the single word sleep does not really have an exact substitute, but once I say GreatSleep then there are other possibilities like GoodSleep, BetterSleep, AmazingSleep, RestfulSleep, AwesomeSleep so my two word, while possibly good, will suffer from the competition if equally good alternatives are available to purchase (or even to hand register).

In new extensions, even if you have a pure word like sleep on left of dot, the problem is that there are many hundreds of possibilities on right on dot. Like sleep.xyz or sleep.best or sleep.top or sleep.site or sleep.space or .... Now depending on use they are not equally good, but there are cases where they are almost equally good, especially in cases like loan/loans review/reviews where it is plural singular.

That is what I meant by both suffer from potential lack of uniqueness.

Bob

 

[Bob Hawkes]

I would love hearing some your "few thoughts" for "finds effective new ways to get a large pool of end users " Suggestions from you on what I can consider or research would be grrrrreat! if you'd like. Thank you.

It is a big question, but here are a few ideas. When or if I put together something comprehensive I will try to post link here

1. Most potential end users for domain names mainly don't know about how to find aftermarket choices. At the high price end, they hire a buyers' broker, but at the low price end, where the vast majority of end users are, they often simply get the best hand reg or no domain at all and use a FB or Wix etc. site. I think there is huge potential here if someone can produce something that is Amazon like in simplicity, that people will trust when they press buy, and that the transfer is fast, easy and with customer support. Dofo may help end users find the domains they want, once enough people know about Dofo.
2. We need to reach out to where the end users are. Whether this is by targeting trade shows, setting up popup stands in malls, using coworking spaces effectively, getting more leads through social media or something else. Domainers talk too much to each other and not enough to end users (in general, obvious exceptions). I am not talking about excessive outbound, any outbound should be limited, targeted and professional.
3. The tech firms realized how critical building audience among students is. We need to get students talking about domains, have domain related conferences, offer deep discounts to student ventures, etc. This will pay off years down the road.
4. I think there is definitely a place for more narrowly focussed brandable marketplaces. Like one that dealt only with biotech, medical, and healthy lifestyle domains, so it had subcategories that easily got people to exactly what they want. Some individual sites do that, but they do not have enough inventory.

Bob

 

[BrandEntrance.com]

The tech firms realized how critical building audience among students is. We need to get students talking about domains, have domain related conferences, offer deep discounts to student ventures, etc. This will pay off years down the road.
Bob

Then again there are students and... students. You give this idea more credit than it is worth.