Frank Schilling

I think it’s pretty safe to assume that ICANN will eventually approve a second round of new gTLD applications. I don’t know when round 2 will happen, but if I was going to place a wager, I would bet there will be at least one subsequent round of applications. I was thinking about what types of new extensions might make up the applications since most of the “good” ones are probably already assigned or awaiting approval.

I had a thought that some new gTLD registries might apply for the plural or singular version of the registries they already manage. For example, perhaps Uniregistry could potentially apply for .Links or the .Club registry could apply for .Clubs. It certainly wouldn’t make sense in many cases, but I could see a few reasons for it.

Frank Schilling posted the photograph of the bus above, which is promoting the .Sexy domain name extension. As you can see from the photo, the bus is on the streets in Hollywood, California. There are currently two buses with the .Sexy advertisement driving through Hollywood and West Los Angeles between Downtown LA and the beach in Santa Monica. The buses are promoting the url, AreYou.Sexy I am told Uniregistry will be doing additional mainstream marketing for its new TLDs in the near future.

This type of marketing is cool, and we’ve seen it before with .Club bus wraps in Canada. I think advertising .Sexy in the Los Angeles market is a smart move. Perhaps Miami would also be a good locale for this type of campaign.

In my opinion though, the best type of marketing is actual usage of these domain names. The more people that see these domain names being used, the more people will know they are available to purchase and use. Although they may seem like a bit of a novelty, more adoption will be beneficial to all who sell (and invest in) the new gTLD domain names.

A few days ago, I saw someone mention

One of the best ways for a new gTLD domain registry to let people know that it exists is to ensure that some of their domain names are developed into brands. One way to accomplish this goal is to get some of the premium domain names in the hands of people and companies who will develop them into brands.

Uniregistry recently announced its Pioneers Program, which aims to put some of its reserved domain names in the hands of developers. Instead of having to pay what might be a substantial sum to secure a reserved domain name from the registry, Uniregistry will either give a domain name to a qualifying applicant or charge a nominal fee for the rights to it.

Here’s how the Uniregistry Pioneers Program is described: