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A
recent increase in high value .US sales is creating a buzz among
the domain community. Nobody expected the TLD to take off,
certainly not to the degree of its predecessor, the .com
which currently has over 40 million domains registered. The .US TLD
has faced some skepticism from its start. However speculation on the
value of the .US TLD is starting to climb as more and more domainers
are purchasing the TLD. Further, the number of purchases of .US
domains on the secondary market is increasing rapidly as well.
The .US TLD, administered by Neustar,
was first established in 1985 as the official Country code TLD for
the United States. However it wasn’t until April 2002 that
this second level TLD was available for registration by
organizations and individuals in the United States. The .US TLD may
be registered by citizens and permanent residents of the United
States or by any entity or organization which has a legitimate
presence in the United States. The .US TLD gives a domain not only a
new branding possibility but also an American identity on the
internet.
There are a number of prominent domain investors developing .US
portfolios. One of the most active buyers in today’s market has
been acquiring food related .US domains, such as onion.us, garlic.us,
herb.us, and chocolate.us. That particular investor
has already spent over $85,000 on such domains for his
American food company and it looks as though this craving has yet to
be satisfied. Further, food.us was actually just sold through
Sedo for a whopping $20,000.
After
the first three quarters of 2005, the dollar value of .US
transactions at Sedo.com has more than quadrupled to $135,074
from $32,698 in all of 2004. The number of transactions increased
from 39 in 2004 to 139 in the first three quarters of 2005.
Transaction volume also doubled between Q1 2005 and Q2 2005. The
.US transaction volume in the first 12 days of October was
more than double the entire year of 2004! For the full month of
October 2005 there were 70 .US transactions totaling $81,035,
an average of $1,187 per sale.
These
savvy buyers are definitely on to something. The .US market is
growing with around 1,000 new domains registered everyday. With more
and more of these domains being registered daily, the value of the
.US market continues to be driven up. Just how intense has the
growth of the .US market been recently? Over the past 12 months, .US
registry DNS lookups have increased by 250% to approximately
10 billion per month. The number of new .US registrations increased
by 21% in Q3 2005 and Q2 2005 alone! The highest .US domain
sale to date is believed to be business.us which sources
indicate sold for between $50,000-$100,000. The exact amount
is unknown due to a non-disclosure agreement. The most popular .US
domain site is Del.icio.us
which has grown to become the most popular Blog online.
Another testimonial to the up-and-coming .US market is the fact that
marketers are now actually branding the TLD. This move has come as a
surprise to many people in the industry, as it has been said in the
past that branding a website around any TLD other than the .com was
a waste of time, as other extensions would simply not be as
memorable or as credible as a .com. However many companies are
changing their antiquated views and are taking advantage of the
availability and lower prices of the .US domains. A recent
commercial for Volvo, which was aired during the Larry
King Show on CNN, directed viewers to Volvocars.us.
Another example is ABB, a technology-based provider of power
and automation products, who ran a full page ad in Forbes
Magazine, advertising the arrival of its new site, ABB.us.
The American identity that this TLD brings to organizations has been
widely accepted by both domestic and foreign organizations. .US
domains not only distinguish an organization as American but also
suggest a sort of patriotism associated with the TLD. Many state,
city and town municipalities as well as their institutions such as
libraries and offices have widely accepted the .US extension. The
reason why so many choose a .US domain is because of such
patriotism. However this TLD is also very cleverly used by foreign
companies, such as Hitachi and Sony, allowing them
more of an American presence via the World Wide Web. Many global
companies have localized the websites of the different countries in
which they operate by utilizing different ccTLDs. Ikea is a
perfect example. They operate different sites in over 25 different
languages each uniquely identified by their ccTLD.
Country specific domains are growing in acceptance and in
popularity. In today’s domain market the most popular country code
TLD is Germany’s .de. With nearly 10 million domains
registered, it is also the second most popular TLD in the world and
the most popular extension in Germany. Many country code TLDs are
increasing in popularity, moving them into a better position to
compete with the .com.
Perhaps the second strongest country code TLD behind the .de is the .co.uk
domain. The UK market has seen tremendous growth for their ccTLD in
recent years. Many well known British companies, such as the BBC,
have used this extension to brand their online presence. There has
already been speculation in the industry about the growth of other
ccTLDs such as .in (India) and .fr (France) and how
competitive they will become in the future.
So where can we expect this domain to take us in the future? As with
all things, only time will tell. However there is certainly enough
evidence to believe this extension will continue to see steady
growth in registration numbers. As for the secondary market, domain
investors believe that there will be continued and significant
growth for the .US TLD. One thing for sure, ccTLDs are strengthening
in volume and value and savvy speculators will be sure to acquire as
many of the quality domains as possible.
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