discuss TOP 10 mistakes new gTLD investors are doing in 2018 - Are you GUILTY of any of them?

[Brands.International]

Hi friends,

I did not have much time for NamePros discussions lately (except my appraisal thread for new gTLDs, where I spend some of my time), but I still like to read new articles and threads here. As some of you might know, I invest exclusively in new gTLD names. It is difficult for me not to notice that some new gTLD fellow investors are not doing well, therefore I am going to write some suggestions & hopefully it will be helpful for some members here!

TOP 10 mistakes new gTLD investors are doing in 2018!

Mistake no.1 - you are registering BAD, WORTHLESS names!
This mistake is far far the most important one - everything else can be forgotten, but if you have bad names, you will never make any profit. The appraisal thread I am running is unfortunately full of such examples...

Mistake no.2 - you are registering lot of names, and will be forced to dropped them prior the first renewal.
This is because you ignore the fact that even in best portfolios which are really well selected, only 1% of names are sold yearly for price which can be considered significant. And many portfolios I see here are not well selected, and there will be 0 sales in total, due to mistake no.1

Mistake no.3 - you spend too much time at Namepros, instead of LikedIn, Twitter, Facebook or Twitter.
Just to clarify, I love Namepros, and I love to hang around here. I also like to buy domains here for few dollars. But most of your end users (when it comes to new gTLDs) are simply not here. You need to reach out on various platforms, as here you speak mostly with other domainers, which is great for educational or recreational purposes, but not for your sales. Largest sales are made to end users, not to fellow domain speculators/investors.

Mistake no.4 - you are trying to impress, or get an agreement/approval from hardcore .com investors.
I mean, come on - selected, high quality new gTLD domain names are direct competition to valuable .com portfolios - there is only limited amount of money spent on domains, and new gTLDs are redirecting part of that money flow towards them. It is therefore logical that it is an unwanted competition for many .com holders and we can not expect lot of praise on them because of that. Saying that, I can clearly see some .com investors are very nice and genuine here, so this can not be generalised - still, it is good idea to have this notion somewhere back in your mind, as seeking approval of your new gTLDs names from someone who spent years to build his or her legacy extensions portfolio can be an doomed effort from the very start.

Mistake no.5 - you are trying to get an appraisal of your new gTLD name from .com investors.
Again, even in 2018, you will get lot of "regfee" comments or "I would stick with .com" comments -this is one of the reasons I am runnig the appraisal thread exclusively for new gTLDs, and I would like to invite other new gTLD investors to be more active in appraisal threads as well. In general, anytime someone gives you an appraisal or advice, try to check the domain portfolio of that person ..for example, if you see lot of bad domain names, it also can give you some information about the quality of such "appraisal".

Mistake no.6: you do not have your own marketplace ..
It really takes only few minutes and few dollars to create domain name marketplace, using solutions like efty.com, or to create simple webpage using wix.com. There is really no excuse for not having your marketplace nice and ready. Especially after GDPR legislation in place since May 2018, we really need to project some more credibility towards end users, and having nice marketplace is very good way to do so!

Mistake no.7: you have your marketplace created, but you operate from .com domain name...
Really???If you sell new gTLDs, you need to lead by your own example...so your markteplace also should operate on new gTLD extension. How can you possibly persuade end user to replace his long or ugly legacy name with new gTLD, if you do not operate from new gTLD? Think about it for a minute.

Mistake no.8: you are registering domain names with renewals around 500 and higher.
And you persuade yourself that you will develop it, if not flipped within 1 year. Yes, you can have 1 or 2 such names, no problem, but if you buy 30 of them, there is no way you will be able to develop all of them within 1 year. So you will end up dropping maybe 28 of them. And then you willl be really hating new gTLDs and "those greedy registries and ICANN maybe as well". This happend to many people 4 years ago, and we saw that recently again few weeks ago (who can guess the extension?), and I am sure we will see it again in near future when other planned new gTLD extensions will go to General Availability.

Mistake no.9: you do not care what are companies behind particular extensions.
You even can not tell difference between registrar and registries. You do not understand that once you drop you new gTLD domain name, it can be easily re-priced by registry, or it can be reserved by registry. You drop your good name, and then you start topics on Namepros saying "Registry reserved my name, please help!"...

Mistake no.10: you registered 1000 of very bad names, which will be only pure money loss.
Then (because you got lucky), you finally get a really good new gTLD name, with low standard renewal. Finally something good! This is a name which you should keep and wait for good ofers. But (because you have spent money on those 1000 bad domain names and everyone laughts at you ) you feel you need some casflow now! And because you are lazy to create your own marketplace (and from unknown reason you cannot also create your LinkedIn profile which is free of charge), and you do not like to send emails to end users because it is too much work, and you do not like to make phonecalls (from your country it is expensive anyway), you start $1 auction here...then it goes like this:
1
up
up
last 24 hours, SUPER PREMIUM name, a STEAL!!!
2
up
LAST BID IS $2, SUPER PREMIUM, INSANE NAME!!! Can anyone give $3? Do I see $3 for it?
up
up
up
me: ok, I will take it for BIN, USD 10...

And then you are again left with your bad 1000 names.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

So guys, are you guilty of any of this?

