.tv Why are you here and what are you looking for ?

[equity78]

This thread will attempt to define buying habits, best uses of resources and get a pulse for what .tv owners are looking for.

Let me preface that jokes or smart ass replies will be deleted so don't bother asking why was my post deleted.

I have never believed personally in the one will move all theory. That in a certain amount of time all .tv will rise in value and you need to wait for that time. First off I believe that because it hasn't for .com which is king. People who own so so or bad names have not made big money off their junk portfolio even though the .com world has had record years. Great domains and good domains have done well, so-so domains have not done well. Many people sitting with renewals year in year out where the money may have been spent in a more productive way.

Secondly I believe each domain is unique and also Illiquid. Some people compare domains to stocks but I can sell a stock any day a market is open. Not so for domains they are an illiquid investment unless you are dealing in something like an LLL.com. Even then you may not get optimal pricing if you need to sell.

Thirdly there is no need to wait you should be owing domains you have some interest in and can develop in a profitable way. So you can do that now and not wait years. Anyone who says they "KNOW" what the Internet will be in five years is a LIAR. They "KNOW" nothing. They may have an opinion but they "KNOW" nothing. What you do "KNOW" is you own a great domain that belongs to you and you can start developing it.

Development is not a just do it and it will be good. I read Hotnames informative post in where he mentioned failures. Millers and I had a conversation back when he was leaving ALLTHINGS.tv and I told him it would never make money. That is not a knock at ALLthings.tv. DOTTVnation.tv does not make money either. It is because IMO it is too narrow a niche and domainers are cheap. Westblock built Launched.tv and Unload.tv and could not get anyone to spend $5. I told Lance I believe domainers are cheap and these projects will never succeed. He flipped Launched to Patty who is doing a nice job IMO but making no money.

You have to approach development as a business IMO, unless you are doing it for a fun hobby. So you need to analyze the market.

Is there a need for my site?
How will I make money?
Who is the competition and can I effectively compete ?
Do I have an above average knowledge on the industry ?
Do I have the time and money to do this the right way?

Next you have to look at how many domains you own. Why spend money on your 100th best idea. I believe if you have 3 great domains that is what you spend money on. Unless you are someone like Domain Acrobat or Searchingtv, who do an excellent job at flipping .tv and have a formula for doing that. I believe unless you are wealthy you are wasting money and valuable time on owning 100/200/300 .tv domains. Because you are not going to hold those 300 domains at $9000 to $12,000 a year for 5 years. Names you have little knowledge on the topic and make no money ppc.
Better IMO to focus on your top domains now. NOT waiting for 2 or 4 or 6 years. Take control and it does not matter.
Example MckennaRonnie purchased Scotland.tv, he has the advantage of being a Scotsman so IMO he brings above average knowledge on the topic of the domain. He can develop that into a money making business and it does not matter if 6 years from now .tv still only has limited traffic and no interest from conferences or live auctions. Why anyone is waiting for those people I am never sure. By developing Scotland.tv he has a business not a domain name but a business and IMO that is what matters most.

I believe the number one opportunity .tv gave people was to register great keywords that were gone in other extensions and had a high perceived value.
Adding to the opportunity is that .tv is intuitive and universally recognized giving it an advantage over another exotic cctld. So IMO the ability to get a domain like Scotland or Wet or See or Watch or Education and turn it into a business is the real selling point.

I do not believe personally .tv will ever attain the sales volume or prices of .com. I do not think that comes in 5 or 10 years. There maybe sales that rival a .com but on a uniquely individual basis. I do not believe there will be 91 .tv sales out of the top 100 on DN JOURNAL like .com is. I do not think so so names will ever sell in volume the way .com sells. There will be some but not enough to justify the ownership of 300 of those domains IMO. Great names I believe will sell just so long as people are reasonable. I do not think you will see tens of six figure .tv sales a year. Hopefully 2 to 4 but that is sometime out IMO.

