The .PRO Discussion

[InvisionTech]

It seems .PRO is slowly coming out of the cage with cheaper reg prices than they were a year ago and major registrars like netsol taking notice of the extension and promoting it.

Here are some that I picked up in last couple of days:

Alexandria.pro

Anchorage.pro

Arlington.pro

Belfast.pro

Birmingham.pro

Budapest.pro

Durham.pro

Fairfax.pro

Italian.pro

Lisbon.pro

Fire away with your regs after the relaunch on September 8th, 2008.

 

[akcampbell]

I was updating Total.pro tonight and noticed that Ovh.co.uk are promoting new .pro reg fees at £4.99 plus taxes in GBP. The usual price is £9.99 plus taxes in GBP. The renewal fee in unfortunately £19.99 plus taxes in GBP so they still only got 2 stars in the latest November 2010 registrar survey but it could be useful for people in the UK provided you plan to transfer the .pro to another registrar before the end of the first year. I also added a new blog on the Snapnames financial keywords auction and updated historical sale prices.

 

[steveteva]

Whats really really weird, akacampbell, I don't know if you have stats about what country keywords are the biggest reg? well French just behind english.

 

[JoeBiz]

Sounds like a lot of work Andrew. Nice job.

I am going to take some time off and am in the process of listing my Pros on Sedo. I decided to pull up all of the Pros on Sedo and found over 8000, with 400 of those either having offers or at auction. Nice to know that my 50 Pros aren't sitting there all alone. LOL

I was going to set a fixed price of $2000 on mine with no minimum offer. I was afraid that was a tad high until I scanned the other 400 or so Pros. The more I looked the more I thought that I should go higher.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

8^X

 

[webdomain]

I've got mine listed on sedo. Had an offer on harmony.pro for 500. but that fell through as I do think 2K would have been a better starting point. Probably would have gone for less at that time (almost 8 months ago) Nowadays, I'll certainly hold out for more with the recent sales.

Anyway, Unless you don't want to entertain lowball offers, I've got almost all of mine set for negotiation. That way at least you can generate some leads.

Somebody on this board brought up the fact earlier that it is difficult to search for .pros on sedo., but its exciting the stats you provided showing how many have received offers so somehow potential buyers are still finding us.

 

[mwzd]

Very honestly if Insurance.pro went for less than 10k, most .pro domains are worth less than that, imho.

Maybe for those looking to sell its time to do some introspection and price domains correctly for sales.

Just my 0.02

 

[webdomain]

Before announcing something like that RegistryPro should get everything set up on Namejet's website. There is no reference to .pro on Namejet.com and no search option. They should also include the .pros to be auctioned in the body of the press release to generate interest. They would get more for the .pros at auction by removing restrictions first. Alot of people won't bid for a .pro because they are unsure if they are eligible to own it. Others won't bid for .pros because the market you can sell into is small which makes them more illiquid than other extensions. Finally, by oversupplying a thin market with premium keywords, the prices achieved will deteriorate quickly as they did in Vincent Liao's .pro sale on NP. People holding weaker .pros may drop them in response so what RegisryPro gains in auction proceeds, they will lose in drops of weaker keywords. One of the strength's of the .pro aftermarket is they are tightly held so when you have a premium keyword at auction, it fetches a respectable price. The reality is the money in .pro auctions comes from the same 4-5 people so until you grow your prospective pool of $X,XXX buyers, you are not going to generate much from an auction. RegistryPro should focus on getting big registrars to sell .pro and restrictions removed before auctioning the dozen or so strong 3 character .pros.

I was in shock to see they were actually prepared...just checked the namejet.com site..to see auction announcement

Overall you are totally correct in your statement.

 

[JoeBiz]

Here's a thought. What in the hell good does it do to auction 11 freakin' names? They need infrastructure work, not 11 sales.

8^X

 

[webdomain]

god nows what they are thinking. i wonder what those names are really going to generate in interest and dollars. I'd figure Dui and ask.pro would be the bigger ones. unless for some reason they mispelled sax?

 

[terol]

I would not want some ones of the .pro domains at Namejet even if someone gave them to me renewed for next 10 years.

 

[JoeBiz]

Hey Terol ! What's up! Hope all is well !!!
------
I'm posting the balance of my Pros on sedo. I need to get everything neatly tucked away so I can take a little time off.

Out of the 8000 Pro listings, 6600 are set on Make Offer. Regardless, I'm going to set all of mine on $2000 obo and adjust them as I have time.

My question is, how important do you think that Category Selection is versus not setting them at all?

:ghost:

 

[siga]

if this is for marketing purposes and I cant see any other reason. Why bother? Some of them would be hard pushed to get any reasonable bids on them on sedo or bido let alone namejet.

How about SEO, GEO, MAP, APP etc

 

[JoeBiz]

From Encirca Newsletter ...

EnCirca’s special auction of finance-related .Pro domain names generated the heaviest bidding of the year. It seems that despite the current economic climate, generic keywords related to the financial crisis are irresistible.

