Staking a claim on domains beyond dot-com
Who said that after the .eu domain name extension fiasco, that was the end of this now popular CCTLD? Well, even though there is controversy surrounding .eu after domain speculators colluded to obtain unfairly some premium domains during the .eu landrush, there is more to the .eu than just scandals. Shopping.eu and hotels.eu in July sold for $270,000 and $330,000 respectively.
This week according to the DNJournal, two of the past week’s top domain sales were .eu. Shopping.eu and hotels.eu went for a low six fugures. Althought it had been rumored earlier over the net that the sale involved a Non Disclosure Agreement between the seller and the buyer, it was disclosed later by the CEO of Sedo, a web domains market place, in an exlusive interview by CNN Business 2.0. You can read the article here.
Country specific domains names have become the latest sector to heat up, claims the article. While real estate prices are falling the internet virtual estate seems to be gaining in value. Might we be headed for another dot come bubble bust like that of 2001? The answer to this question is hard to come up with. It can be yes and no.
It is No, because of the fact that some internet properties might well indeed be a bit overpriced, take for instance myspace.com bought for $0.9bn by Google from News Corp Inc. The big question that remains is how Google might be able to monetize over 100m daily visitors to the site. If placing Google search ads on Myspace.com does not convert into revenue, what comes next?
Yes, in the sense that the internet is still growing in some parts of the world. It is estimated that only a measly less than 1bn people on the planet have access to the web. With the prospect of developing countries and emerging markets heating up, more and more people are becoming regular internet users day in day out. As a rule of thump the internet is expanding globally to many parts of the world.
As an investor of domains, one should not forget to turn around to Country Code Top Level Domains, where the potential lies. CCTLDs like .eu, .cn, .de and many more are quite promising markets for investors. My advice to you is not to be left behind. But do adequate research before you dive into the goldmine.
People might discourage you with such nonsense like only the dot com has a future but don’t listen to them. It is common knowledge that most the good dot coms have been taken. There there is hope in CCTLDs.