Lastly these are only my opinions, not facts but opinion. I am not looking to debate them because no one will change my mind and I am not looking to change anyone elses. So now give your opinion on the extension and also why you are here and what you are looking to get from the investment you have made in the .tv extension.

Are you someone who believes .tv will rival .com?
Are you here to flip domains at reseller levels?
Are you just looking for one perfect domain to build a business around?
Whatever you are looking for post it here.

 

[filter]

came here just to flip one, but may stay a while ... I like TV ...

by the way, current.tv is an interesting project (local to me here in SF) - if that's not on your radar already, check it out ...

 

[Steven]

Are you someone who believes .tv will rival .com?

.com is the king, and will remain one for a long time. Personally, I don't think .TV has / or will have the power to rival .com. In fact, I don't think any extension does atm or in the near future imo.

Are you here to flip domains at reseller levels?

For some domains, I buy to resell. For many of my .TV domains, I have development plans in mind.

Are you just looking for one perfect domain to build a business around?

One or two serious development.


Here's what I'm seeing.
- An increasing number of huge media and other companies launching a .TV website of their own. Serious money is being poured into development of some .TV websites.
- An increasing in exposure of .TV to general population sites through me.tv sites and other developed .TV sites.
- TV/Banner Advertisement of .TV websites
- Increasing number of video websites or websites that contain videos. .TV is a very nice way to brand a video containing/related websites.

Nobody knows how .TV will turn out 5-10 years down the road, but I like the trend (in our favor) that I'm seeing (sales report, increasing exposure, ...).

 

[meeks]

Have a few names more than worthy of development.
Im in this to build businesses.
And loving the journey!

 

[smashfactory]

i flip some, and some i am holding- i want to develop, i justtdont have the time right now

i like having a fat portfolio as opposed to a few names because i see with tv, name prices are all over the board, and you never know who is going to pay what.

a country, scotland, goes for the same as a job, landscaping- someone paid too little, and someone paid too much, and that would have not happened in .com-

since the day i started with .tv, and i still believe it, that people who go for .tv sites are not after the generic all the time- they go for more funky urbanistic name and many times use an adjective- like juicy.tv-


i do not think tv will rival com but compliment it- it is the one ext that can work with it- i also buy tv.coms for that reason-

 

[TheBulldog]

Good topic.

When I first started in tv it was with the intention to hold for sales. Those sales of generic words have pretty much been non-existant. Those same words in com fetch tens of thousands.

So what does that leave? Development. I am actively getting all of my domains, across all extensions, to have at the very least a parking page that I control. I own my own dedicated server and see NO reason to give part of my clicks to a parking company. So I may have 200-300 blah parking pages, but at least they pay for themselves.

Those that get no clicks are being actively sold. I see it this way, if no one is clicking, and the domain name is iffy, then it is out. I am selling quite a few of my crap names in all extensions just to be rid of them. My renewal time for the bulk of domains happens every year in January-March, and I fully intend to be rid of every stinker by then, or have it making enough throughout the past year to pay for itself. If it doesn't, then I will let them drop or give them away. But I have resolved not to renew any domain that isn't getting at the least about 10 clicks a month.

For tv, it will never beat com. My opinion is that anyone who thinks that is retarded. Sure, there will be a few cases where a developed tv is worth far more then a com, but that will be about half of 1 percent of sales, if that.

My belief is that if you are going to have domains, then you should be actively doing something with them. Marketing, developing or flipping. Right now my entire focus is to get traffic going to my sites. A domain with traffic, even to one of my "parked" pages is worth far more then one sitting at sedo or bodis. While I understand that bodis pays back all parking revenue (I fail to see if that is possible how they make money, so I am skeptical), their pages are nothing more then a blank page with 10 links to other links. Why not get a template with updating content?

