new gtlds Mike Mann: “Read my lips gTLDs are D*E*A*D, absolutely no demand!”

[lennco]

Mike Mann shared on Facebook my article about the bad landrush phase that .Blog domains had last week and also shared his views on the New gTLDs in general:

Read my lips gTLDs are D*E*A*D, absolutely no demand! This was the best out of thousands, along with .web and .app Better luck with other snake oil. .Com stays king. If you also voted for Hillary, rough week. TYVMI.

He also made several other comments about new extensions such as:

How about don’t but them at all, they serve no purpose and cause many problems, and waste a lot of time and money.

Now that everyone knows gTLDs are dead, please Google “Mike Mann gTLDs” and you will see I hit the predictions spot on.

He continued by quoting my article:

Ruggh ruoggh, too many scooby snacks: “So the .blog registry made more than $150,000 from the landrush phase. That doesn’t seem bad but the registry spent $19 million to get rights for the .blog new extension.” Not counting millions per year of overhead. Lesson learned, listen to the mann next time and stick with .Com

He then made more comments like:

“Don't renew your fancy new gtld domains. The experiment is over. No material resale market will take root.”

Mike replied to a comment made by Phil Harris

26 million registered and new sites being launched daily .. X.company being used by Google , Rightside stock just raised to buy status by zachs investment firm .. Awareness growing , secondary 6 figure sales being made , Mike I would say you should watch the movie God is not dead ..

by saying

sure sounds like a bubble

Mike today talked about Google and .soy:

Google spent some energy telling me how ".soy" domain extension was going to be the next big thing a while back, I tried to splain what was up….. Not to discount the fine folks, fancy offices, and great buffet. Googs, gimme a buzz, I’m still a know it all.

Drinking own Koolaid instead of listening to grassroots in the streets

Technically I havent checked the sales numbers but lets take a wild guess, dramatically lower than their expenses…….. like I told them nicely before they invested

Konstantinos Zournas November 14, 2016
http://onlinedomain.com/2016/11/14/...nn-read-lips-gtlds-dead-absolutely-no-demand/

 

[decode]

Just got a 2 word .com for one of my new projects. Hand Registration. Plenty of .com left.
Best use for nGTLD are people in geo sales jobs like insurance, real estate, etc. that want to stand out and need lots of marketing spokes. These should always be complimentary sites in addition to a .com.
And yes, I employ this strategy myself.
Clearly nGTLD with big premium renewal fees are a complete disgrace. Totally unfair and no one should buy them.
A better way is what .club is doing. You may pay a premium price but it renews at a normalized rate.
They also offer 0% over 5 years on premiums.
Anyone (not domainers) in business for themselves should register a few or buy a few on the secondary market as a nGTLD hedge. A budget of $300 - $500 for some category killer .club or .xyz would be a good long term hedge and could compliment any sales driven business with lots of competition.

 

[dordomai]

Take note that konstantinos kept a list of new gTLDs, he didn't drop them all. I replied on his blog today as well pointing out a couple in his list that he kept

he kept some, dropped most. nothing wrong with that. he does what works best for him probably.

i always believed that some people make and will make money with the new tlds. it will just be less than what some want us to believe.

 

[JB Lions]

Take note that konstantinos kept a list of new gTLDs, he didn't drop them all. I replied on his blog today as well pointing out a couple in his list that he kept

Dropped 72% of them.

"It’s nice to see that you held onto some of the new gTLD’s."

Why? With that, and .com is a dinosaur, for transparency, are you invested in any stocks pertaining to new gtlds?

 

[Eric Lyon]

Dropped 72% of them.

"It’s nice to see that you held onto some of the new gTLD’s."

Why?