 

[Brands.International]

Just to summarise, there were 2 separate of the analysis done by Bob, if I understand that correctly:

First part, was about how many gTLDs and for how much are selling YTD 2018, comparing to whole domain name set. Results of this basic and rough analysis : new gTLDs are still 5 times less likely to sell comparing to whole set of domains in 2018, but WHEN they sell, they fetch 4 times higher price in average then domain from the overal set.

Second part of the analysis was concerned with registry vs domain investors sales ratio. Here, Bob has analysed data coming from last month, and he wrote

"
I don't know of a way to get out of NameBio the individual details for more than 100 sales in a category at a time, so I tried to answer your question using the most recent month's data. This resulted in 99 ngTLD sales totalling $320.3k so I could analyze each of them.

Of the 99 ngTLD sales in the period, 29% (29 out of 99) were registry sales. The often repeated statement that there are pretty well only registry sales, is simply not supported by evidence. Most of the main marketplaces that report had at least a few sales during the period - e.g. 13 of the sales were on Sedo.

Of the $320.3k in sales during the period, 53.5% ($171.2k) were registry sales. This was dominated by a couple of two letter top extension registry domain sales in the period, each for about $50,000. If you look at the top 10 sales in the reporting period, it is true that registry sales dominate, with 6 of the 10 sales being registry.

The figure is for a single month, but it, and similar analysis in the past, gives me confidence that the figure that I used in my calculation earlier in this thread of 50% is approximately correct.

If anyone wants to analyze or examine the NameBio data for themselves, here is the link.
https://namebio.com/?s==gTNwUDMygTM
"

That means, when we speak about frequency of new gTLD sales, 29% of sales are done by registries. Value wise (dollar volume) it is around 50%. This makes sense as registries have high quality inventory AND professional sale teams, so their average sale will be higher then domain investor sale.

But again, those number clearly shows that it is nonsense to say that only registries are selling new gTLD names, when we see that 71% of sales are not done by them. And value wise it is 50:50 based on data processed.

 

[Josh R]

I bought Office.Club so there's another sale for your list.

Oh wait, I'm not supposed to like any new gTLD's..... Help!

 

[Brands.International]

The one where half the $ were registry sales?

"Seriously, I know it can be boring to go through all those numbers, but really, read it"

I would love to read the numbers of somebody selling new gtld ebooks and appraisals, I'm just waiting for the day you stop using excuses to get out of it.

Yes, I am writing ebook about new gTLDs and I apparently am in favour of them. But numbers provided are not by me JB, they are by @MetBob - he is different person then me - he is from Canada, and I am from Czech Republic, we are not the same
Btw, every one can go to namebio, and do the same analysis - for average dollar volume, you will just summarise sale prices achieved by new gTLDs and also summarise sale prices achieved by all domains as such, and then you divide those sums with actual numbers of sold new gTLDs, and of sold all domains as such, and then you have the ratio between those two - you will get the same results as presented here. Similar for frequency of sales. I mean, no matter who is doing the math, 10:2 will be always 5 ..

 

[Brands.International]

I bought Office.Club so there's another sale for your list.

Oh wait, I'm not supposed to like any new gTLD's..... Help!

Personally I think Office / Club is very good one! GL with the sale

 

[JB Lions]

Yes, I am writing ebook about new gTLDs and I apparently am in favour of them. But numbers provided are not by me JB, they are by @MetBob - he is different person then me - he is from Canada, and I am from Czech Republic, we are not the same
Btw, every one can go to namebio, and do the same analysis - for average dollar volume, you will just summarise sale prices achieved by new gTLDs and also summarise sale prices achieved by all domains as such, and then you divide those sums with actual numbers of sold new gTLDs, and of sold all domains as such, and then you have the ratio between those two - you will get the same results as presented here. Similar for frequency of sales. I mean, no matter who is doing the math, 10:2 will be always 5 ..

I didn't say you were the same. You think it's normal that half the money being made in sales are by the registries? Who's running who there?

Look at your own conclusion:

CONCLUSION:
Based on statistics provided by Bob, it seems that new gTLDs are 5 times less likely to sell in 2018 comparing to set of all domain names. But ... WHEN they sell, they sell in average at 4 times of the average domain name price!

Probably why we see low day to day sales. And you can thank the registries for the average domain price, most here are not getting those type of prices, you got the leftovers. They're so low, you don't want to mention them.

 

[garptrader]

Lol thanks for sharing the link to the Namebio data. Regarding the 99 July 2018 NTLD sales, a few observations...

Median sales price between $1389 & $1394

72 .Top sales imo a Chinese phenomena
4 . .Global registry sales

44 of 50 .Top sales over $1000 were five characters or less

Excluding the .Top and .Global registry sales above median sales price is about $600

Note that when SEDO last reported domain sales on their platform the median .Com sales price was around $600. So perhaps ntlds (excluding .Top) even by non-registry holders are getting similar sales prices to .Com SEDO sales.

 

[garptrader]

Now if ntlds excluding .Top are yielding median $600 sales when they sell, considering marketplace commissions and renewal costs what portfolio turn rate does an individual investor need to break even (not the desired result)?

Checking some of the ntlds which sold average renewal rates at Godaddy vary but are $25+

$600 -20%commission ($120) =$480 with ~$25 renewals the investor needs a roughly 5% turn.

