I don’t have a domain portfolio the size and caliber of Frank Schilling’s.
While I’m selective with my domain acquisitions over the years, I never went all out like Frank did. My domain portfolio is compact and manageable, consisting primarily of single word, dictionary .com/.net/.org domains, two-word .com compounds and creative or marketable .com’s.
Overall, I don’t invest in exotic TLDs but I made an exception last year when I registered about 50 .co domains, primarily geoDomains and 3-letter .co’s. Some of those I sold, others I kept for development.
It was one of those .co domains that gave me the opportunity to wonder about Domain Administration’s selling prices; the .com is owned by Frank Schilling and I just sold the .co
The buyer quoted the .com owners as “greedy” for wanting 5 figures for the domain; this gave me the opportunity to sell them the .co at a nice price that further increased my ongoing trust in the Colombian TLD.
Those of you that are skeptical about renewing their .co domains in July, be very observant of your traffic stats; there are plenty of people or companies ready to snatch them if you let them drop.
I own a geographical .co domain that is a very popular summer destination. The destination is very easy to spell and the .com site gets tens of thousands of visitors. The .co site gets no direct navigation traffic. The .co domain will only confuse visitors.
If I can sell the domain I will be selling the hype.
Tommy – The .com is parked by Frank and the .co will be developed by the buyer. One cannot depend on slip-over typo traffic from the .com to the .co although it does occur. However, TLDs can co-exist e.g. Bahamas.co as developed by Elliot Silver.
According to Compete, Bahamas.com gets 84,023 unique visitors per month, while Bahamas.co gets 72 visitors per month. Define co-exist.
The .co registry nominates Bahamas.co for a content award for having like 20-30 pages. That is kinda funny. I think Bahamas.co got nominated because its owner has a popular domain blog.
I absolutely applaud the .co registry for the perfect execution of a marketing plan. It should be used as a blueprint.
I think I see through it….but flip .co while it is being pumped.
“e.g. Bahamas.co as developed by Elliot Silver.”
Bahamas.com was easy to find on Google, I’m still looking for Bahamas.co on Google …
Tommy – Sorry to see you haven’t had any success with your .co investments. For the record, I don’t flip domains. This sale had a ROI of almost 120x and the buyer *will* develop the .co instead of keeping a longer .com or spending 5 figures on Frank’s .com equivalent.
Also see http://www.opportunity.co/case-studies/ for more case studies of developed .co domains, although that’s not the point I am making with my post today.
Shaun – I am not familiar with the amount of SEO involved in the post-launch of Bahamas.co – however, in terms of branding or content the TLD is not a restricting factor, or else ccTLDs would not exist.
“e.g. Bahamas.co as developed by Elliot Silver.”
Wonder why this would win an award? It looks to me like an MFA site.
Tommy – Is your .co developed?
If not, then why would you expect visitors to type in your .co site?
People type undeveloped domains in every second of every day, even .co
How does a .co coexist with a developed .com ? A parked .com sure. Is there a need for both when the missing M is the only thing that makes these sites really different.
Geo sites that just give the history of the site, isn’t that Wikipedia ?
That’s not a knock but I mean,you already have the .com developed with an about section. If it was a local that would give local flare. I am not negative on .co, I own three, I just don’t see the value in .co developed almost the same as the .com. I see value how you sold, the .com parked and over priced. Again IMO
Congrats on the sale.
@Acro
Congrats on your sale. From what I’m seeing, .CO are roughly valued at 1%-4% of .com counterparts.
@Shaun
There are domains like BMR.co and CharlotteChurch.co that come before their .coms on Google for their respective search (in the second case the .com is nowhere to be found…) and not, of course, because .CO is better than .com (as fanboys like to say) but because Google’s algorithm likes their content more.
And no, before you look for my Acapulco.co on Google, you won’t find it in the first pages since it’s simply parked, while Acapulco.com is a fully developed brand, so I wouldn’t even expect my domain to be on first page, let alone to come before the .com on SERP.
UDRPtalk – You made my point. Even if I do develop the site it will not get type in traffic. The .com will get my type in traffic.
Quid pro quo: just as in Acro’s example that a solid .com asking price may lead to a good .co sale of the same keyword, so too may the buyer’s extensive development of the .co lead to an increase in both the traffic and value of the .com (that they may become inclined to purchase at same time in the future).
John F – Everything on Bahamas.co was custom made, from the logo to the content, so why would this not be a candidate?
RH – Great analysis! For that matter, even a blog provides content.
Joe – While that range is accurate, it’s based on a small number of sales that have occurred thus far. The .co Registry just now surpassed 1 million registrations, so data is insignificant compared to the millions of com, net, org and other TLDs that have existed for years.
Tommy – Type in traffic is not the only kind of traffic one can benefit from. There are numerous examples of e.g. IDN domains that thrive on visitor traffic once developed. A bookmark is all that’s needed.
fizz – Great points as well.