Because they have current or future value. There is a big risk involved with any new markets, which is pretty standard when investing in something. He's taking an investment risk and I pointed out a few that have current or future value. Which I'm sure he already knew, which is why he kept those and dumped the ones that weren't as good of an investment. - Believe it or not, there's still bad .com's out there too people are holding/dropping

 

[JB Lions]

Because they have current or future value. There is a big risk involved with any new markets, which is pretty standard when investing in something. He's taking an investment risk and I pointed out a few that have current or future value. Which I'm sure he already knew, which is why he kept those and dumped the ones that weren't as good of an investment. - Believe it or not, there's still bad .com's out there too people are holding/dropping

I added a comment, are you invested in any stocks pertaining to new gtlds? I've seen some of your comments on new gtlds on the blogs (positive) and then the comment about .com being a dinosaur. Doesn't really go with market reality, so just in regards to transparency. I own 0 stocks.

Or do you even actually own any new gtlds?

I remember years ago you posting that you didn't have many domains, the ones you had were developed, leads and such, personal/business site.

 

[frank-germany]

Dinosaurs ruled the earth at one time as well. But then, so did the romans, and persia. Legacy domains are the industries dinosaurs and the progress in today's technology is starting to shift. History unquestionably shows that change is inevitable in all markets (even with the Amish) and no one thing will dominate a market forever without change of some kind.

Not every change is a good move
Think of CDs versus vinyl

Or kodakchrome versus digital photos

I deleted my personalname.tel

This change was not needed

 

[Eric Lyon]

I added a comment, are you invested in any stocks pertaining to new gtlds? I've seen some of your comments on new gtlds on the blogs (positive) and then the comment about .com being a dinosaur.

I've owned/sold a couple and still own a few nondotcom's. But then, my business model is not the same as everyone elses. There's literally 100 ways to structure a business in this industry. Personally, I like to hold a public and private portfolio. I also like to develop all my domain assets. For me, it doesn't make much sense to hold a domain that can't pay it's own renewals every year. Most my investments are niche targeted to a business model (Service/product) that I can use, that way, even if they don't sell, I still win with the revenue from the business. One example in development that is a new gTLD would be LogoDesign.Work or one of my brand protection properties like Scorpion.Agency

What works for me won't work for everyone else, so it's important that everyone does their own research and structures a business model that works for them.

 

[imc]

I've come to this sage conclusion. At any price, whatever the extension, if NP members aren't buying it, the domains are useless.

 

[frank-germany]

Don't forget, .com's were $100 reg/renewal fee at one time as well

Actually they were 70 as they were
140 for 2 years

 

[Eric Lyon]

Actually they were 70 as they were
140 for 2 years

Steve Jones - @Domainate.com answered this on Quora:

Steve Jones, Domainate.com COO, a domain industry professional for 7 years, offers consulting and training on acquisitio...
Answered 24 Mar 2011
Believe it or not, until 1995, domain registration was free. Network Solutions was granted the authority to start charging for them in 1995, at which point cost of domain registration was $100 for 2 years of registration, which dropped to $70 for 2 years in 1997. Bear in mind they were the sole source of domain registrations until 1998 when ICANN was formed and forced Network Solutions to split its registry and registrar sides and allow other registrars to resell domains from the registry.

 

[Lox]

if NP members aren't buying it, the domains are useless.

it's a different feeling buying here and chasing backorders, jet or at any other more exciting place.

 

[Bram C.]

Steve Jones - @Domainate.com answered this on Quora:

Steve Jones, Domainate.com COO, a domain industry professional for 7 years, offers consulting and training on acquisitio...
Answered 24 Mar 2011
Believe it or not, until 1995, domain registration was free. Network Solutions was granted the authority to start charging for them in 1995, at which point cost of domain registration was $100 for 2 years of registration, which dropped to $70 for 2 years in 1997. Bear in mind they were the sole source of domain registrations until 1998 when ICANN was formed and forced Network Solutions to split its registry and registrar sides and allow other registrars to resell domains from the registry.

$100 for 2 years is $50/year. So .com was $50/year. Never $100.

