Domain Names Optimization, Monetization & Valuation.

The views expressed are my own, where I have used examples of strategies, that have worked for me when I build websites. I have also gained vast experience over the years using resources from mentors specializing in marketing, advertising, and SEO. I understand not everyone will agree with me over my opinions, but what I have published I have tried and tested and know what works well for my clients. Being able to get a company on the first page of Google to generate organic traffic and keep them there is what is most important. Knowing how to optimize a website is the difference between an SEO expert that can value domain names, workout PPC advertising budgets and a domain seller.

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Domain Names Optimization, Monetization & Valuation.

Content:

1. What is a Domain Name?
2. What are the most popular Domain Extentions?
3. Valuation.
4. How Do I Vaule Domain Names.
5. Registering Multiple Domain Names.
6. What are country code TLDs?
7. How and Where to Register Domain Names.
8. How to pick a good Domain Name.
9. Dot Com Domain Names.
10. Domain Extensions To Avoid.
11. Geo Fencing.
12. Monetizing Your Domain Names.
13. Domain Hacks & Flops
14. .XYZ Domain Names.
15. Final thoughts.

1. What is a domain name?

A domain name is an URL (A Uniform Resource Locator), colloquially termed a web address, which is a reference to a web resource that specifies its location on a computer network and a mechanism for retrieving it.

It is a combination of protocol, subdomain, domain name, domain extension, and directory. An URL is a specific type of Uniform Resource Identifier. It is the address of your website on the world wide web. It’s what people type into their web browsers to find your website.

For a better understanding of what a domain name represents one needs to understand the format of how a domain name is written.

When you register a domain name for your website/blog or resell, users will find it much easier to remember you if you perform SEO.

When visitors enter your domain name in their browsers, their computer sends a request to a cluster of servers called the Domain Name System (DNS). The DNS then responds with the IP address of your website’s hosting server, which is how people are able to use your domain name to reach your website.

The key for people to remember your URL is to have a memorable name that is short and easy to spell. People are more likely to remember a keyword or a brandable name over a long-tail phrase, a series of numbers, and hyphens.

2. What are the most popular domain extensions?

Extensions often indicate the nature of the website. Some example:

• .com – for any type of Global Commerce.
• cc tld – country code domain names, such as – .io – .in – .au – .pl – .i.e – .wales – .cymru etc, – .co.uk (United Kingdom), etc.
• .edu – for an Educational Governemnt Sites.
• .org – for Non-Profits or Other Miscellaneous Organizations
• .gov – for Government Sites.

However, unless one is proficient in SEO one should refrain from buying and selling domain names in the hope of making big bucks. If you cannot value a domain name properly and do not know anything about SEO how can you possibly sell a domain name?

Most people just pull a figure out of the hat and hope someone will come along and buy their domains, whilst others will list them on saturated marketplaces that attract domain investors.

Nine times out of ten either a startup will look to hand register a domain name themselves or they will ask their website designer to do it for them and sometimes they will just buy what is available. A company that wants to rebrand may approach another company to make an offer to acquire the domain name, but in most cases, people settle with what they have already got.

If you are a global brand you may want a domain name that has one word and is a dot com. The word could be a dictionary keyword or a made-up brandable word.

3. Valuation.

For a domain to have value it needs to be:

• Short
• Easy to Remember
• Easy To spell
• Match the Location where traffic is being generated.
• Have equity (Equity could include an App, a Directory, A Social Media Platform or Search/Booking Site or an eCommerce Store, Product or Service.
• Has Branding Nine times out of ten I will design a logo for a domain to increase the value. If you click the link you will see the most expensive logos ever sold.
• Is Developed
• Is Indexed and Ranked and is on the first page of Search Engines, saving on PPC advertising
• Is Generating Traffic
• Has Investors

An SEO expert will find a way to get a domain name without paying top dollar and if they do their jobs properly can get websites/landing pages indexed and ranked using keywords and meta tags and descriptions. In fact, I got someone on the first page of Google within a month using these strategies, and without him having a domain name forwarded to the landing page or a developed website, I still managed to get him on the first page of Google.

