.tv Spanish GEO .TVs

[CarryOn]

GEOs and Spanish appear to be the hot topics of the week.

So I’m inspired to start a Spanish GEO TV thread. Clearly English language GEOs are hot now. What do we think about Spanish GEOs? My intention is to start a discussion about Spanish language GEOs. I certainly don’t have all the answers – I’m always interested in learning more. I would love to hear everyone’s thoughts comments and interests.

I am a big believer in the potential for the Spanish language domain market & see inherent value in Spanish language GEOs.

I suggest that the GEO market could be divided into native name and foreign language versions. An example of a native name GEO is “New York” and a foreign language (Spanish) version is “Neuva York” (Still available at $5,000 premium).

Some GEOs have universal names (same in all languages) other’s almost a different name per language. This is especially true in Europe, for example Croatia (English), Croacia (Spanish), Croatie (French), Kroatien (German), Croazia (Italian), Croácia (Portugues), Kroatië (Nederlands) etc.

The value of a GEO depends on 1) size of local population 2) size of tourism market (Although there are many other elements to consider, including broadband penetration, wealth, etc., IMO these are the most important) Thus a universal name GEO with a large population which is also a large global tourist market would be the most valuable. You get the local population, plus you get the world’s tourist market for the GEO. A good example of this might be Miami (large local pop., major global tourist destination, and same spelling in all roman character languages). Of course these are the most expensive – either in the after market (verified sales, or what a holder expects) or the annual premium price set by Verisign/DM.

As for foreign language versions the value may depend mostly on the tourist/travel/commerce potential. Examples of real value for foreign language versions include Searching’s offer of $3,500 for Netherlands.tv (English language version of Nederlands) with many valuing it much higher, or Versign/DM looking for high premium reg fee for Germany ($25k) (english version of Deutschland) or Nueva York.

So let’s have a look at the Spanish Name market. Note, practically speaking there is a 3rd category of GEO names for foreign language GEOs: IDNs. This will become increasingly important as IE7 browsers are rolled out in foreign markets. (I noticed that someone on the board recently regged Los Ángeles. IDN Spanish version of Los Angeles)

What’s still available as premium Reg for Spanish GEOs: (If I’ve missed any pls add)
NuevaYork.tv ($5k)
Rusia.tv (Russia) ($10k)
Holanda.tv (Holland) ($10k)
Viena.tv (Vienna) ($7.5k)

Back in January when I saw the premium pricing for the English versions of foreign GEOs, I decided to build a portfolio of Spanish language GEOs. For the most part I have focused on country/city names that do not include IDN characters in their real spelling. I do believe in the future of IDNs but didn’t want to go down that path at the time. Furthermore, I tired to focus on countries/cities that were good tourist markets, and thus some inherent value.

Here is my list of Spanish GEOs: (all are normal reg fee)

Regions:
Andes.tv (Andes Mountains)

Countries:
Suiza.tv (Switzerland)
Irlanda.tv (Ireland)
Egipto.tv (Egypt)
Croacia.tv (Croatia)
Marruecos.tv (Morocco)
Turquia.tv (Turkey)
Hungria.tv (Hungary)
Ucrania.tv (Ukraine)
Malasia.tv (Malasia)
NuevaZelanda.tv (New Zealand)

Cities:
Tokio.tv (Tokyo)
Ginebra.tv (Geneva)
Estocolmo.tv (Stockholm)
Niza.tv (Nice France)*
Marsella.tv (Marseille France)*
* These last two may not be major global cities but they are major Spanish tourism markets located within driving distance of Spain.

Anyone else on the board have spanish GEOs? Please add to the list. Or any thoughts/ideas/relative values on Spanish TV GEOs.

Cheers, CarryOn

 

[mckennaronnie]

Nice thread.

I have a English spelling of a Spanish region (if that makes sense)

I have Andalusia.tv (Spanish is Andalucia.tv)

Andalusia is a massive region in Spain that is undergoing some massive changes with property springing up everywhere.

I have already been offered $1000 for this but hagve no plans on selling anytime soon as i feel there is great potential.

 

[antonis12]

I think you should be careful about Spanish language GEOs of areas without a Spanish language population because then you are making for a very small intersection of potential users in that case.

In other words, the target user market for Egipto.tv is Spanish speaking people who want to go to Egypt and then when you are looking for end-users or advertisers, you are competing against a) the english version and b) the arabic version. In addition to the .com version of all of these.

I don't think it will be a top priority for most Egyptian vendors to advertise online, in .tv and in Spanish. That would be different if it were a Spanish or Latin American GEO or even one next to Spain (like Marseille), but I would be wary of going too far afield.

At reg fee, probably an OK investment, but just barely in my opinion. I don't want to throw cold water on this. it is an innovative idea and perhaps if you know spanish, it makes more sense, but if you start down this path, you suddenly go from having maybe 1,000 good GEOs (x 2 = their native spelling + english) to having 1,000 x 10 (each geo in each major language, English, Mandarin, Germany, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Arabic, etc). Clearly the value of the latter will be substantially lower...