 

[Brands.International]

I didn't say you were the same. You think it's normal that half the money being made in sales are by the registries? Who's running who there?

Look at your own conclusion:

CONCLUSION:
Based on statistics provided by Bob, it seems that new gTLDs are 5 times less likely to sell in 2018 comparing to set of all domain names. But ... WHEN they sell, they sell in average at 4 times of the average domain name price!

Probably why we see low day to day sales. And you can thank the registries for the average domain price, most here are not getting those type of prices, you got the leftovers. They're so low, you don't want to mention them.

Well, whether it is "normal" or "not normal" that registries are making this or that portion of the money I personally do not care. It is only fair to note that registries are investing lot of money to buy and then to maintain new gTLD extensions, they have large yearly expenses, so it is fair imo they are getting sales to support all this.Personally I have no problem with that, it is not of my concern. Also, it is clear that It would not be "normal" that registries would pay for all the fun and expenses, but domain investors like you and me would get 100% of profit.

So for me, as an private domain investor, I am interested in that second half of the pie, so to speak

As for the average domain price, again, it is not important whether we should thank registries or not - important fact is, that according data processed from namebio, new gTLD names seems to sell in average at 4 times higher then the average domain name price, but less frequently. It is in total opposite of what you like to say, that new gTLD domain investors are "getting only leftovers".

"The leftovers" myth is second most favourite myth here, said by very small group of 4-5 people. It is very close behind no1. myth the "new gTLD names are sold only by registries". Both those myth are completely false, as numbers in this thread are showing...

The only feasible way for domain investor (and where our focus should be) is to get best possible names, with lowest possible renewal costs. This is what we need to discuss, imo.

 

[Brands.International]

Now if ntlds excluding .Top are yielding median $600 sales when they sell, considering marketplace commissions and renewal costs what portfolio turn rate does an individual investor need to break even (not the desired result)?

Checking some of the ntlds which sold average renewal rates at Godaddy vary but are $25+

$600 -20%commission ($120) =$480 with ~$25 renewals the investor needs a roughly 5% turn.

@garptrader lol I like it. But what about this calculation which I will now perform?

a) You kindly include those .top names back to statistics (Chinese phenomena or not, they sold and were reported so they simply belong there). If you include those cuties back, you will get average sell price back to around 1000 (by excluding them you slashed the price to 600)

b) Then we need to realise that renewal fee for .top is now around 3-5 at many registrars. This will the affect your average renewal price, from your estimation of 25 to something like 10.

c) We then do your calculation with new numbers: $1000 -20%commission ($200) =$800 with ~$10 renewals the investor needs a roughly 1,25 % turn.

And this is pretty much in synch with observation of many new gTLD investors of 1% turn on well selected portfolio. Of course, there are lot of hidden variables in those types of rough calculations, I can think of at least of 10 of them...I just wanted to demonstrate how easily we can change numbers if we selectively exclude or include something from statistics.

 

[JB Lions]

Well, whether it is "normal" or "not normal" that registries are making this or that portion of the money I personally do not care. It is only fair to note that registries are investing lot of money to buy and then to maintain new gTLD extensions, they have large yearly expenses, so it is fair imo they are getting sales to support all this.
Personally I have no problem with that, it is not of my concern. Also, it is clear that It would not be "normal" that registries would pay for all the fun and expenses, but domain investors like you and me would get 100% of profit.

So for me, as an private domain investor, I am interested in that second half of the pie, so to speak

As for the average domain price, again, it is not important whether we should thank registries or not - important fact is, that according data processed from namebio, new gTLD names seems to sell in average at 4 times higher then the average domain name price, but less frequently. It is in total opposite of what you like to say, that new gTLD domain investors are "getting only leftovers".

"The leftovers" myth is second most favourite myth here, said by very small group of 4-5 people. It is very close behind no1. myth the "new gTLD names are sold only by registries". Both those myth are completely false, as numbers in this thread are showing...

The only feasible way for domain investor (and where our focus should be) is to get best possible names, with lowest possible renewal costs. This is what we need to discuss, imo.

This is your favorite myth:

"I mean, come on - selected, high quality new gTLD domain names are direct competition to valuable .com portfolios"

That's the bs marketing spiel you've been using from the beginning, especially with those getting the second half of the pie, the leftovers. It's something you want to believe to try to make yourselves feel better, when others point out some obvious issues with the domains you have, stats etc. It's the ole' they're just haters, pretending the stuff brought up doesn't exist.

There is nothing in your portfolio that is a threat to anything I own. Most of my domains don't end in the available new gtlds. A lot of your domains I can hand reg in .com. How is that threat? And if there were, then it still be a domain somebody settles for.

"as numbers in this thread are showing..."

As one of the bigger proponents, you're not showing any numbers. If you were getting big/good sales, you would be posting about them. That would help the new gtld market. You're not posting them because they're mostly likely small. You've come up with a world of excuses, none of your fellow new gtld investors use.

And this is 4 months ago:

"Guys, some of you are holding best of the best .loans names. I just made extensive study of what was available in this TLD yesterday, and got few names.

Their renewal is standard for all of them, but as it is around 70 atm, I think only best 1 or 2 names will be keepers. Can you please share your views what is good and what you would drop?