You stand a much better chance of having repeat traffic, and people are more likely to click links on something with content specifically related to your domain name. So I say do SOMETHING with your domains. Even if it is only a small reseller account for hosting, do SOMETHING other then parking. A decent reseller will run you 15-25 a month. So instead of buying 1 crappy domain every month, pay for a hosting account and get ALL your domains working for you.

For TV in particular: there is literally no market right now. And I say this for a very specific reason: look at the marketplace here and at say Sedo. Names are just not selling for what any of us would consider their true value. Or better still, they are selling for EXACTLY their value. Right now, even prime keywords directly related to video are just not selling well. Yes, yes, I know there are sales, but not nearly as much as there could or should be.

There is simply too many uncertainties in the tv extension. Stupid premium pricing, a marketer of tv that is only interested in the extension to push their me.tv platform, and basically just a complete lack of interested buyers.

I have done some of my own testing to see what happens if I have a .tv and a com of the the same name with xxxtv.com. Guess which one gets more traffic even though it is EXACTLY the same content? Granted it is right now a very short term test and I will watch it for the next few months, but I don't really believe it will change much. I picked names with the word video in them just to pick up the search engines, and am patiently waiting to see what happens.....more on that later.

It is very simply just too early in the game for tv. Yes, I know that countries outside the US have a pretty strong foothold in the tv extension and it is marketed heavier, but I do believe it will take a peaked US interest by major companies to really get this ball rolling. And I don't see that happening for the next 3-5 years.

I have sold enough tv's now to cover my investments in the extension, and I don't plan on going on anymore buying sprees. I will hold what I have, sell it for what I feel is right, and will dump my dogs in the next few months. My intention is to dev enough to be profitable every month, without having to put any more of my own money into it.

The stuff I hold is being devved, even if only to a glorified parking page, and I am fine with that for now. To be perfectly honest, I am very dissappointed with the people managing this extension, have no confidence in them doing anything except for themselves, and think they will end up loosing the marketing contract to godaddy. When that happens, I think we will see a much larger push for the extension. Until then, I just don't think Demand is good for the extension at all.

I'm spent.

 

[Disintegration]

I noticed some of my favorite bands had .tv's and found this site looking for their websites. I akin .tv to the rebel of the extension world and I like that edge it has- something fresh, not just going to have words and pictures but multimedia. This was around the time of the merge so after reading some threads I was able to reg a few one word names. I had some .coms to develop and learn about domaining with but I figure this would be a neat opportunity to get some decent names during the new beginning of this ext.

I have a strong feeling it will grow and is growing pretty fast. It took a while for .com to be on television and advertisments. .Tv is already doint that. A year ago my friends in the 20's age group had little concept of anything beyond .com and .net. When I've mentioned .tv they know exactly what I'm talking about from different Local businesses we see on .tv to hollywood and tnt.

I also see this extension as an alternative to regular television. More choices to people, made by their peers instead of what corporations want us to watch. It is very complimentary to this home video explosion and livecasting at the right place and time. Really no matter what extension I think i-video will be integral to business.

The more I learn the more I realize that there are so many opportunities and have started developing to be ready in January. When I first received an offer though small it gave me a rush, more than offers I was getting for my long .com names. .TV is exciting, like a secret that hasn't been leaked yet and no one knows the gravity of it..yet.TV is cool and I enjoy being a part of it.

 

[RogueWriter]

In addition to serving as a creative tool to generate registration ideas for me, this forum is in essence feeding me information about how the developmental process will work best in regards to streaming video, and presentation.

I have started minimal development of several domains, basically just trying to get some activity and traffic at the sites, as several business opportunities coalesce. My largest issue, and I would be willing to bet this is the case with 95% of us, is that I am strapped for cash. I am going to get one shot at developing a site to it's potential, so I need to make sure that one shot is focussed on a domain where I have the greatest chance at success.

Looking over my domains, I have several different niches, where I could begin:

Instructor.tv - It could end up like ExpertVillage.com , only more in depth, actual accredited classes, like you find at ed2go.com . Biggest downside is that this will require a huge investment of capital and time, something that may be beyond my means at this time.

