The whole domain industry seems to be finally getting excited about Country Code Top Level Domains (ccTLDs). Even the American domainers are evidently testing the waters.

We had the chatter, the hype, the forums and the conference, so now what’s next?

I’m very pleased to hear that the TRAFFIC ccTLD went very well. Unfortunately I had other business commitments elsewhere in Europe and wasn’t able to fit TRAFFIC ccTLD in.

From what I have read so far on DN Journal it seem to have went very well and even surpassed expectations.

One of the reasons why I wanted to attended the ccTLD conference was to hear first-hand about the various restrictions and residency requirements that some registries seem to have for ccTLD. It would have also been good to chit-chat to the respective registry representatives and even local investors to get a clear idea as to the types of domains that are likely to do well on the domain aftermarket.

Analysis of ccTLDs
The ccTLDs do have tons of potential. The end-user markets are quite strong. If domainers get the right types of domains they could be laughing all the way to the bank.

Whereas a significant amount of the .com domains are parked or registered by speculators, I believe the majority of all registered ccTLDs are owned by end-users. Europeans like to use their own ccTLD.  One of the reasons for this is that while the .com version of their desired domain may be already taken, the ccTLD version is normally still available for registration.

Also, using the ccTLD is better for local search, branding and building trust amongst their local clientele.

Investing In ccTLDs
There are some ccTLDs that have loads of potential. And at the moment, that is all that they have got, potential. This is due to the fact that there are still loads of unregistered premium domain names for some ccTLDs. So the end-user still has a choice of top quality unregistered premium domains, and as a result, may be unwilling to spare the cash to invest in an aftermarket domain name.

Some ccTLDs are currently only attractive to long-term investors. It will take time, and even faith/risk-taking for the full aftermarket sales machinery to kick in for quite a few ccTLDs.

The only ccTLDs that will do well immediately on the aftermarket are those that monetize well, and those where the amount of unregistered premium domains are extremely limited.

If the ccTLD does well with domain parking, then there will be an immediate and active domainer-to-domainer sales market. If there are very few unregistered premium domains and the internet penetration in that particular country is quite high, then the domain aftermarket sales to end-users will be very strong.

My ccTLD Investment Strategies
Personally, I currently own my fair share of ccTLDs. I also owned hundreds of domains in various ccTLDs up until late last year. Most were sold, while some were dropped.

This recession has highlighted quite a few risks in my buy and hold domaining strategy. Given that barely any business sector was spared, I had to take various measures across my businesses in order for them to remain profitable.

When companies face economic uncertainties they take quite a few measures, most of which are tied to cutting costs. These costs are often related staff costs, and quite often the end result will be redundancies. The other popular measure taken by businesses is re-organisation. This often includes selling or shutting down certain aspects of a business.

With my domaining business, this re-organisation and shut down process will involve my buy-and hold investments. I am switching my business to a buy-and-flip model and limiting the number of long term buy-and-hold investments.

With that being said, this means that I won’t invest in the majority of ccTLDs until the aftermarket for those ccTLDs become extremely active. Of course the profit margins will be absolutely minimal, as all the great premium domains would have been registered by the buy-and-hold investors.

Diversity is key for the success of any businesses. I will keep a mixture of both long and short-term investments. However, I will reserve the long-term ccTLD investments only for the ultra-premium domains.

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I have stood on the mountain and preached the gospel of .TV quite a few times. I sincerely believe that .TV is one of the strongest non-.com domain extensions.

As a matter of fact, I do believe that if there is any extension out there that could pose a credible and global threat to .COM’s reign, it would be the .TV domain extension.

There was a time when I was carrying well over 500 .TV domain names, all of which were one-word English dictionary domain names. I have been quite successful in selling a lot of them.

As a matter of fact, each and every .TV domain inquiry that I received ended in a sale. These were all end-user sales, and these buyers always came with their wallets opened.

Most of the .TV domains that were sold are now branding some major sites. The .TV domain extension, like most Country Code Top Level Domains (ccTLDs) is not widely used or invested in by American domainers. All of my .TV sales were made to European end-users.

Majesty.tv and Competence.tv are some of the well-developed .TV domains that I have sold.

.TV is the ccTLD for Tuvalu, a collection of nine Islands scattered in the Pacific Ocean. However, .TV is globally used, accepted and respected because of its appeal to television and creative media.

TV is globally used as a reference to television, and as such the .TV domain extension easily gains recognition.

Now there have been reports that Tuvalu is sinking. Some say that this is due to global warming. I have been seeing reports citing that Godaddy, the world’s biggest domain registrar is advising against .TV registration because of this. I have not confirmed if Godaddy actually expressed those views, so please don’t quote me on that one.

Most of the websites/blogs reporting that Godaddy is advising against .TV registration are also citing that this could be a PR stunt in order to push .ME registrations. Go figure.

I believe in the future of the .TV TLD. However, I have now taken an executive decision to cease all investments in this extension. This decision has nothing to do with any possibilities that Tuvalu may in fact be sinking, but purely due to the hefty registration and renewal prices.