Startups do not have money to spend on a domain name unless they have investors backing them.

For example, I would love to have had renata.com but instead, I have settled for irenata.com whilst it would have been more fitting for the company that owns the brand “Renata” to have had batteries.com, it is what it is. Besides even with acquisitions there is no way I would ever be able to afford the domain, even if it went back on the market. So sometimes companies settle for second best. Before I get inundated with offers of different extensions I was only after the dot com in this case and not the (.co.uk) (.wales) or (.cymru). I am aware someone is selling the (.co.uk) version and all I can say is good luck to anyone buying it because I won’t be. I do not have a problem with somebody registering “Renata” as there is more than one in this world with the same Christian name and besides I am content with “iRenata” as a personal brand name and that is how it will stay.

Unless a domain has value it is only worth what registrars sell them for.

People who sell domain names, but have no knowledge of SEO and think domain names are like lottery tickets should not give up their day jobs. I have many emails sent to me to buy domain names, even website-related domain names (like how many website domain names do I need). Even though I would not call myself an investor I do buy domain names once in a while if I have a particular project in mind that I am developing.

I do broker domain names by offering SEO, Marketing, and Advertising, but I won’t contact busy CEOs directly, as I have done that, been there got the t-shirt and it does not work.

I use a different strategy I drive busy CEOs to me by offering quality content and offer solutions.

If someone wishes me to put their domain on a pedestal I will do content marketing, create a landing page and perform SEO and drive traffic to the domain name with advertising and marketing strategies providing the domain names have value, solely at my discretion.

The best way to sell a domain name is to perform SEO, offer valued content, have a landing page, and get that page indexed and ranked. Anyone looking for your domain name or matching keywords will find you providing you do your SEO and marketing right. If you can provide quality content you will get eyeballs.

Regarding Valuation The Proof Is In The Pudding:

(www.ukdomainbrokers.com)

which forward to

(https://ukdomainbrokers.ukwebsitedesigners.co.uk/)

is on the first page of Google for the Search Terms “UK Domain Brokers”

and page 5 for the search terms “Domain Brokers”.

So I have to agree to disagree with the following statement, not that it was directed at me in any way, but I need to make a point.

Domain names are only worth what someone is willing to pay for them unless they have equity, have been branded, developed are generating traffic, and are on the first page of search engines.

One needs to do the maths to value a domain name.

One cannot just value a domain and expect someone to part with their hard-earned cash unless you can prove the domain is worth what you say it is.

Now I have a screenshot stating the following by a very well-known Domain Investor/Broker. I do not want to step on anyone’s toes but I have the right to my own opinion and want to point out that web designers and SEO experts know about search engine optimization much better than any domain investor.

According to this famous person he has been quoted as saying:

“So stop listening to IT guys that don’t know JACK SHIT about sales and marketing”.

I do not mean to offend the writer of the above quote, yet I feel I have to defend all SEO experts and web designers in my industry as this does not look good for people in my profession. It looks like IT people do not know what they are talking about. When web designers offer PPC advertising they need to calculate an advertising budget per month for the business and the same principle applies when making valuations, one has to calculate how much a business will save in PPC advertising if they were to acquire the said domain name.

I understand the person is an expert to a certain degree as he sold some very valuable one-word dot coms in his time but he sold them with a vision of perceived equity and what that one word would do for a business that wanted sole control of an entire industry. I get that and cannot fault him, but you still can control the industry with systems and directories using more than one keyword domain name. One word to describe an industry is good but two or three words can also provide value. For example “UK Business Banking” keywords are GEO targeted and are an exact match whilst “Business Banking”, “Banking” and “Bank” are broader. So depending on who you aim to target, will determine the right domain name for the business.

Proof in the pudding…

My question is considering I am on Page (1) for the keywords “UK Domain Brokers” and Page (5) for the keywords “Domain Brokers”

Out of curiosity where is the website for the search terms “Domain Brokers” for the person that made the quote, considering he has been in business longer than I have? If you do not know who said this I am sorry you will have to do the research and find out yourselves, although I am sure most of you already know who it was that said it. Even some other well-known companies and brokers are way behind me on the ranking, including Flippa on page 13 for the search terms “Domain Brokers”. This tells me Google favors me over their sites, sorry guys and gals.