Critical views are especially welcome as it will help me not to waste money. I just parked them and will test their traffic and potential offers, so in next few month I will be more wiser also from this perspective."

So 4 months ago, you're asking for help because you don't want to waste money. But here, you've giving appraisals and selling appraisals on your site?

 

[ecalc]

Before we chisel the ngTLD 4x average selling price (asp) advantage into stone, as the great Frank Gore once said, consider the inconvenient truth. Aftermarket giant Sedo sales data:

2018
all TLD # sold 3016, asp $5188
com TLD # sold 1816, asp $5921
ngTLD # sold 107, asp $4377

2017
all TLDs # sold 5094, asp $4481
com TLD # sold 3124, asp $5033
ngTLD # sold 140, asp $3939

2016
all TLDs # sold 5481, asp $4496
com TLD # sold 2924, asp $5416
ngTLD # sold 179, asp $2473

source: namebio

FAQs
Q - Yeah but you ignored banging sales by Jiangsu Bangning/Donuts/DotGlobal/etc.
A - Next.

Q - Sedo is an outlier. My personal site is killing it.
A - You rule.

Q - Why are you discussing average not median, meathead.
A - AGT came on 14 minutes ago.

 

[Brands.International]

Before we chisel the ngTLD 4x average selling price (asp) advantage into stone, as the great Frank Gore once said, consider the inconvenient truth. Aftermarket giant Sedo sales data:

2018
all TLD # sold 3016, asp $5188
com TLD # sold 1816, asp $5921
ngTLD # sold 107, asp $4377

2017
all TLDs # sold 5094, asp $4481
com TLD # sold 3124, asp $5033
ngTLD # sold 140, asp $3939

2016
all TLDs # sold 5481, asp $4496
com TLD # sold 2924, asp $5416
ngTLD # sold 179, asp $2473

source: namebio

FAQs
Q - Yeah but you ignored banging sales by Jiangsu Bangning/Donuts/DotGlobal/etc.
A - Next.

Q - Sedo is an outlier. My personal site is killing it.
A - You rule.

Q - Why are you discussing average not median, meathead.
A - AGT came on 14 minutes ago.

@ecalc nice try, thank you

We need to answer only one question here: are data about SEDO sales included in namebio.com, or not?

Answer: yes, they are included in namebio - everyone can verify that instantly.

So what happens here: in your attempt to give us picture about new gTLD sales, you have selected 1 venue (SEDO), while you have disregarded ALL other venues where domain names were sold. By this selection you have also conveniently disregarded many registry new gTLD sales which were done outside SEDO - so most of them afaik (but at least you acknowledged that in your FAQs, just before you jokingly dismised that concern with Answer: Next). So what you did is exactly what I demonstrated in my reply #85 to garptrader, where we suddenly got from 5% required turnover to 1,25% required turnover just by including back those .top domain names which were conveniently excluded as well, although they belonged to analysed data...

Look, we can not select only data which suits us. In this thread, we somehow started to discuss overall frequencies and sales volumes of new gTLDs vs all domains, So it is mandatory to use as wide dataset as possible for that purpose, to avoid local discrepancies. Your selection of 1 venue (although important one) only demonstrate the numbers of that particular venue, nothing else.

To demonstrate it further:

a) if we speak about year 2018, and data from the NameBio statistics, there have been 48,010 domain sales in total recorded.

b) from the stats you have just provided for SEDO, there have been 3016 domain sales in total recorded.

c) this means that you have just selected 6,2% of data, which we have already analysed in this thread, using namebio.com data If I am allowed to select small subset like this from any dataset, I can prove you almost anything you want. There are even some mathematical theorems about it.

Summary:

- data from SEDO are already included in wider data set analysed from NAMEBIO.COM.

- results derived from analysis of wider set of data gives always more precise global picture, comparing to data from selected subset.

- selection of 1 venue (although important one) only demonstrate the numbers of that particular
venue, nothing else.

 

[Brands.International]

@ecalc so can we chisel ngTLD 4x average selling price (asp) advantage into stone, or not yet?
But seriously - is there any real problem you can see with using namebio as wider set of data the way Bob did?

 

[garptrader]

[QUOTE="lolwarrior,But what about this calculation which I will now perform?

a) You kindly include those .top names back to statistics (Chinese phenomena or not, they sold and were reported so they simply belong there). If you include those cuties back, you will get average sell price back to around 1000 (by excluding them you slashed the price to 600)
b) Then we need to realise that renewal fee for .top is now around 3-5 at many registrars. This will the affect your average renewal price, from your estimation of 25 to something like 10.
c) We then do your calculation with new numbers: $1000 -20%commission ($200) =$800 with ~$10 renewals the investor needs a roughly 1,25 % turn.

And this is pretty much in synch with observation of many new gTLD investors of 1% turn on well selected portfolio.

LOL
Yes there are many ways to slice the data but I believe there are many domain investors in new extensions who have few .TOP domain holdings or at least few .TOP domains that are as short as the ones which are selling 5 or fewer characters). Certainly the reported new TLD sales are VERY .TOP heavy and certainly many of the extensions with reported sales have much higher renewals than .TOP. What percentage of your domain portfolio consists of .TOP domains of five characters or less? If we look at .TV sales there are likely many 'LL sales in the data. I have none. Actually many of my domains are Spanish so whatever is going on with one-word English .TV domain sales may not translate into my portfolio. Thus the reason why I slashed my .TV holdings.