Over the years, I was careful to take advantage of Godaddy’s 19.99 .TV promotional prices. .TV domains don’t monetize well, but I was lucky enough to secure enough .TV domain sales that covered the renewals more than two times over, each and every year.

As a matter of fact, because all .TV domain sales were to end-users, the sale figures were normally very impressive.

However, I am in the process of re-organising this business. I am doing everything to ensure that this business does very well in good times and is solid enough to survive any economic recession.

As an accountant, I am only too aware that you should not invest in inventory that you can necessarily afford to purchase and carry, but to invest in inventory that you can sell well.

The .TV carrying cost at $40 is quite huge when compared to $7.95 for .COMs. That is over four times more. Because .TV is mostly sold only to European end-users, the target market is very small when compared to the global appeal of .COMs. Hence the inventory turnover rate of .TV is not as impressive as that of .COM.

So although just a few sales could easily cover the costs of maintaining a .TV domain portfolio, it is more prudent and profitable to use the said cash to maintain a bigger .COM portfolio. This will result in far more sales, and far more profits.

It is just strictly business common sense.

We will however hold on to the following .TV domains as we have serious development plans for them:

Admit.tv
Amusements.tv
Afford.tv
Chosen.tv
Locally.tv
Someone.tv

Am sure you can easily and readily see the potential of those.

We will be dropping the other .TV domains that we hold. Well over 150 of them. If you are a .TV fan you can get ready to catch them.

However, if you want to be sure to get the one that you want, you can bid on most of them right here at eBusinessDomains.com.

We will send a handful of them to a 3-day auction at a $19 reserve. You have a better chance of getting your desired .TV domain that way, than to play the drop-catching game.

You can view the full list of .TV domains by clicking here.

Click here to see the selected few at auction.

Good luck!

Rick Schwartz wrote an article the other day citing that Europeans are not risk takers. It was a very interesting article and one that’s worth reading.

Firstly this blog post is not a direct response to Rick’s post or by any means any sort of criticism.

I had promised to only blog directly to end-users once our new domain marketplace is launched. However, I believe that given the fact that end-users will need to be educated about the domain industry, it is only pertinent that I blog about domaining a bit as well.

I am a Caribbean boy, but I do have a British/European Union passport so that means that I am European.

I make a lot of money from my domaining efforts and without a striking biography here, I will declare myself a domainer.

So I’m European and I’m a domainer, so that makes me a European Domainer.

However, I am a very big risk taker. I have over the years invested and reinvested hundreds of thousand of dollars in the domain industry. I have been burnt not once, not twice, but many times. But what you have to understand is that the domain industry is not taught in school and has very little rules, so the only way to learn and master this industry is by experience.

Now in all of my domaining experience, I have only ever attended ONE domaining event, which was hosted by Sedo here in London some years ago when they were launching their Sedopro platform to UK domainers.

I must say that I learnt a lot and well did get a few contacts. That was very small but intimate domain meet. I gather that even though domainers argue, fuss and quarrel on forums and blogs, they are normally very friendly is such social settings.

I put this down solely to the fact that when domainers meet up, everyone wants to demonstrate that they do know something about domaining, and as such the secrets coming flying out . It’s all good fun though.

Now Europe plays a very key role in the domain industry. I can’t elaborate now, as I have to rush to a meeting on the other side of London in a few minutes.

However, let me quickly point out that Sedo, the world’s biggest domain marketplace was founded in Europe (Germany).

The first pure premium domain portfolio that I came across is that of Dotcom Agency, which is based here in the UK. They had over 30,000 domains when I first saw their portfolio. They still own domains like Ad.com (Ads.com recently sold for $1.4 million), Printers.com and Camera.com.

Dotcom Agency solely inspired me to pursue a portfolio of pure premium domain names. They are European (based here in the UK). (We can offer you better deals on the same quality domains ).

There are quite a few other top European domainers such as MemorableDomains.co.uk, and KeywordDomains.com. So Europe is well connected to the domain industry.

I really can’t write much longer, but the main difference between American Domainers and European Domainers in my opinion, is that the Americans are more loquacious.

I love America, and this is not a negative statement, but American Domainers seem to seek out the limelight, while Europeans tend to just shut up and make their secret millions. Nothing wrong with either approach. Americans have done a lot to publicise the industry, while Europeans sit back and reap the profits! .

The only reason why you heard about me is that my Internet marketing instincts directed me to start a blog to bring more exposure to my online brands.

In a few weeks TRAFFIC will hold their first European conference, which will focus solely on Country-code Top Level Domains (ccTLDs). This is a great and sensible step.

However, Europeans for years have been reaping sweet success with ccTLDs. It is more a case that the Americans are now catching on to ccTLDs and are trying to get a piece of the action.

I am trying my best to make it to the conference. Unfortunately, June is one of my busiest months with work, exams, business, travel etc. I have been postponing a Guest Speaker appearance at Bido for quite some weeks now due to lack of time. That will just be a 1-hour chat online. Now imagine 4 days overseas.

I will let you know in the end if I am going though. I am pulling out all the stops! Some of my best business trips overseas were made to Amsterdam, so those attending will have a damn good time!