AntiqueMall.tv - Merchants could buy 'booth space', and advertise, say, 100 items for one annual fee. The whole focus is on streaming video of each specific product, where they could provide a monologue, etc. No need for a shopping cart system, the purpose is to provide a portal that is niche specific.

BusinessServices.tv - A portal for providing sales/affiliate marketing services to merchants. Probably the easiest to create, just a splash page to explain some of the information I provide in an introductory contact. The goal would be to make money overseeing a merchant's affiliate marketing revenue.

Figurines.tv - A merchant retail store, just buy high end figurines, provide my own streaming video of each product, perhaps throw in a few timely videos of trends within the collectible figurines industry, and a shopping cart. Largest expense would be maintaining a decent selection of figurines, which would tend to cost a significant amount. Sort of a qvcish site really focussed on this one niche.

I have a dozen other .tv domains that could be used in the same manner as figurines.tv, so as one becomes a success, I add on a second site, then a third, etc., until I have a platform large enough to suit my income needs.

Like I said, I am just trying to decide which particular ledge to jump off.... and hopefully the parachute opens!

 

[mckennaronnie]

Interesting thread that made me have a good long think about my attitude to .tv's over the past year I have been using this forum and how my attitude and circumstances have altered due to .tv.

Are you someone who believes .tv will rival .com?

No never. I believe .tv will become possibly the 2nd most well known and used extension over the next 5 years but .com will always be kind of the internet and get the majority of traffic.

Are you here to flip domains at reseller levels?

No definitely not. I was selective about what .tv's I bought and always had the idea of buying to hold for a number of years to see where the market takes me. IF .tv does become anything as big as I hope it can then eventually I will look more into selling my names but not at reseller prices. I do not regard myself as a domainer and flipping names holds little attraction to me, I treat all my .tv's as investments or as separate business interests when I am developing.

Are you just looking for one perfect domain to build a business around?

In the beginning I bought purely for investment as I could imagine .tv's future like no other extension from the minute I started to read this forum. I bought in categories that I felt would best suit the extension long term such as Geo's, adult & domains with keyword+Video or keyword+channel.
After a while I realized I had some decent names and thought about possible ideas to build a new business from one of these domains that was both a strong keyword & very brandable (I was at a loose end after selling my last business)
So now I am building a business around the domain Cranes.Tv, it will be marketed as "The UK Cranes Channel' and will be launched on December 1st. Fingers crossed Cranes.Tv works out (i clinched a deal with the biggest Cranes Jobs Agency today to sponsor our Jobs Section so im very happy to get my 1st advertiser!!)
One thing I already know for sure after talking to some of the biggest Crane Hire & Crane Sales companies in the UK about my new business is that those 2 letters 'TV' hold so much power! People get excited when they hear it’s 'Cranes TV' as they know love and understand TV, what is essentially an Industry directory is coming across as something new, exciting and innovative simply because I am using '.TV'

My future with .tv:

I really hope that over the next few years i can develop some of my better .tv's and slowly sell some off IF the offfers meet my value at the time. I will never be under any pressure to sell to keep up with renewal fees as i never bought a massive amount of .tv's and only 3 of mine are Premiums.

Hope that explains my .tv life a little bit.

Best wishes all & goodnight

Ronnie

 

[SKG]

So now I am building a business around the domain Cranes.Tv, it will be marketed as "The UK Cranes Channel' and will be launched on December 1st. \

Site is looking good Ronnie. Keep up the good work.

 

[mckennaronnie]

Thanks SKG, Cranes.Tv has been my pet project for a few months now so I’m happy it is near to taking off. It is more or less a simple Industry directory but with a little video twist, will never win any awards for best site ever or praise for great video work but it will make money & that is all I care about!

 

[equity78]

Would have thought more people would reply so as people can understand what one another is looking for, domains,programming,design etc...