While the 99 sales are only one month of data there is no way one conclude that the typical new TLD portfolio sees sales prices four times those of a typical .Com domain portfolio. As well, with the reported sales so heavily weighted toward very short .TOP domains, it is likely many new TLD portfolios are more balanced - with many different extensions and many longer than five-character domains. So excluding .TOP and registry sales likely yields a picture closer to what many investors are realizing. 5% turn is not typical in this industry unless you are doing aggressive outbound marketing in which case the value of one's time has to be considered.

On the other hand if one looks at the number of short .TOP sales an argument could be made that even if the buyers are wealthy Chinese investors, someone is buying those domains. No, I am not going to start creating hundreds of posts shouting about how great .TOP is. But .TOP does seem to be kicking butt compared to the rest of the new extensions.

 

[Brands.International]

This is your favorite myth:

"I mean, come on - selected, high quality new gTLD domain names are direct competition to valuable .com portfolios"

That's the bs marketing spiel you've been using from the beginning, especially with those getting the second half of the pie, the leftovers. It's something you want to believe to try to make yourselves feel better, when others point out some obvious issues with the domains you have, stats etc. It's the ole' they're just haters, pretending the stuff brought up doesn't exist.

There is nothing in your portfolio that is a threat to anything I own. Most of my domains don't end in the available new gtlds. A lot of your domains I can hand reg in .com. How is that threat? And if there were, then it still be a domain somebody settles for.

"as numbers in this thread are showing..."

As one of the bigger proponents, you're not showing any numbers. If you were getting big/good sales, you would be posting about them. That would help the new gtld market. You're not posting them because they're mostly likely small. You've come up with a world of excuses, none of your fellow new gtld investors use.

And this is 4 months ago:

"Guys, some of you are holding best of the best .loans names. I just made extensive study of what was available in this TLD yesterday, and got few names.

Their renewal is standard for all of them, but as it is around 70 atm, I think only best 1 or 2 names will be keepers. Can you please share your views what is good and what you would drop?

Critical views are especially welcome as it will help me not to waste money. I just parked them and will test their traffic and potential offers, so in next few month I will be more wiser also from this perspective."

So 4 months ago, you're asking for help because you don't want to waste money. But here, you've giving appraisals and selling appraisals on your site?

JB but you can also give appraisals here..lot of people are submitting their appraisal requests for their .com names, and some are literally waiting for days, sometimes they get no response at all. You are an very experienced .com domainer so give them an appraisal, share your experience. Do this, instead of dwelling on each new gTLD thread. And share your experience with others about new gTLDs as well - If you know about some renewal/transfer promotions, good cheap registrars, also please share. You can also sell appraisals at your website, we are in a free world (at least I am, but I guess you are from US so you are too), so do what makes you happy Of course, the question is whether someone will buy them, but imo if people will find them (and you) useful, you will be succesful.

You have some nice .com domain names, so you can write some book about that too. I promise that once you will be working on it, I am not going to jump on every thread, mark you as 'self-proclaimed .com guru' or endlessly ask about your personal and financial details. For me it is enough when I see what domain names you own, imo I can judge things from that POV pretty clearly. All I ask from people is: just show me your domains! So, focus on what is positive. I like to discuss with you as you are clever, but honestly I am not big fan of heated discussions or personal remarks, 'bs' words, quotes from other forums, etc, and by arguing with you. well... I would become GUILTY of new gTLD investor's mistake no 4! I guess options are unlimited for both of us: enjoy your .com names, and let me and many other people enjoy new gTLDs. Good luck!

 

[JB Lions]

JB but you can also give appraisals here..lot of people are submitting their appraisal requests for their .com names, and some are literally waiting for days, sometimes they get no response at all. You are an very experienced .com domainer so give them an appraisal, share your experience. Do this, instead of dwelling on each new gTLD thread. And share your experience with others about new gTLDs as well - If you know about some renewal/transfer promotions, good cheap registrars, also please share. You can also sell appraisals at your website, we are in a free world (at least I am, but I guess you are from US so you are too), so do what makes you happy Of course, the question is whether someone will buy them, but imo if people will find them (and you) useful, you will be succesful.

You have some nice .com domain names, so you can write some book about that too. I promise that once you will be working on it, I am not going to jump on every thread, mark you as 'self-proclaimed .com guru' or endlessly ask about your personal and financial details. For me it is enough when I see what domain names you own, imo I can judge things from that POV pretty clearly. All I ask from people is: just show me your domains! So, focus on what is positive. I like to discuss with you as you are clever, but honestly I am not big fan of heated discussions or personal remarks, 'bs' words, quotes from other forums, etc, and by arguing with you. well... I would become GUILTY of new gTLD investor's mistake no 4! I guess options are unlimited for both of us: enjoy your .com names, and let me and many other people enjoy new gTLDs. Good luck!

