Mike Mann on gTLDs

Elliot Silver
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25

Mike Mann is unquestionably one of the most successful people in the domain industry, having sold BuyDomains for  reportedly  many millions of dollars, and he acquired domain names such as Phone.com, SEO.com, and many more. Mike also founded DomainMarket.com, which sells millions of dollars worth of domain names annually, and he is likely headed for a similar type of exit sometime down the road.

Mike has been “vocal” with his bearish feelings about new gTLD domain names on various blogs and in personal meetings with him. I reached out to him with a bunch of questions and want to share some of his thoughts on gTLDs and if he believes there’s money to be made by domain investors.

If you have other questions about gTLDs that you’d like Mike to answer, I would bet he’ll be happy to answer them. My questions are bolded below.

Will companies adopt descriptive keyword gTLDs and re-brand websites?

Only for the best ideas and dictionary words where they cant get .Com

How long will it take consumers to understand what gTLDs are?

They wont on average, might land there by accident

What is the path to success for a gTLD operator?

Only a small pct will be profitable unless they are mixed with other services or free like from Amazon or Google. If they get some good sites that get well indexed in Google they may get some traction, or maybe with press, etc. But on average short the hype.

How do registrars and registries sell their names?

The hard way, same way we sell .Com, landers, brokers, hustlers.

Will brand gTLDs help make consumers aware of the right of the dot?

No

Will you be investing in registries and/or acquire various domain names in different TLD?

No way, flight to .Com quality investing

How can domain investors make money when it comes to gTLDs?

Buy the short fund

Do you think marketing dollars spent on gTLDs will be good for the domain industry as a whole?

Short term but no

Will land rush opportunities bring more people and capital into the domain investment space?

Short term

What will happen to the money domain investors spend on gTLDs?

They will lose most of it

gTLDs: “Governments Appear to Have Become Quite Relaxed About Sex”

Elliot Silver
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3

The Tech Europe Blog in the Wall Street Journal posted an article by Ben Rooney about the lack of governmental objection to sex-related gTLD applications. Referring to the GAC early warning list published by ICANN, the article discusses how TLDs such as .porn, .sex, and other adult themed TLDs did not receive a single objection from a government.

Stephane Van Gelder, Registry Relations and Strategy Director at NetNames, expressed surprise about the lack of  objections. “There have been none on any sex-related gTLD [string]. Frankly I am a bit surprised. Governments appear to have become quite relaxed about sex,” said Van Gelder.

Although I am also surprised at the lack of objections, I would imagine the introduction of .XXX domain names by the ICM Registry may have made governments less objectionable this time around. Since there’s already a .XXX domain extension available, what difference does it make to governments if there’s a .porn or .sex, too?

In addition, perhaps some governments didn’t even bother submitting objections for whatever reason. Out of the 1,930 applications, there were only 145 TLD strings that received objections.

I don’t think that governments have become “relaxed about sex,” but I do think the proverbial genie has already been let out of the bottle when it comes to adult gTLD extensions.

eNom Gives Customers an Introduction to New TLDs

Elliot Silver
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8

Making the general public aware of new TLDs is going to be crucial for gTLD registries to become profitable. For many of these companies, educating consumers starts at the registrar level, as small business owners may opt to register a shorter gTLD as opposed to a longer tail, hyphenated, abbreviated, or some other type of .com domain name that is available to registrants today.

eNom has been one of the more active domain registrars promoting new gTLDs to its customers. The company has taken steps to make them aware of the new TLDs that are expected to be introduced in the next year or so. The company has a prominent link to its new TLD section on the top menu in yellow.

Yesterday, eNom posted a video called “An Introduction to New TLDs,” which explains what they are and why a small business would want one. eNom’s founder, Paul Stahura, is Co-Founder and CEO of Donuts, a company that applied for 307 new TLD. My assumption is that Donuts and eNom will work together to sell gTLD domain names to eNom clients, and the first step is educating them.

It’s always interesting to see how domain industry companies market their products to clients. The introduction of gTLD domain names is going to shake things up and will be fun to follow.

Sell Your “gTLD” Domain Names

Elliot Silver
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113

People love it when they have the opportunity to sell their domain names, and I am going to give you that opportunity today. I welcome you to list your non-.com “gTLD” domain names for sale in the comment section. Be sure to include your price and your contact information.

You’ll notice that I have gTLD in quotes. The reason is that I am offering up the space for you to sell domain names like .CO, .ME, .TV, .and XXX. While some are actually ccTLD domain names, people use them as if they were gTLDs.

When you list your domain names for sale here, keep a couple of things in mind. First, most of the people who read this post are domain investors rather than end user buyers, so price your domain names accordingly. Second, keep your list brief. Although I am not a buyer of these types of domain names, if I was reading the names to buy and saw a list of 10 or 20+ names, I would likely skip over the list and move on to the next one.

Just as a small disclaimer, I am not going to get involved in any of the transactions. I recommend using Escrow.com to complete your sales to ensure a safe transaction.

ICM Registry Giving $75 Search.XXX Advertising Credit to Registrants

Elliot Silver
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2

In a bid to “reward existing .XXX adult site owners and encourage new registrants,” the ICM Registry announced a $75 Search.XXX advertising credit (valid for 90 days) to .XXX domain name owners. The advertising platform has not been launched yet.

The company also announced that its seen 2  millions visits and 12 million pageviews to its Search.XXX adult search engine, making the advertising credit seem like a pretty solid incentive for someone who is developing their .XXX domain name(s).

Let’s say you go to Name.com  (or another registrar) and you register YourFavoriteFetish.XXX for $84.99 and launch a white label adult website. You’ll receive a $75 credit for advertising on Search.XXX, so you can immediately be able to drive traffic to your new site and hopefully begin to earn revenue.

101Domain.com  has an even better offer, essentially giving full value in advertising for registering a domain name: “Sponsored Community customers can renew or register with us for one year at $75 and get the entire amount credited towards ad credits on Search.xxx !”

I have no idea what type of traffic you’d be able to drive with the $75 you’ll be given, nor do I know adult conversion rates and RPC numbers, but it seems like a reasonable offer and a good way to start making money with your .XXX domain names.

I highly doubt the company will permit parked names to use these credits though.

Press Release:

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.XXX: “Over 1,000 Premium Generic Keyword Domain Names” Available for Sale

Elliot Silver
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11

I received a press release that will be of interest to people who have invested in .XXX domain names. ICM Registry, the company that operates the .XXX registry, has announced the release of “over 1,000  premium generic keyword domain names.” The names will be available on a first come, first served basis.

Many of these keywords were determined to be premium based on searches of the ICM Registry’s Search.XXX search engine, which went live at the end of September. It looks like the company has a custom landing page with a blue “Buy Now” landing strip across the top. Interested buyers are requested to make an offer on the name via form.

According to the company, these keyword domain names should benefit the owners, as the company skews towards exact match domain names in Search.XXX results. According to the press release, “the algorithm that search.xxx uses gives weighting to exact match domains with highly developed content and so these newly released names , once developed and listed, will feature prominently in search results for the most popular keywords.”

This seems like this is a good way to increase the value of keyword .XXX domain names.

You can see a list of names that are now available on the ICM Registry website, along with the prices. Based on the offer form though, it seems like there might be some room for negotiation. As Kevin posted this morning, the company hopes to raise over $7.7 million by selling these domain names.

Press Release below:

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