 

[Premiums]

https://onlinedomain.com/2017/05/22/opinions/just-dropped-198-new-gtld-domains-saved-45000/

https://onlinedomain.com/2017/05/04...l-thinking-will-not-change-domain-names-used/

konstantinos and schwartz, no bs guys. tell it like it is. rare these days. no sellouts
Here are a few of the domains I dropped:

friend.photos
star.photos
england.domains
revenue.domains
gay.holiday
england.marketing
select.photo
redcarpet.photo
freelance.photo
grey.photo
greek.photo
infrared.photo
extreme.agency
carribean.us
internetbusiness.biz
bistrot.us
adultshow.org
distill.info
greektv.net
tissues.info
fiestas.info
excaliber.info
humiliation.info
manipulation.info

those names aren't worth even reg fee

 

[Recons.Com]

Let's assume .coms will fall and ngtlds will rise in xx years.

That still wouldn't explain why I should invest in them.

First, I don't know which of those ngtlds will make it so would have to spread my bet unnecessarily

Second, I'd need to invest and hold paying renewals until good times come, while I can hop into the bandwagon just before the rise starts happening and buy in secondary market the names I want and let everyone else "hold the baby" through bad times...

Strategy 1 - Buy now:

Buy 1000 premium ngtlds, invest around 100K now and around 50K annually and 10 sales at $1K annually for next 20 years for renewals for Present (2017) value of around negative 475K at 10% expected return

Strategy 2: Wait until year 19

Buy 1000 premium names at around $500K at year 19 for Present (2017) Value of around negative $90K

You can play around with those numbers, insert different renewals, sales etc. but you'd have to make crazily optimistic assumptions to get Strategy 1 show results better than Strategy 2

Conclusion: even if you believe in future of ngtlds, you are better off waiting. Remember, @Rick Schwartz was not the original registrant of porno.com but he was the one who made nearly 8 digit sale out of it...

 

[Eric Lyon]

$100 for 2 years is $50/year. So .com was $50/year. Never $100.

There wasn't a one year option at that time. Since we are talking about registration costs in general back then, both answers are correct (Yours and mine)

 

[Kate]

Let's assume .coms will fall and ngtlds will rise in xx years.

That still wouldn't explain why I should invest in them.

First, I don't know which of those ngtlds will make it so would have to spread my bet unnecessarily

There are just too many extensions, and some are even redundant and competing against one another. The supply vastly exceeds the limited demand. Now a few TLDs will do better than most. But even that success will be relative.
The most successful extensions released post-2000 are .info and .biz, and they are not investment-grade even after 15 years of existence.

Conclusion: even if you believe in future of ngtlds, you are better off waiting. Remember, @Rick Schwartz was not the original registrant of porno.com but he was the one who made nearly 8 digit sale out of it...

That's how the real money is made: buying names on the aftermarket, at expired auctions or straight from their owners.
This is not 1996 anymore, when premiums could be picked up for regfee.
The problem is that many domainers don't want to admit it, or will find out after wasting a lot of money on dubious handregs.

New extensions should be treated as speculation and not investment. And the percentage in the portfolio should be kept low, that is more like 5% or 10% than 90% or 100%. Reminder: the majority of dotcom portfolios are not profitable.

I am not saying one shouldn't invest gamble in nTLDs. But maybe the same money can be spent on safer bets.

 

[Bram C.]

My 2 cents on all of this: Yes change is inevitable. But what that change will be nobody knows at this point.

I remember people saying the same about .mobi: "Change is inevitable". And change did happen: .mobi went from being arguably valuable to undeniably worthless.

Which brings me to the other saying "History repeats itself":
What a lot of people seem to forget is that before the new gTLDs started to launch we already had tons of alternatives to .com. What would be different now? Giving consumers alternatives to .com obviously has been done before. Increasing those alternatives tenfold won't make a difference imo. People will still mostly choose .com (or a ccTLD) over a new gTLD.

There simply was (and is) no real demand for the new gTLDs. It was a money grab by ICANN, nothing else. And you would think registries would at least try to make new gTLDs look more attractive (to try to counter the lack of demand). Yet nothing is further away from the truth with the (mostly) high renewal fees, premium pricing on good keywords, no price protection for existing customers, etc...

 

[Brands.International]

Let's assume .coms will fall and ngtlds will rise in xx years.

That still wouldn't explain why I should invest in them.

