Comments on: Are domain names recession-proof?

By: JK, Portland, Or

JK, Portland, Or — Sat, 29 Mar 2008 05:00:47 +0000

Sahar,

As someone who is known and respected in the domain space, I’m disappointed in your appraisal of the domain industry based on the most recent auctions. The entire point of Paul’s article (and the industry) is not resales. It’s the revenue lines that come from finding the best ad feed/model.

I’m thrilled that the people above think so little of this industry. I get this response every time I attend a trade show adjacent to my industry, and I’m amazed at the response to PPC in the doamin space.

You cannot stop people from navigating directly, and you cannot deny the 1000+ new internet users/day, many of whom click on ads that lead them to something that they find useful.

By: Rick, Silver Spring, MD

Rick, Silver Spring, MD — Fri, 08 Feb 2008 15:54:07 +0000

There is a strong move underway to “generic” domains. One word domains (like those noted in the article) are all gone and are valuable. Acronym domains, including all 3 letter and 4 letter.com combinations are also all gone and are rapidly rising in value. Finally, numerics, the ultimate “generic” domain names, are hot as well. All the 4 number .com domains, 1827.com are registered and are prime real estate to own, and there are under 20% of the 5 number domains left and these are being rapidly bought out as well. Numerics get good type-in traffic and have multiple uses (zip codes, lucky numbers, part numbers, etc.). And, there is a new trend for numeric domains that spell words, i.e. 466453 takes you to google.com.

By: Joe, Portland Maine

Joe, Portland Maine — Tue, 29 Jan 2008 18:37:57 +0000

“Direct search” will become a victim of its own purported success. Eventually people will tire of sorting through the junk sites and Google will get better at sending them to the bottom of the search list. Coupled with decreasing returns on pay-per-click models that do not work (name the last ad you intentionally followed), people are going to be left with a lot of ridiculous domain names with no value.

By: Sahar, Florida

Sahar, Florida — Mon, 28 Jan 2008 06:25:10 +0000

Paul,
It was obvious to most professionals in the space the auction was not a success, far from it (wrote more about it on my blog)
So to answer your question, domains are not recession proof, and we can already see it.
Cheers
Sahar Sarid

By: Neal R. Voron, Montgomery Township, PA

Neal R. Voron, Montgomery Township, PA — Sat, 26 Jan 2008 10:07:22 +0000

Paul, as the cost to acquire top tier generic domain names keeps rising, interest in the concept of “fractional domain ownership” may begin to accelerate.

The October sale of Cowboys.com to a group of investors organized by Eric Rice of DomainsForMedia.com is an interesting example of how individual investors were each able to get involved in the purchase of a quality generic domain name for just a fraction of the total acquisition cost of $370,000. While each investor only owns a percentage of equity, they could all ultimately benefit significantly from the synergies created by the members of the group.

I believe the opportunities for fractional domaining will dramatically increase in 2008, and I will be keeping an eye on what’s happening via my FractionalDomainingBlog.com site. Feel free to visit!

By: Greg, Mountain View, CA

Greg, Mountain View, CA — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 21:22:32 +0000

Yes, domain names and internet will be the next gold rush, I expect serious acquistion activities in 2008, European and Asian firms will come after US assets too. Keep an eye on Local.com (LOCM) and Marchex (MCHX), my two favorites, but also think Yahoo and Monster are bigger targets too.