 

[del.icio.us]

I think you should be careful about Spanish language GEOs of areas without a Spanish language population because then you are making for a very small intersection of potential users in that case.

In other words, the target user market for Egipto.tv is Spanish speaking people who want to go to Egypt and then when you are looking for end-users or advertisers, you are competing against a) the english version and b) the arabic version. In addition to the .com version of all of these.

I don't think it will be a top priority for most Egyptian vendors to advertise online, in .tv and in Spanish. That would be different if it were a Spanish or Latin American GEO or even one next to Spain (like Marseille), but I would be wary of going too far afield.

At reg fee, probably an OK investment, but just barely in my opinion. I don't want to throw cold water on this. it is an innovative idea and perhaps if you know spanish, it makes more sense, but if you start down this path, you suddenly go from having maybe 1,000 good GEOs (x 2 = their native spelling + english) to having 1,000 x 10 (each geo in each major language, English, Mandarin, Germany, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Arabic, etc). Clearly the value of the latter will be substantially lower...

Well said. Totally agree. It would be a waste of money if we register any particular language dependent geo domains. If the language we use to register the geo names is not popular at the particular geographical region, we won't able to recover even the reg fee.

For example, Registering an Arabic TV domain name for "Tokyo" won't succeed, because tokyo is one of the cities in Japan, and Arabic is not as much popular as Japanese or Chinese in Japan. :imho:

 

[Ammudamus]

I will have to agree with Antonis' thoughts on this in dealing with other extensions that may have a local attraction to the country or region before a foreign translation of it. I am a big believer in the Spanish market (fellow NPer's are probably tired of me ), but know the market has to accept the extension overall first. The English market is growing acceptance day by day and with the growth in the Internet (world recognition) and Spanish being one of the top languages spoken, you can't go wrong in the long term.

On a developer's standpoint, one of the obstacles that may be faced for domain owners is whether you are native to the language to produce an end user product. This may require obtaining an external team that can develop and generate revenue to sustain the costs for the name. Also, sometimes, the Spanish .com's are parked, so what makes the .TV's that much more valuable?

Just a few thoughts. Thanks for everyone's contributions.

A

 

[CarryOn]

Thanks everyone for your comments and thoughts

Antonis, I agree with much of what you say. And a little cold water is valuable - you don't forge good swords without heat or hammering. No question that the further you stray geographically from the "local" language market the less value of the foreign language GEO. Neighboring country/city GEOs have much more potential and value. Distant ones less. (Although distant places like New Zealand are higher ticket travel journeys so potentially offer more return per transaction.) Your observation follows the OVT results as well - Marsella, the nearest major foreign city travel destination to Spain has the highest Spanish OVT, Tokio the lowest. (BTW digression - Tokio.TV gets decent traffic parked - since registering I've realized its an alternative foreign spelling of Tokyo in Japan as well as being a cult like music group in Japan, "tokio" OVT in Japan overture is around 80k.)

Obviously there is some value in Spanish foreign language GEOs - Francia (France in spanish) is a regged $1k premium name and several other spanish GEOs are premiums (Nueva York, Holanda, Rusia, an Viena). I don't agree with the premium levels but they are premiums. Spanish speakers tend to search in Spanish so single word popular tourist destinations have some inherent value on a gradient from distance to local language market. Foreign countries, travel agencies, hotels, etc. actively promote to the spanish speaking world - so the English versions are not competition - the dot com versions of the spanish GEOs would be though, as all .coms are competition for every .tv counterpart.

But the interesting thing about .tv for the the spanish travel market is that it cuts through the ccTLD problem. .TV can intuitively reach a billion spanish speakers scattered around the world without the need for dozens of ccTLDs (.es, .com.ar, .com.co, com.mx, etc, etc.) Advertise on Egipto.TV and intuitively reach the entire spanish speaking world interested in visiting the Pyramids or sailing down the Nile, or just watching a show on King Tut or Ancient Egypt. Also, there is less of a threat from a developed xxxxxxxTV.com site since the local markets are already comfortable with a differnt tld and not just .com, so when they hear Madrid.TV they don't automatically assume MadridTV.com (like many in America would think).


Ammudamus

Also, sometimes, the Spanish .com's are parked, so what makes the .TV's that much more valuable?

A, No question that .coms are more valuable, but Spanish language GEO TVs are slowly gaining traction. Encouraging. Here is a list of developed/partially developed ones. Most are in Spain and europe:

www.venecia.tv (Venice Italy)
www.madrid.tv
www.galicia.tv
www.sevilla.tv
www.marbella.tv
www.madrid.tv
www.sotogrande.tv
www.alacant.tv
www.canarias.tv
www.colombia.tv

Yes too many dot com spanish GEOs are parked but here are a few that have been developed:

www.irlanda.com
www.egipto.com
www.turquia.com
www.ucrania.com
www.estocolmo.com
www.suecia.com

mkennaronie

I have Andalusia.tv (Spanish is Andalucia.tv)

Andalusia is a very nice name for the English market. That region has become the South Florida for europe. Spain is certainly the most popular place for Brits to holiday and own 2nd homes.