Buying multiple domain variations

If you’ve just found yourself a fine “.com” domain name to promote yourself or your company online, you’re probably wondering if it’s a smart move to expand your purchasing to include multiple domain variations.

Well, you’re not alone asking yourself this question.

Buying up “.net”, “.org”, “.biz”, “.info” and few relevant ccTLDs like “.ca”, “.us”, “.be” and “.co.uk” to accompany the initial “.com” selection makes perfect sense if you intend your business to attract visitors who might be tempted to try either one of those variations.

Furthermore, if you’re not confortable with the idea of having a perfect stranger suddenly building up a web destination on, let’s say, a “.net” variation of your “.com”, it’s imperative that you reserve both, from the very start because either battling the “other guy” in court or trying to buy his domain name could cost a fortune.

Paying a small $8-or-so fee per year to own the variations makes even more sense, in this light!

As a domain name expert and consultant for various companies, I manage portfolios which contain lots of domain name variations which are not only purchased as a precautionary measure but also to address specific market needs.

For instance, one of customers operates a foundation on the “.org” variation of his “.com” name and on the “.net”, he operates a closed-circuit network for his partners, which help build up loyalty to his brand without getting in the way of the “.com” visitors which are typically from the general public.

Furthermore, that particular customer also redirects his “.us”, “.co.uk” and so on suffixes to his “.com” web site, followed by a “/united-states/” or “/united-kingdom/” subdirectory which is designed to market his products to those customer bases. It works like a charm.

If that customer, which grew quite a lot over the last few years, had not reserved all those variations of its name in the major gTLDs and ccTLDs that matter (according to its own criterias), competitors would probably be cashing in on its marketing efforts, comfortably parked at those very addresses.

Of course, a given company can succeed with only one (1) domain name (it’s been done… a lot) but having a few variations to go along with a “.com” doesn’t cost that much more and provides, among other things, for more room to grow.

Tags: .com, .net, .org, .biz, .info, .name, .us, .ca, .co.uk, .be, domain suffixes, domain name suffixes, gtld, gtlds, cctld, cctlds, global domains, country domains, comapny domains, domain variations, domain name variations, multiple suffixes, mutliple dots, buy domain names, domain purchases, legal, precaution, prevention, caution

Identify key concepts which can translate into valuable domain names

In case you thought the domain name land grab was (already) over, it’s time to shake out of your relative inertia and jump into any of the countless niches where valuable —and soon to be valuable— key concepts, that are easy to translate into domain names, are just waiting to be discovered.

The task of identifying key concepts that are “domainable”, however, is serious business. Newbies can have fun poking around for good domain name candidates but those who invest the most effort usually end up getting the most valuable ones.

Each domainer seems to have proprietary methods for catching, early on, those key concepts which, according to them, are promised to a bright (and popular) future.

Here are a few ideas to get you going…

• Monitor the news for novel expressions, including those made up of slightly modified words;
• Scan specific RSS feeds (which interest you), on a daily basis, for leading edge concepts that few people know about but which sounds like it could be interesting for lots of people (who will -eventually- learn about that specific lingo);
• Become a statistics afficionado to mathematically identify where the action is happening (from a birds-eye view perspective) and translate that into domain names people will type;
• Read more government documents which typically hold a wealth of information people will be looking for. Load up on those key concepts, including the acronyms to designate all sorts of things;
• Listen to what people are saying and even more importantly, how they’re saying it. Languages evolve and very exciting domain name opportunities arise when a language shift is identified early on.

Fortunately, there exists tools to automate at least part of the general search for key concepts that can translate into valuable domain names but whatever a given domainer’s method, the more work is invested, the better the results will be.

Why search for key concepts, anyway?

For starters, all the obvious domain names have been snapped up so the niche, evolving and emerging niches appear to be the natural alternatives where less people tend to venture, hence the abundance of opportunities.

Newbie domainers might be tempted to buy “borderline domains” which closely resemble well-known brands but that’s just a ticket to get lawyer letters. It’s best to stick with the general concept of the public domain where creativity can run wild… without getting cease and desist letters!

At a low $8 a year for a “.com” domain name you feel has potential, it’s relatively easy to recoup your initial (annual) investment and even generate profits by setting up a blog, a wiki, a directory or an e-commerce destination people will appreciate.