I don't jump or dwell on all new gtld threads, I've made 0 posts in your appraisal thread here. Reread your very first post in this thread. It goes both ways. Your outlook to what you call ".com investors" usually those who've been doing it awhile tends to be negative if they ever give an opinion on a new gtld. It's not some foreign animal, it's just extensions. It seems you assume that anytime an opinion is given by a .commer on a new gtld that isn't favorable, you think think it's because they feel threatened, when it's usually just an opinion, many times based on experience. Just opinions. Also, many have ventured into other extensions as well. In the past I've had many different extensions. If somebody has horsestall.vacations, and I say, I think it sucks and give some reasons, it's not from feeling threatened or hating, or any of that other stuff. There have been people with some new gtlds that I said are decent, atinc knows this.

Mistake no.4 - you are trying to impress, or get an agreement/approval from hardcore .com investors.

Mistake no.5 - you are trying to get an appraisal of your new gTLD name from .com investors.

You probably consider me a .com investor, I am. But I've owned .us. me, ws, cc, info, org, md......... These new gtlds, just more extensions. There is plenty of information out there to see how they're doing, I don't need to invest in .vacations to see horsestall.vacations is bad or have an opinion/appraisal on it. So don't automatically discount those just because you feel they invest mainly in .com. You even have a few hardcore new gtld investors, who give appraisals sometimes, have admitted they have never even sold any. So how much weight would you put on those appraisals? Or if I see somebody buy a misspelling brandable in a new gtld and I say I don't like it, don't ever buy those type of domains, that would be based on seeing 0 misspelling brandable new gtld sales and it being a horrible purchase. It would be good advice not to buy those type of names.

 

[ecalc]

Lolwarrior, please drop the chisel and put your hands where I can see them. Namebio database is a jewel, but it’s a mix of primary (registry to registrant) and secondary (registrant to registrant) market data, dangerous when stirred. Namebio floor is $100 so their primary sales data is limited to ngTLDs. Imagine the howls if millions of $10 Verisign regs showed up. Sorry to rock your boat but I disregard primary sales when analyzing the secondary market. Regarding Sedo, it’s a big enough trustworthy sample to describe the larger secondary market with a high degree of confidence.

 

[garptrader]

Ok so very short .Top domains are dominating the new TLD sales charts. How are the rest doing? Namestat.org shows more than 22 million new TLD registrations while about 2.9 million are .TOP. That leaves about 19 million registrations amongst the other extensions. I believe domainer speculation in New TLD extensions is 80-90% of the total but even if only say two thirds of registrations are domain investor held you still have at least 12 million registrations in the other extensions - one million renewals a month. While there are many year one promos renewals are key to cash flow as most domain investments in any extension are not quick flips. So if the typical sale is about $600 and one pays 20% commissions with $25 renewals (being generous because many of the extensions I checked had higher renewals) $480 will not even cover the renewal of 20 domains with $25 renewals. Regardless you need.more than 5% turn for many of the new extensions (given July sales of non .TOP domains which were not registry sales). If 1 million non-.Top domains are renewing monthly and a portfolio needs 5%+ turn to break even, we should be seeing 50 thousand new TLD sales monthly. Not all will be reported but compare 50 thousand to the 25 reported non .Top non-registry sales in July. Not even close.

 

[Kate]

...

Of the 99 ngTLD sales in the period, 29% (29 out of 99) were registry sales. The often repeated statement that there are pretty well only registry sales, is simply not supported by evidence. Most of the main marketplaces that report had at least a few sales during the period - e.g. 13 of the sales were on Sedo.

Of the $320.3k in sales during the period, 53.5% ($171.2k) were registry sales. ...

Let's assume this is accurate. I still think the big sales are made by registries most of the time.

If you look at the weekly reports from DNJ for example, they list the sales that meet the minimum reporting threshold. I seldom see third parties listed as the sellers, usually it's always the registry and on the occasion it could a non-representative domainer like M Berkens.

The rest of the sales could be spread across a large number of small sales and many domainers, but if their sales do not even meet the reporting threshold (1K or 2K ?), I draw my own conclusions. I assume that domainers are indeed reaping the crumbs only. I could be wrong of course, but please understand my skepticism.

 

[Asfas1000]

The calculations are off, because the renewal fee was not taken into account.

 

[Bob Hawkes]

The calculations are off, because the renewal fee was not taken into account.

Thanks for comment @Asfas1000 . This has also been commented on by @lolwarrior, but your note prompted me to use the TLD-list data from this morning for least expensive renewal to actually see how valid the widely repeated idea that ngTLDs are more expensive to renew really is. Here is what I found.

First off, I used the TLD-list data to find the least expensive renewal rate for some extensions that are widely traded. These data change every few hours, so this may be different even by the time you read this, but these values reflect the values as of right now.

• .com $8.75
• .net $9.78
• .org $9.99
• .info $10.98
• .io $29.95
• .co $21.47
• .ai $70.88

Next I went to the ntldstats site and and looked up the ten most registered of the new extensions. Together these 10 extensions account for 52% of the total ngTLD registrations and a large percentage of ngTLD sales numbers over the past year (at least). I think therefore we can accept they are representative of the most encountered ngTLD renewal costs.