This tells me an SEO expert can optimize and value domain names just as well or even better, than some experts I have come across in this field.

Dot Com – If someone is paying for PPC advertising it is very difficult to control the traffic from a dot com domain extension, if they are in a different location to the USA, even with GEO Fencing, as you will still have USA traffic filtering through which can eat up your daily advertising budget in no time, which evidently would be a waste of time and money and possibly a fired marketing agency to boot. As an example, I have set my GEO fencing for the UK for the domain name www.cymrumarketing.com yet I still get traffic from outside my location, with the majority of traffic from the USA.

Domain Valuation – “At the end of the day The company that will pay the most for a domain name is the company that will gain to most from it, like with any domain name in the world it’s worth $0 to the company A and $1m to company B” or (ones man’s junk is another man’s treasure) and if it is not on the first page of Google which is where all businesses want to be it is only worth what someone is willing to pay for it. To make a domain very valuable it has to have (1) equity, it needs to (2) generate traffic and be on the (3) first page of Google“.

The Domain Investor went on to say and this is his valuation:

1-Word Keyword Dot COM – 7 figures+ MINIMUM!!
2-Word Adjective, Noun, or Verb plus Keyword Dot COM – 6 figures+ MINIMUM
3-Word domains that are truly memorable, mean something $30k+ MINIMUM

Now I do own a one-word domain name called www.raczyna.com I also own the .pl version. Rączyna is a village in the administrative district of Gmina Kańczuga, within Przeworsk County, Subcarpathian Voivodeship, in south-eastern Poland. It lies approximately 10 kilometers south of Kańczuga, 18 km south of Przeworsk, and 35 km east of the regional capital Rzeszów. It is close to the Ukraine border and it is where my mother was born. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R%C4%85czyna

Now I have semi-developed this domain and originally I was going to get all the farmers to plant Hemp/CBD and earn a profit from the sales. But I have lost all momentum because of the situation with Ukraine.

Now going back to the valuation the perceived equity could be $1M easily if my plan went ahead and if someone could convince the farmers and pay for the licenses, seedlings, and production but by offering this domain to the people in Poland as it is they would not see the value. This domain would only suit a business person such as an angel investor who knows the lingo and specializes in CBD.

I have done zero SEO on this particular website and have just used it as a way to generate traffic. It is just floating in cyberspace at the moment. I am still planning on holding on to it and do not have any plans to sell it just yet.

I actually had a vision with this domain name and still may have as I am undecided. It is nowhere near worth $1M in fact Google keyword planner came back saying only 1-100 people a month search for the keyword with zero bids which says no one is paying for PPC advertising.

There are 107,000 search results, which could be a combination of websites, blogs, articles, and posts mentioning the keyword in question, but according to Google at the most 100 people search for the keyword in any given month.

Therefore as it stands it does not have quality content and is not on the first page of Google. I have done zero SEO and is only worth the sentimental value, and domain registration price. hosting and management fee and nothing more.

The only other way this domain could be worth a lot of money is if the high ticket affiliate likes converted, sadly though I have not done anything to drive traffic to this site (www.raczyna.com).

So not all one-word dot coms are worth $1M.

I do have other short one-word domain names for sale, which do not belong to me and are being brokered as part of a joint broker partnership.

4. How I value domain names:

Here is how I value domain names, first I see what the domain is and what it could be made into. I then see if it is developed and generating traffic. When people say they have a domain 20 years old for example what does that mean exactly? has it got 20 years’ worth of traffic. It is indexed and ranked?

People are clueless when it comes to selling domain names, that is why they do not sell. If someone has had a domain name for 20 years and has not sold it by now what does that say about the domain name or the person selling it? Owning a domain name for 20 yrs or generating traffic for 20 years is the key difference. For a domain name to generate sufficient traffic it would have to be search engine optimized.

