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The Hidden Opportunities in ccTLDs
In the rush into the new gTLDs many domain investors have almost forgotten about the ccTLDs. The country codes are full of incredible domains that are in many cases still available at registration fee. The question we need to ask is why?
There is one thing for certain, most ccTLDs have neglected marketing to the domainer community. When you consider that around 30% of registered domains are owned by investors the lack of focus on this market by the registries is at their loss. In addition, domain owners that aren’t keeping an eye on the ccTLD market segment are missing out on a fantastic opportunity.
I remember attending one of the very first TRAFFIC conferences and one of the things that struck me about it was that it was incredibly .COM centric. No one was talking about any of the other extensions….in fact, they were often regarded as being irrelevant.
I immediately invested heavily in many of the accessible ccTLDs at that time and made a great return on both the traffic revenues and sales of those domains. In its most simplistic perspective, I let everyone else fight over .COM and I took the rest of the world. I focused on ccTLDs that had large populations, a decent credit card penetration rate and where foreigners were able to register the domains.
Why were credit cards so important? Credit cards are the fundamental payment mechanism that drives most traffic revenues and also is behind the majority of sales. Cash based economies make it very difficult for an online marketer to buy traffic and ultimately see a sale on their website. There is a disconnect between promotions and conversion.
I’m a very strong proponent of ccTLDs and I still believe there is HUGE opportunities for domain investors in many of them. As a timing issue, I still think it will be another 5 years before many of the new gTLDs will become majorly investable (there are some exceptions).
The challenge for the ccTLDs is how to market to what is essentially a very fragmented market of domain investors. Then again, maybe it’s time for some investors to widen their perspective beyond .COM?
Comments
Good post M.
Michael, what are your thoughts on .US domains, specifically city names.
I really like .US domains. to date, I think that it's been treated as the poor cousin of .com. City names with .US at the end work for me. I've had quite a few .US domains that had reasonable levels of traffic which is always a good sign.
cctlds have a clear purpose and with all the hype surrounding ngtlds, people have forgotten them in the last 3-4 years. It was cool to talk about ngtlds, but we all know cctlds work and are currently used by large and small corps to varying degrees depending on the cctld.
Clear purpose and increasing usage will only lead to higher returns, There is no need to make up phony numbers, when you have a real need for an extension
Great comment.....you're exactly right in saying ccTLDs have a purpose.
Thanks for sharing the charts. Some disturbing trends. I have been holding about a dozen .xyz keyword domains and I'm debating keeping them. But I'd rather sell into a rising market....