• .top $4.99
  
• .loan $1.89
• .xyz $8.50
• .club $8.88
• .vip $6.99
• .online $16.99
• .win $1.89
• .shop $25.95
• .ltd $14.46

If you take the top 5 of the ngTLD every one of them has a best renewal price better than the average of the best renewal rate currently for a package of .com, .net and .org. They are significantly better than some general distribution extensions that are widely sold such as .co and .ai and many others.

Lest you think these rates are only for some obscure registrar you don't want to deal with, the lowest rates for .top, .loan, .online and .win is NameSilo, for .club, .shop and .ltd is Porkbun, for .xyz is Epik, and for .vip is Dynadot. These are all registrars I respect and would or do use.

Ah, but you say, some of those have premium renewals on a small percentage of the really best names. Yes, true, certainly not in all ngTLDs, but in some, there are premium costs beyond the initial purchase. Be cautious of these in your portfolio is good advice, and always check any name you are considering buying to see if it is 'premium' in this sense. I give potential users this advice in my domain descriptions (but they should confirm of course!). Renewal cost is one factor to consider, as the OP of this long thread has always stated. You can readily find this rate by starting as though you are going to renew any particular name using your favourite registrar site. I am glad that the newest significant ngTLD release, .icu, have standard renewal rates even on those that they are selling at premium initially. I hope that becomes the standard.

For the vast majority of ngTLDs really being used and held, they are cost competitive to legacy extensions.

I have not included the deals you can get on multi-year renewals if you know where to look, wait for the right deal, and shop around. I have renewed a .site for 5 years for $8.88 for the 5 years (not counting ICANN fees - I wish I had registered more at that rate, now gone), a .science for $5.88, and you can occasionally register a .tech for 10 years for about $40.00 total. SometimesI try to lock in renewal rates for the number of years if I expect to be holding the domain name for a long time because I both regard it as good and more valuable in future (i.e. emerging technology). Lets all be smart about renewal costs!

Thank you all for taking the time to read this. We all grow stronger when we use data and evidence to make the best informed domain investing decisions.

#EvidenceMatters

 

[Asfas1000]

@MetBob I think you should use the renewal fee of the domains that actually sold. I may have a ton of .xyz domains for $0.01 each, but these won't sell (at least not for $x,xxx)

 

[Bob Hawkes]

My last post in this thread (you and I both hope ) - so I made it a long one. Thanks for putting up with me, really.

I just wanted to say that I have spent enough time pointing out what the evidence indicates, in response to various statements by those who are opposed to all ngTLDs. I've invested a lot of effort getting statistical data, and then presenting it here. Considering rule 3 (don't spend all of your time on NPs, as fun as that would be ), I plan to move on. This will be my last post on this topic (at least at this time in this thread). I'm going to invest the time I would have spent in further debate with ngTLD "dislikers and sceptics" in enjoying the amazing place I live in Canada, playing with my grandchildren, browsing at my local library, reading a good book, and taking care of my domain portfolio!

I originally did the statistical analysis to counter statements that the momentum in ngTLDs was totally gone and essentially never do any ngTLDs sell. This has been a better year for ngTLD sales than the previous few. The data clearly shows if you use NameBio data for this year, or the last 12 months, or some similar period, the total sales value has increased. Also, if you scale sales and dollar figures by a measure of how many registrations/for sale there are in an extension, the ngTLDs are same order of magnitude (I am not saying equal, just order of magnitude).

I did take into account registry sales distortion in ngTLDs, initially using a rough estimate that 50% of value. Later did a small study that supports that. If you look at numbers, the impact of the registries are not nearly as significant, so the statement that most sales in ngTLDs are by registries is not true. It is true that the biggest sales are from registries. Registry data skews the sales volume in ngTLD, by about 1/2 of the total sales figures reported by NameBio, but only about 1/4 of the total sales in ngTLDs.

I totally agree with the statement that we should not etch in stone the data that apparently shows a significantly higher average price recently for ngTLD sales when compared to sales of all domain names on NameBio. I think that is very influenced by a string of large sales. I wish NameBio still calculated median values (I do understand why they don't), since median prices are much better indicators of what real domain investors might get. In both .com and ngTLD median values are much lower than averages. I feel that in the long run ngTLD average prices will be similar to, or less than, than .com - we will see if I am right. The Sedo only data kindly collected by @ecalc suggests where I think the long term will go, and I thank him for the data.

I totally agree, and have always felt, that currently ngTLD are not as lucrative as .com in terms of ROI. If I looked only at ROI right now, I would invest almost exclusively in .io and .org and .com and a select few country codes. I would not invest in .net, .info, .biz, most ngTLDs and most country codes.

But will ngTLDs ever be, or maybe become more lucrative? I have no idea. However, you can't just look over a few NameBio daily reports or the DNJournal major sales, without taking into account the number of sales should be scaled. If everyone only invested in businesses that are currently the most lucrative, the economy and financial investment would be pretty different!

I am still developing my thoughts, but in the same way that in traditional investment there are growth and value styles, I am trying to establish what long term inherent value is for a domain name. It has to do with usefulness, aesthetics, uniqueness, respect, familiarity and other factors. The .com extension right now adds respect and familiarity. But is that inherent, or like a fashion, that will change over time? I would not have predicted it would lasted more than two decades. But it has. Taking off the .com makes the name more aesthetically elegant and pleasing, however, as Blake J reminded us in his interviews.