Here is a screenshot of the keywords “Domain Brokers” according to Google Keyword Planner:

The searches per month for the keyword “Domain Brokers” are between 100 & 1000 searches, at the highest cost per click of £4.30 (1000 x £4.30 = £4,300 x 12 months = £51,600 ÷ 3 % click-through ratio = £1,548) for your website to be indexed and ranked by Google in which you would need to pay for PPC advertising. So according to google keyword planner without taking into account if the domain is developed and has equity it is only worth £1,548.00 providing the website designer could get the website on the first page within that time frame. Once the website reached the first page the business would then save themselves £1,548.00 per annum in PPC advertising and should they want to sell it in say 20 years’ time they could ask for a minimum of £30,960. excluding equity and branding etc, but it would mean the domain name was generating traffic to command that price.

Now according to Godaddy Domain Appraisals and I know some of you including myself aren’t that keen on using bots to value domain names, the value for www.ukdomainbrokers.com is $1,156 converted to GBP is £879.69 according to Godaddy and Estibot less than $100 This shows that bots do not give accurate valuations but maybe only good to get comparisons. I know that my domain is worth more than $100. May I add that I have do not have any plans of ever selling this domain name but what is not taken into account is all the paying clients I have and all the equity and services, advertising, and affiliate revenue associated with this domain name. So the bot valuations are wrong as one would have to value the annual turnover of this business to make a true calculation.

Domain Bots primarily compare previous sales but not all website designers or clients announce to the world how much their domains have been sold or bought for. Just because someone paid 6 or 7 figures for a domain name one would have to analyze why that happened and learn from that. Some people have bigger pockets or more money to burn than others and some may even be cryptocurrency.

5. Registering Multiple Extensions.

Owners often register domain names across multiple TLDs to prevent others from purchasing an identical domain name (cybersquatting) in other TLDs. This can also avoid copyright issues, loss of business, and spamming. For example, Facebook owns every domain extension appertaining to the trademarked name and domain keyword – Facebook is trademarked so no one can create a domain with the Trademark Name plus another keyword). In most cases, most Facebook domain extensions forward to the dot com.

If you are a domainer owner and have been in business for many years and can prove you have used your domain for longer than someone that has newly registered a keyword branded domain name in another extension or has added another word alongside your branded word, and are trading the same services as you, you may have a reason to start a UDRP against them.

Some domain extensions are restricted, so not everyone has the opportunity to register certain domain names. For example, you can’t use the .gov and .edu extensions. One has to prove they work for the government or education institute. When applying you need to provide proof that you meet the criteria.

6. What are country-level TLDs?

Country-level domain extensions and how do they help with generating traffic? Country-level domain extensions are ideal if you want to target traffic in your own country. I have used both the (.com) and (.co.uk) versions and from an SEO perspective a (.dot) will rank better than any other extension, but even if you set your GEO Fencing Filters on, only to allow UK traffic as in my case you will still have traffic mostly from the USA. This is especially bad if you are paying costly PPC advertising and only want UK visitors but have USA traffic clicking your campaigns. Before you know it your daily advertising budget would be swallowed up with unwanted visitors.

Having a country-level domain name is ideal if you’re targeting visitors from a particular country. So although a dot com is the bee’s knees of all domain names it does not mean it is any good for you in terms of SEO. If you want to be known globally then it makes sense to have a dot com and register all the appertaining (CC Domain Extensions) to the countries you wish to target. You may want your website in another language for the country you are targeting.

These are all called ccTLDs (country code top-level domain).

In some cases, ccTLDs are restricted to only people who can prove they’re from that location, while other country extensions are open to the public. As an example when the UK left the EU any domain name that had the extension was restricted only to people in the EU. So even though I did have a couple (.eu) domain names and I have dual nationality I am not a resident of the EU which meant my domain names were restricted, I simply did not have the energy to argue it and let them drop.

Some country-specific domain extensions have even become popular in recent times such as (.co) which most people assume means the word (company) and is an alternative to as well short for (.dot com) but in reality, it is the country code domain extension for (Colombia) so I am curious about companies buying these domain extensions and how it affects their traffic. Another domain extension is technically a country-level TLD for British Indian Ocean Territory (.IO) has become much more popular as an extension for tech websites and again if you are in the UK and you were to have either one of these extensions I dread to think about your PPC advertising.

7. How/where to register a domain name

Once you have decided on your domain name and providing it is available, you then need to register it with a domain registrar and hosting provider. Again you can do this yourself or if you plan to develop it and have a website designer in mind he/she may register it on your behalf but you need to have a contract in place so that when you part ways that the domain name comes to you. You will then have a paper trail of evidence that the domain name belongs to you.

A registrar is a company that is accredited through ICANN (International Committed of Assigned Names and Numbers) to sell domain name registrations.

There are many accredited registrars available and you’ll need to choose one that shows credibility.

Our sister site (www.ukwebsitedesigners.co.uk) is partnered with IONOS.

IONOS PARTNER PROFILE:

https://partnernetwork.ionos.co.uk/partner/uk.website.designers

PACKAGES:

Web Hosting

https://www.ionos.co.uk/web-hosting?ac=OM.UK.UKf11K357001T7073a&kwk=563133442

Web Builder

https://www.ionos.co.uk/website-builder?ac=OM.UK.UKf11K357002T7073a&kwk=563133442

My Website Design Service

https://www.ionos.co.uk/custom-made-website?ac=OM.UK.UKf11K357002T7073a&kwk=563133442

Some things to keep in mind while choosing a domain name registrar are:

• Cost of the domain name. Prices vary from one registrar to another (IONOS have some great deals).
• Do you want to purchase a domain name from your web host (Again IONOS hosting packages offer free TLD domain names for the first year)?
• Does the domain name registrar offer high-quality support (IONOS has 24/7 telephone support)?
• Does the registrar offer additional services such as email reminders for renewal (IONOS send out emails a month in advance reminding you your domains are about to expire)?
• Does the domain registrar give you free WHOIS privacy? Normally, anyone can look up the owner of a domain name, but WHOIS privacy lets you hide your information behind a proxy service (IONOS offer this for TLDs).

8. How to pick a good domain name

Picking a name is something one should not take lightly. It has to be personal to you and your vision. It should represent what you are selling and it should speak volumes. Sometimes one has to be creative to get the right domain name to make your brand a business that will be easy to remember.

I have found that living in Wales some people use the word “Cymru”, Cymru is the Welsh word for Wales but for people further afield I have found the word not easy to remember let alone spell. I find I am forever having to explain what the word means to my foreign friends. Therefore if you are going to use a made-up brandable word that Google will not recognize as a search for the word you will find it will take forever for your website to be indexed and ranked. You will have to spend a lot on PR, advertising, and Marketing to make your brandable name a household name.

It is not always easy to register a domain name that only has one or two words and one then may have to compromise on the domain extension.

If your main focus is to acquire a dot com over any other domain extension and you find that your domain has gone, try being creative by adding short words at the front or back. Because I am in the UK I will add the UK towards the front or back or (i) as in the case of (irenata.com), there are many combinations one can use. Your tagline could mention your actual brand name or slogan.

Either way, it is crucial to come up with a name that’s unique and matches your brand and its purpose. More importantly, it should be easy to remember and spell. If you are a blogger or an influencer or super affiliate and you are selling courses sometimes to get people to search for you it may be an idea to use your own name, Russel Branson, Tony Robbins, Rob Moore, John Chow to name a few. Or in my case iRenata.com For other cases, a name that indicates your website’s purpose would be best, for example, www.ukwebsitedesigners.co.uk and www.ukdomainbrokers.com

9. DOT COM Domain Names.

Dot Com Domain Names are for businesses that want to capture the Global Market, they want the whole world to know about their brand. A dot com domain will get you indexed and ranked faster over any other domain extension and when registering a domain name do try and register the dot com if you can, to stop cybersquatting and problems further down the line with people cloning your site, etc.

Whenever I register a (.co.uk) I try in most cases to register the (.com) sometimes having a domain name such as www.ukwebsitedesigners.com does not have the same ring as a (.co.uk)

I have noticed however a cybersquatter selling the (.com) version of my business here:

https://www.hugedomains.com/domain_profile.cfm?d=ukwebsitedesigners.com

I may start a UDRP because this could affect my business if it was sold to a competitor.