Some domainers prefer to get help from DomainSponsor, DotzUp or Parked to monetize their domains but building your own web site is usually (much) better.

Don’t waste your time trying to register the (already registered) domain names everybody wants, become the creative domainer everybody will admire by looking for key concepts outside the beaten paths.

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Verisign yanks up domain name fees — again

If you own a “.com” or “.net” domain name, this is very bad news, on all fronts.

Verisign, for the second time in just 6 months, is asking every single domain name owner to shell out even more money to register, transfer or renew their “dot coms” and “dot nets”.

Take notice that starting October 1st, 2008, California-based Verisign which operates the “.com” and “.net” domain name suffixes will raise the fees required to own them. And these aren’t insignificant raises, we’re seeing the “.com” increase from 6.42$ to 6.86$ per DNS (a 6.86% raise) and the “.net” go from 3.85$ to 4.23$ (a 9.87% raise).

Non-content of taking in astronomical amounts of fees for the “.com” and “.net” namespaces, Verisign says that rising traffic on the internet, allegedly from web-connected wireless devices, new technologies that use DNS and demands on improving net security, drive the newly imposed increase.

Domain name owners would be entirely justified, yet again, to interpret this latest increase as sheer greed on the part of Verisign, an incestuous monopoly that’s been decried by both domain name owners and ICANN representatives alike.

Without any dependable independent audit being conducted, Verisign alleges that it handles approximately 33 billion DNS queries daily, with a maximum potential volume of 400 billions — which shows, among other things, how very, very far we are from putting any meaningful stress on Verisign’s current technological setup. Furthermore, Verisign intends to expand that DNS handling capacity to 4 trillion per day, within a couple of years.

For those who keep tabs of Verisign’s arrogance and greed, keep in mind that the last time the billionnaire company bumped up the “.com” and “.net” fees was October 15, 2007 when the “.com” rose from 6$ and the “.net” from 3.50$. Prior to the latest “greed shots”, fees had remained stable since 1999, when the ICANN first set up a DNS pricing scheme.

Because of arrogant price hikes like this one, both Verisign and the ICANN, a for-profit firm that works with the U.S. Department of Commerce to set DNS policy, are continuing to meet with significant resistance from the internet community, as a whole, who view such price hikes as unjustifiable taxation.

Tags: .com, .net, domains, domain names, verisign, icann, internet, price hike, fees, greed

List of generic TLDs

There’s a lot of business happening in the .com namespace and it’s only natural since this particular domain name suffix is the most popular, on Earth.

The .com domain name suffix is one in a short list of generic top-level domains which are intended for particular classes of organizations. These gTLDs are three (3) or more letters long and are named to identify the type of organizations they represent.

The IANA confirms that the following gTLDs currently exist:

• .aero – for the air transport industry;
• .biz – for business use;
• .cat – for Catalan language and culture;
• .com – for commercial organizations but unrestricted;
• .coop – for cooperatives;
• .edu – for post-secondary educational establishments;
• .gov – for governments and their agencies in the United States;
• .info – for informational sites but unrestricted;
• .int – for international organizations established by treaty;
• .jobs – for employment-related sites;
• .mil – for the US military;
• .mobi – for sites catering to mobile devices;
• .museum – for museums;
• .name – for families and individuals;
• .net – originally for network infrastructures but now unrestricted;
• .org – originally for organizations not clearly falling within the other gTLDs but now unrestricted;
• .pro – for certain professions;
• .tel – for services involving connections between the telephone network and the Internet (added March 2nd, 2007);
• .travel – for travel agents, airlines, hoteliers, tourism bureaus, etc.

The .arpa suffix is sometimes considered to be a gTLD, it depends on who you ask.

The following gTLDs are in the process of being approved and may be added to the root nameservers in the near future:

• .asia – for the Asian community;
• .post – for postal services;
• .geo – for geographically related sites.

As you can see, .com is just one of the domain names, albeit a dominant one, that you can promote your organization with. Major companies nowadays own almost every “dot” for their names because so many people tend to naturally type them in.

Experts argue that adding too many domain name suffixes in this coveted gTLD list will dilute the tremendous power of .com and balkanize organizations switching to .museum, for instance.

To this day, however, most organizations that own and operate a lesser known gTLD domain name usually have their own .com, mainly as a precautionary meaure because that’s what visitors tend to use the most.

Tags: gtld, generic domains, domain names, web, .com, dot com