Here are some of the .Pro names recently sold at auction:

* RealEstate.pro $14,000
* Insurance.pro $6,500
* Mortgage.pro $4,300
* Bank.pro $2,010
* Loan.pro $1,800
* Broker.pro $925
* Escrow.pro $750
* Appraisal.pro $600
* Financial.pro $454


8^X

 

[Ben42]

I bet they are planning on releasing only a few at a time. There are a ton more gems like: Gem.pro, Car.pro, PHP.pro, ASP.pro

 

[akcampbell]

Very honestly if Insurance.pro went for less than 10k, most .pro domains are worth less than that, imho.

Most are but not all as RealEstate.pro proved by selling for $14,000. When a .pro sells at Snapnames it is more likely to be bought by a collector and they pay less than an end user. Also, if several premium domains .pros are offered for sale at once the price any one sells for is reduced.

Maybe for those looking to sell its time to do some introspection and price domains correctly for sales.

Premium .pro sellers are speculative, if a tempting offer comes along, they will consider it but they are not going to sell their best domains for peanuts after surviving $99 reg fees. .pro is an unusual aftermarket, it's very illiquid but the people who buy and sell them are relatively well off, so when they do sell, the price is usually $X,XXX+.

I bet they are planning on releasing only a few at a time. There are a ton more gems like: Gem.pro, Car.pro, PHP.pro, ASP.pro

Instead, they picked 12 of the weakest 3 letter .pros you could think of. Better to have bad names than no names though from an awareness angle. I doubt the domains on offer will raise more than a $1,000. There are only a couple I would pay the Snapnames drop fee for.

 

[JoeBiz]

Looks like Bido is back. :talk: Or maybe my WayBack Machine just needs a tune up.


:ghost:

 

[JoeBiz]

I have a lot of Pro renewals coming up over the next few months and would appreciate everyone's input. I'm probably going to keep Sonar and Monsters and drop Sure and Winning.

Any thoughts? Chas 8^X

Sure.pro :ghost:
Sonar.pro
Monsters.pro
Winning.pro :ghost:


8^X

 

[gkjunior]

I have a lot of Pro renewals coming up over the next few months and would appreciate everyone's input. I'm probably going to keep Sonar and Monsters and drop Sure and Winning.

Any thoughts? Chas 8^X

Sure.pro :ghost:
Sonar.pro
Monsters.pro
Winning.pro :ghost:


8^X

If they where .com would you be asking ? Most people could not afford the .com version of those words.

At some point the end user will look at .pro and decide that though they cannot have the same location as the downtown mall they can still open a store at another major intersection for less.

As the city (internet) grows commerce will also grow. So the option is to keep your land, build on it or give to some one else for free.

Obviously I recommend you keep your land. Especially if it’s a one word.

 

[akcampbell]

I would drop Monsters.pro. There are no previous keyword sales for Monster or Monsters on Namebio and 2 bids for Monster.org on Sedo. The keyword Monsters would work with .tv or .info but it doesn't fit .pro. The singular might be worth holding from a branding angle but it would be a long shot. Sonar.pro works well with .pro but it's got no value to others domainers. You would have to direct market it to people with 2 and 3 word sonar website names.

Sure.pro is probably the best .pro of the 4. People have already made the association between Sure and Pro, http://www.surepro.co.uk/ and http://www.surepro-solutions.com/aboutus.html are good examples. The problem is until more people know about .pro and more registrars sell it, it won't figure in the decisions companies make about their online brand. However, there is potential there. I have had two expressions of interest in Safe.pro and that is a similarly brandable .pro although it could also refer to a safe you put money in.

 

[JoeBiz]

Hi Guys

Thanks for the input. It's much appreciated.

Would you keep scream.pro? I'm letting it drop. It takes a massive amount of traffic but it's all associated with the Scream series of movies.

Booooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo:ghost:

8^X

 

[akcampbell]

Would you keep scream.pro?

I would drop it. It isn't a sought after keyword in alternative extensions and doesn't have a professional or commercial context.

If I look at the keywords I have sold in .pro, they either have a commercial context: Quote.pro, ForSale.pro, Leads.pro, Booking.pro, Calculator.pro or a professional context; Surgery.pro, Surgeon.pro and Local.pro.

You have to ask yourself has this keyword sold in other alternative extensions and would somebody prefer it in .pro to .info, .biz, or .tv.

If you have doubts about whether a .pro should be renewed or dropped, it should probably be dropped. If you would accept less than $1,000 for a .pro, you should drop it because you would need 50-100 .pros of that quality to sell one so you would lose money when you factor in renewal fees.

Out of the 46,000 .pros registered, maybe 5,000 have any chance of selling. To an end user or motivated collector, 4,000 of those might sell for $2,000-$5,000, another 900 could sell for $5,000-$10,000 with perhaps 100 fetching over $10,000.