For your information, I have secured both the (.co.uk) and the (.com) version of “UK Domain Brokers”. But that is not the point I detest people thinking they can make a quick buck at the expense of an established business.

One-word dot-coms can command high figures but they need to have perceived equity or some sort of system. As an example, I have a website www.ukbusinessbanking.co.uk (it s business directory), and also have the matching domain dot com and it would be ideal to complement the site with the shorter version www.bank.com but the seller is asking multiple $$M figures. So even if I wanted to acquire this domain name where on earth would I get the money from to pay for it, it is not like I could go to a bank and ask for a loan.

10. Domain Extensions To Avoid

Top 7 Malicious Domain Extensions (TLDs)

• 1. – .tk: (10,405 Malicious domains out of 18,875 registered = 55.1%) The most threatening TLD of all the one from Tokelau, New Zealand.
• 2. – .fit: (4,618 Malicious domains out of 8,321 registered  = 55.5%) A generic but brandable extension for all fitness-related (personal trainers, gyms, supplements, clothing, and so on).  This and several other reasons make .fit extension very dangerous.
• 3 – .gq: (2,636 Malicious domains out of 4,835 registered = 54.5%) The TLD directed to the African country: Equatorial Guinea is well-known among hackers and scammers and not that much between webmasters. 
• 4 – .work: (14,214 Malicious domains out of 36,672 registered = 38.8%) Are you interested in highlighting your professional skills on the web? That’s what the TLD .work is for. Unfortunately, this one has been highly-exploited by scammers.
• 5 – .ga: (3,406 Malicious domains out of 7,600 registered = 44.8%) This one was created in 1994 for the sovereign estate of Gabon. Gabon Telecom formed a partnership with Freenom in 2013 to offer registrations of this one for free… And you know the story.
• 6 – .ml: (3,666 Malicious domains out of 8,667 registered = 42.7%) It carries the country’s code of Mali, and like the previous one,  it has no territorial restriction. This was very positive until the African Nation started to give these away for free (the 1st one in Africa to do so). 
• 7 – .cf: (3,506 Malicious domains out of 8,667 registered = 40.5%) The .cf belongs to the Central African region was opened to the world in July 2013… And you can get them for free, however the place you are now.

https://www.gomyitguy.com/blog-news-updates/malicious-domain-extensions

However, I would also avoid domain extensions such as .xyz .co .bet as well as hacks, and hyphens that could damage a business’s reputation.

By coincidence, I was offered the domain www.start-brand.com the other day (I own www.startbrand.co.uk) as many of you know, so the domain seller was offering me something that was like me offering Facebook.com Face-Book.com, one does not register domain names that are developed in another extension without running the risk of having a UDRP served against them. Besides the fact it was a hyphen I told the seller I was not interested without going into detail.

11. GEO Fencing.

When it comes to local domain extensions or country code top-level domains a survey revealed that, aside from ‘.com’, people are more likely to trust a domain with ‘.co.uk’ — one of the most popular examples of ccTLDs. The main reason brands use ccTLDs is due to their benefits for geotargeting.

A GEOFENCE filter on the other hand works like a walled (fenced) garden. Only the websites identified by the metadata as allowed to receive an endpoint answer to the query. This filter can be configured, for example, to allow specific countries within a region to get a different answer than all the other countries in that region. The filter removes DNS answers from the answer pool based on configured metadata and the user’s origin IP address.

Geo Targeting and Geo Fencing ccTLD’s

12. Monetizing Your Domains Names

So you have parked your domain on a sub-domain marketplace and you may have signed up for affiliate marketing but how much of the commissions do you actually see? Are the commissions split between you and the publisher (aka marketplace)? Do you get a choice of what you can promote and can you track the clicks to your campaigns?

There is a better way to get your domain name in front of a targeted audience and that is to set up a landing page on your own, perform SEO (very important) and monetize the page with high ticket affiliate links. You need to be consistent and have high-quality content. An example I have several categories on several websites relating to many industries and topics and I will write articles relating to the keywords for the domain name in question and forward the domain name to the article.