I plan to continue to personally hold a diversified domain name portfolio that includes names from a number of different niches, and from a number of extensions including the ngTLD extensions I like, .com, .ca (because I am a proud Canadian but especially because it is such an accepted and respected extension here) and a handful of country codes with general use (mainly .co and .pw and a handful of .me). I can't predict the future, but I am not convinced that others in this business can either! They remind us in conventional investments that past returns are no guarantee of future returns. NameBio and what has sold is important, past sales are no guarantee of future sales prospects.

Yes, a few premium ngTLD domain names have crazy renewal rates. As @lolwarrior reminds us, always work the renewal cost into your projection numbers. Period. However, for the majority of domain names in the ngTLDs the best price cost to renew is less than the best price renewal cost for the legacy extensions. Yes, really! See my previous post in this thread for the numbers.

I admit, the .top extension has me confused but I definitely feel it would be unwise to take it out of the statistics. It tops registrations, and at least in NameBio data it has come to dominate the ngTLD sales too. Other than the vacation.rentals and the.club and home.loans of the world, it also dominates the huge sales. Both for major sales (mainly 2 letter or super one word), but also even if you looked at the $$$$ sales, it dominates, month after month. Many of these are registry, but it is selling frequently in a host of other places too. If you go to NameStat, top has a far different geographic spread than domains in general or almost all other ngTLDs (except for some developed obviously for the Chinese market). It is dominantly in China. This makes it hard to sell if not in that market. We should not underestimate that China and India will dominate the world economy in not that long a period. Businesses added daily are so high in China. Could top become a com like general domain extension? I think its possible, and wish I held more and more quality in top, but I have never sold one even for $$. I am perplexed by top, but each month when I do the monthly ngTLD statistics I feel that too many ngTLD investors are overlooking the .top extension and in 5 years we will wish we had held more. Taking out .top from ngTLD data would be like taking out .com before you look at all domain data. I respect other views, but to me it makes no sense.

Anyway, I don't plan to go down the statistical rabbit hole any further to respond to arguments from those who are convinced there is no future in ngTLD. I started responding to the "there is zero momentum" in ngTLD and "there are essentially no sales". I provided NameBio data to refute that. Then people wanted to exclude .top, or use only Sedo data, or scale in some way related to renewal costs, or count only big sales, or count only little sales or whatever. I have responded to the renewal cost with an objective analysis, and I do accept that Sedo only is an interesting way to look, although as has been said, it is dangerous to exclude 90% of the overall data. I am not sure that each marketplace does not introduce it's own biases re extensions (ok I feel stronger than that about the statement).

I hope I have pushed us to use evidence more, and to be more open to countering views, and I thank those, even those who are ngTLD critics, who responded with evidence and data and logical arguments. We all become stronger when we use evidence rather than vague statements. We have amazing tools such as NameBio and NameStat. We should use them frequently, in a sophisticated manner, and with an open mind.

Thanks for reading, and sorry to be so long (again, you point out, I am sure).

Have a nice day. Really. Everyone. As the great Louis Armstrong reminded us with his powerful voice, What a Wonderful World. Explore a bit of it today.

Bob

#EvidenceMatters #BeNice

ps Just in case you thought (hoped? that is harsh!) this post means I am leaving NPs, not at all. Just not going to respond further to each new argument from ngTLD sceptics on this thread.

 

[garptrader]

Of the 25 non-.TOP non-regsitry domains which sold in July, Godaddy & Name.com (popular US-based registrars) show the following base RENEWAL rates... Certainly not a $10 average. So where are these TLDs available with $10 renewals?

App $23.99 vs $19.99
Bio $79.99 vs $59.99
Cards $39.99 vs $34.99
Cooking $14.99 vs $34.99
Dental $69.99 vs $59.99
Digital $39.99 vs $34.99
Fit $39.99 vs $29.99
Group $24.99 vs $19.99
Life $39.99 vs $34.99
Media $39.99 vs $34.99
Network $34.99 vs $22.99
News $29.99 vs $19.99
Online $49.99 vs $34.99
Solutions $24.99 vs $22.99
Space $11.99 vs $10.99
Ventures $69.99 vs $59.99
Work $9.99 vs $8.99
Xyz $14.99 vs $14.99

 

[Premiums]

Of the 25 non-.TOP non-regsitry domains which sold in July, Godaddy & Name.com (popular US-based registrars) show the following base RENEWAL rates... Certainly not a $10 average. So where are these TLDs available with $10 renewals?

App $23.99 vs $19.99
Bio $79.99 vs $59.99
Cards $39.99 vs $34.99
Cooking $14.99 vs $34.99
Dental $69.99 vs $59.99
Digital $39.99 vs $34.99
Fit $39.99 vs $29.99
Group $24.99 vs $19.99
Life $39.99 vs $34.99
Media $39.99 vs $34.99
Network $34.99 vs $22.99
News $29.99 vs $19.99
Online $49.99 vs $34.99
Solutions $24.99 vs $22.99
Space $11.99 vs $10.99
Ventures $69.99 vs $59.99
Work $9.99 vs $8.99
Xyz $14.99 vs $14.99

use porkbun.com
.life renews at $21.47
media renews at $22.12
etc...