The third birthday of the relaunched .co is this week, originally just branded as Colombiaâs ccTLD and now branded as a generic TLD, sees it is a force to be reckoned with.
Since its relaunch it has achieved a very decent 1.5 million registrations registered by people in over 200 countries. But beyond high registration rates, .CO has achieved strong brand awareness widespread domain development and impressive performance on the secondary market.
Of the registrants, 53 percent come from the United States, ten percent come from the UK and nine percent from Colombia, while about 4 percent each from Australia and Canada.
A study by Sedo, the market leader in the domain name aftermarket, has some impressive figures. Since the relaunch on 20 July 2010 the total value of .CO sales at Sedo has been US$2.6 million.
Other figures put out by the registry resulting from a Sedo report include the mean average sales price for .CO domains on Sedo’s marketplace is high, reaching $2,486 in 2013, up 37 percent (from $1,819) since the TLD was introduced. It has also gone against the trend for TLDs Sedo compared it to, who have either stayed around the same mark or dropped, with the exception of .biz. Other TLDs in the study were .com, .me, .net, .org, .biz, .us and .info.
The year-to-date average sales price of a .CO domain at $570, up 14 percent since 2010, has also surpassed the most well-established legacy TLDs, including .COM, .NET and .ORG.
For median sales value, which is probably a better indicator of the value of domains, Sedo reports that the .com median is $650, the only TLD to best .coâs $570 in 2013. Again, most TLDs in the Sedo study have seen their median sales value decline over the three years, with the exception of .com and .us.
The top sales price for a .co domain through Sedo in this three year period was $81,000 for e.co. Although there were sales not through Sedo for far higher prices.
“It’s exciting to see that .CO is already achieving average and median sales prices on the secondary market that are on par with – and in many cases surpass – industry heavyweights like .COM and .ORG,” said Lori Anne Wardi, Vice President of Brand for .CO. “This said, we recognize that we are still a young TLD with a lot to prove, so we plan to redouble our brand building and community engagement efforts, working even more closely with Sedo and our other partners to build the long-term value of .CO.”
With hundreds of new gTLDs slated to join the existing extensions in the second half of 2013, .CO is one of the most recently launched TLDs for new registries to study and learn from as they establish themselves in the market.
“Our work with .CO – from creating a successful launch period and promoting and selling premium .CO domain names, to using consumer marketing and community building around the TLD – is a great case study of what it takes to successfully launch and build a new domain extension,” said Tobias Flaitz, Sedo’s CEO. “As we prepare for a slew of new TLDs, .CO not only shows that there is life beyond .COM, but also that a solid strategic plan, value-added benefits, and partners who have a global outlook and great strategic insight, are important factors for building any new TLD into a successful extension.”
The Sedo study is available for download from:
https://sedo.com/fileadmin/documents/pressdownload/dotCO_market_study-3_years_dot_co_2013-Sedo_.pdf
The latest Domain Name Journal chart of top reported sales sees a whopper of a sale reported and the yearâs biggest to date â that of z.com for Â¥800,000,000 ($6,784,000) in a private sale. It is also the largest reported domain sale since the sale of sex.com for $13.0 million in November 2010.
Encouraging many small businesses in particular to get online has proven difficult. For those without an interest in technology, the idea of registering a domain name, building a website and all the considerations that go with it are sometimes too complex and/or too expensive.