First, I don't know which of those ngtlds will make it so would have to spread my bet unnecessarily

Second, I'd need to invest and hold paying renewals until good times come, while I can hop into the bandwagon just before the rise starts happening and buy in secondary market the names I want and let everyone else "hold the baby" through bad times...

Strategy 1 - Buy now:

Buy 1000 premium ngtlds, invest around 100K now and around 50K annually and 10 sales at $1K annually for next 20 years for renewals for Present (2017) value of around negative 475K at 10% expected return

Strategy 2: Wait until year 19

Buy 1000 premium names at around $500K at year 19 for Present (2017) Value of around negative $90K

You can play around with those numbers, insert different renewals, sales etc. but you'd have to make crazily optimistic assumptions to get Strategy 1 show results better than Strategy 2

Conclusion: even if you believe in future of ngtlds, you are better off waiting. Remember, @Rick Schwartz was not the original registrant of porno.com but he was the one who made nearly 8 digit sale out of it...

I had a good laugh when I was reading this

First, let me tell you: everyone who has money can make it as you have described: lets take, lets say 100k, and buy 1000 "premium" new gTLD names 100 USD each. Then after 1 year, lets count our losses and say new gTLDs are bad investment. That is what many "big guys" did early. On their defense, they were maybe too early in the game, as it was very difficult at that time to see everything clearly..it was the very start.
But 4 years later, there is no excuse for this strategy anymore. If this is your idea how new gTLD investors should invest, then I really advise..please invest in .com. You have very nice LLLL.com domains and really great logos, I like your site! But if this is your knowledge of new gTLDs, you need to stay clear from them.

Investing in new gTLDs is much more complex, then it was ever before with .com. You need to understand things like which registries are "domainer friendly" and which are "domainer unfriendly". You need to understand great pricing differences between various registrars and move your domains to ones where pricing conditions are reasonable. You need to get names with no premium pricing attached to them, usually by buying directly from early adopters - other domainers. And if you happen to have premium pricing attached to name, you need to understand if and how this can be changed and for what. You need to study what big tech companies are doing, where is the focus today at research on search, voice search, etc, to try to understand what extensions are viable to invest in, as no one will tell you this (no one knows for sure, that is sure). You need to learn where and how to drop catch particular extensions, and check end dates of renewal cycles for extensions you decided to invest in, as that is the best time to get good domains from early adopters for reasonable prices. And many other things. So just taking 100k and applying your scenarios 1 or 2 would lead directly to financial suicide.

I like also how you do contemplate whether to invest in new gTLDs or not - you probably thinking we are at the beginning of investment opportunity. With registrars who woke up and started to apply defensive pricing in many cases, I believe we, as domainers, are coming to end of this investment opportunity. I know several early adopters who started 4 years ago, and now are sitting on great portfolios full of beautiful names, with renewals as low as 10-15 USD for amazing names. But it takes lot of time, patience and study to build such portfolios, and lot of discussions between domain investors who invests in these extensions. It is still possible to do it today, but it becomes more and more difficult.

If you do not have time for all that, as domain investor stay with .com - as new gTLDs might not serve you well.

Saying that, I advise @dordomai and @JB Lions to buy some - you guys spent so much time discussing anti new gTLDs, that you know them almost better then anyone else here! They will be nice complement to your .com portfolios, and you will not become uneasy every time there is some nice gTLD sale spending literally days fighting them. Also it will help you diversify in upcoming years when new gTLDs will be on the rise. Believe me

 

[Recons.Com]

I had a good laugh when I was reading this

Not surprised. After all, you are lolwarrior ))

 

[JB Lions]

Saying that, I advise @dordomai and @JB Lions to buy some - you guys spent so much time discussing anti new gTLDs, that you know them almost better then anyone else here!

It's why I'm not touching them. I don't see any good signs. Almost half Chinese and overall numbers already dropping with a lot more coming. Sales? Before these ever came out, I said that I didn't believe there was a real market for them. Some of the "success" stories on stage and here, people were actually losing all kinds of money. But if you're making a profit personally, that's great. Just can't picture why these would go up in value in the future.