Disclaimer – you need a large network of people to show your article to, this could be an email list or a large following on social media platforms. I would exhaust all the free options before moving over to PPC advertising. Do your research on Super Affiliate Marketing. Super affiliates can often make more than $10,000 per day, such as the likes of Russell Brunson or John Chow, these sales figures are not guaranteed and you have to put in the work to get compensated, so do your research and learn. Do not pay for courses and stay away from people offering done-for-you offers. Learn without spending money, there is so much free information out there, you just need to know where to look. Start by searching the top super affiliates and go check out their websites and youtube channels.

Affiliate Marketing Is A No Brainer.

https://respona.com/blog/best-affiliate-programs/

13. Domain Hacks & Flops.

Domain extension flops

Domain extensions that have tried and failed. Tuvalu for example tried to turn their domain(.tv) domain extension into “dot Television. Western Samoa tried to market their country-level domain (.ws), as “dot World Site. Djibouti failed to attract many DJs with their country-level domain (.dj) and now we have to contend with the (.co) for Colombia.

Novelty Charm Domains or Domain Hacks.

In some situations, using a specific novelty gTLD can also complement your branding efforts. These are sometimes referred to as “novelty charm domains” or “domain hacks”. These will not necessarily help drive GEO targeted traffic to your domain name, but they may be quirky and memorable and used to help advertise a business’s brand.

Some examples are: www.simp.ly, www.close.ly www.passport.photos www.digital.marketing www.ken.co

If the domain extensions have a country-code domain extension like (.ly) Libya or (.me) Montenegro (.co) Colombia, they will be inundated with traffic from those countries.

14. .XYZ Domain Extensions.

According to Google, it is the content on the website that will help rank your domain rather than the domain extension. However to have targeted GEO Fencing having a lesser-known domain extension will generate unwanted traffic and will actually damage your website’s credibility.

As an example, if a website was named www.ukdomainbrokers.xyz (this domain name is for example purposes only and does not exist I do not think) as opposed to www.ukdomainbrokers.com or www.ukdomainbrokers.co.uk which I own, which one would you choose to click on?

Dot XYZ Domain Extension Trustworthiness.

15. Final Thoughts

Choosing the right domain is the first hurdle, the second is to secure all domain extensions appertaining to your brand, and thirdly optimize the domain and get it to generate traffic.

I have not been able to acquire the dotcom version of my site (www.ukwebsitedesigners.co.uk) for many years and I am not going to pay the seller for the privilege. The way I see it is what came first the chicken or the egg? If the domain was developed into a fully optimized website then anyone sitting on the dot com version should drop it as it is deemed as cybersquatting holding the website owner to ransom.

If the dotcom person wanted to develop it and make it into a business they would have done it a long time ago, rather than simply holding on to it simply to make money. The way I see it is, that anyone that domain seller sells the dot com version of my brand will get into trouble as well as them when I start a UDRP against them.

If you are rebranding it is still worth holding on to your old domains and forwarding them to your new website so that you do not lose traffic.

Domain Trading Can Be Subjective, they carry a lot of risks of losing a lot of money especially if you have a portfolio of domain names you cannot shift. Always do your research and be up to speed with all the up-and-coming trends. You should not go into the domain buying and selling business if you cannot afford to do so, because it may take many years for you to find a buyer if at all depending on the quality of your domain name.

Domains don’t always have accurate valuations, and people do not always understand the implications of certain domain extensions or the importance of search engine optimization and simply draw their own conclusions about the value of the digital assets that they own.

Some domain extensions can actually damage a business’s credibility so one needs to have an element of knowledge of SEO. While you might think a domain is valuable, this may not be the case for anyone else. You need to prove and give a good reason why you have reached your valuation so that you can persuade the buyer to invest in your property.

I am always curious to know how companies are doing after buying inferior domain extensions for a lot of money. I see this all the time and wonder why someone would part with money for domain names that may take forever and a day to get indexed and ranked.

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