 

[Brands.International]

It's why I'm not touching them. I don't see any good signs. Almost half Chinese and overall numbers already dropping with a lot more coming. Sales? Before these ever came out, I said that I didn't believe there was a real market for them. Some of the "success" stories on stage and here, people were actually losing all kinds of money. But if you're making a profit personally, that's great. Just can't picture why these would go up in value in the future.

Imho big mistake @JB Lions
In few years you will be that you have not invested - it is pity, as I love when people around have prosperous.life

 

[Eric Lyon]

My 2 cents on all of this: Yes change is inevitable. But what that change will be is pure speculation.

I remember people saying the same about .mobi: "Change is inevitable". And change did happen: .mobi went from being arguably valuable to undeniably worthless.

Which brings me to the other saying "History repeats itself":
.COM had to deal with many other extensions after its release. What a lot of people seem to forget is that before the new gTLDs started to launch we already had tons of alternatives to .com. Not a single one of them ever had a negative impact on the power of .com. In fact, .com grew stronger year after year. Why would it be different now? Giving consumers alternatives to .com obviously has been done before. Increasing those alternatives tenfold won't make a difference imo. People will still choose .com (or a ccTLD) over a new gTLD.

There simply was (and is) no real demand for the new gTLDs. It was a money grab by ICANN, nothing else. And you would think registries would at least try to make new gTLDs look more attractive (to try to counter the lack of demand). Yet nothing is further away from the truth with the (mostly) high renewal fees, premium pricing on good keywords, no price protection for existing customers, etc...

The price structure (Call it a conspiracy theory) looks more like an attempt by the registries to thwart/prevent domain cybersquatting by resellers (By having a higher reg/renewal fee) and target end users directly. Now, instead of having to pay $50k+ for a .com from a reseller that could have been registered for $8 to $15, an end user can go direct and get a new gTLD to brand for $25, $150, or $2k+ (Still much cheaper than the reseller/cybersquatter price).

While I do agree that past releases of extensions didn't trump .com, many of them are still thriving and doing well. There's still money to be made with them. The new gTLD's go a step further and focus more on keyword branding than the older releases. The flood of the market (speculations or not) opens up vast new doorways for businesses/products/services/personalities/etc. for a fraction of reseller pricing (Affordability for start-ups).

To dismiss the real world branding potential of the new gTLD's would be a mistake. Not all of them will thrive, however, like their predecessors, many of them will. The more mainstream exposure we see on TV, Radio, Vehicle wraps, News publications, etc. with branded nTLDs, the higher the demand/desire will become for them. Maybe not in a month, a year, or even 5 years, but it will happen. I see mainstream exposure happening more and more every month.

At the end of the day, what works for one won't work for another, so those against nTLD's and only believe .com has value, should stick with what works for them and let other speculators, prospectors, investors, developers, new start-ups, etc. do what works best for their business models (Based on their own targeted research).

Just my personal opinion.

Happy business building everyone.

 

[JB Lions]

Imho big mistake @JB Lions
In few years you will be that you have not invested It is pity, as I love when people have prosperous.life

Prosperous life, invest in what people really want, what there is a market for. You already have new gtlders vanishing from the forum.

 

[JB Lions]

The flood of the market (speculations or not) opens up vast new doorways for businesses/products/services/personalities/etc. for a fraction of reseller pricing (Affordability for start-ups).

You just basically gave a reason why these are bad for domainers. There are a flood of options for people/businesses in these settle for extensions, you don't have much negotiating leverage in trying to sell them.

You also skipped the question about stocks.

 

[Eric Lyon]

You just basically gave a reason why these are bad for domainers. There are a flood of options for people/businesses in these settle for extensions, you don't have much negotiating leverage in trying to sell them.

Your reply is spot on to that snippet of my post! Unless an investor knows what they are doing, they won't make much (If any) money in the nTLD markets this early in the game, however, once an investor/reseller isolates the buying triggers of end-users developing brands on nTLDs, they can slip into the action with a new strategy and clean-up where others are missing the mark.

The reality is that a domain (Regardless of extension) is truly only worth what and end user is willing to pay for it or what a reseller can convince an end-user it's worth in a solid presentation.