Changes since 2006..

[aldwin]

Hi Everyone..
I've been buying and selling domain names for about a couple of years between 2004 and 2006 (probably something also in 2007, I don't remember).

Given that I don't have the time to read a zillion of forum threads, is there someone who is willing to summarize a bit the changes in the market?
I remember I leaved because every domain seemed overpriced back then.. how is the situation now?

Is there still someon parking domains or everyone has moved towards developing?

[DNB]

There is no grace deletion, so you need to update your signature

[aldwin]

Updated
What about the questions?

[INFORG]

I also left for several years and came back. Parking revenue is very tough and seems to be in perpetual decline, but still someplace to keep them until you can do better. Development does appear to be the latest wave, but I'd recommend staying away from the auto-blogging, made for adsense stuff, I think that is next to fall. Affiliates, lead generation, micro e-com sites, seem to be your best ROI in the present.

The nice difference between then and now is the development tools (Wordpress, joomla, Xsite, scripts, etc) are so much easier to use, full of features, cheap and more plentiful.

[aldwin]

Interesting.
I recently (yesterday, actually) had a look at my survived names (about 100 went deleted in the meanwhile) and there are a few that may be worth some development.
As you suggest I was thinking about affiliate/lead generation or local showcase, so at least I'm on the right way

Parking is declining in term of revenues (less conversion/click revenue) or in term of sheer visitors (a decline in people typing directly inside the address bar) from your experience?

What are domain price trends? I remember some average names selling at 8yr revenue back then.

[INFORG]

I think the biggest dip in parking revenue is an overall surplus of impression inventory, which leads to lower price per click, and the parking/feed companies shaving more and more to maintain their end of the revenue. I also think that browsers are so much smarter now, so type-in and especially typo traffic seems to have declined as well.

Pricing based on revenue really depends on the name. For a name that has search engine or old link traffic, the multiple may be as low as 6-12 months of revenue. For high end type-in names, they can still draw a 10 year plus multiple. I think the average is probably around 3-5 years for middle of the road names.

[Acro]

There is no spoon.

[aldwin]

There is no spoon.

Sorry, my English is not so good to understand this sentence. Care to explain?

[Acro]

Sorry, my English is not so good to understand this sentence. Care to explain?

It's a quote from The Matrix In other words, what if life is just a dream and none of this exists?

[aldwin]

It's a quote from The Matrix In other words, what if life is just a dream and none of this exists?

Well, in this case i need to find a trainer to run on the server. Maybe it'll get me a new home, car and maybe a few nice premium names

[Acro]

Haha, cool

[jmcc]

Given that I don't have the time to read a zillion of forum threads, is there someone who is willing to summarize a bit the changes in the market?
I remember I leaved because every domain seemed overpriced back then.. how is the situation now?

Is there still someon parking domains or everyone has moved towards developing?

2005 - early 2006: Domain parking and buy to park registrations. Some Domain Tasting.

Mid 2006: .eu/Eurid fiasco results in most of .eu owned by US/Canadian domain speculators and .eu ccTLD becomes a junk TLD for those in EU. People ignore it. This causes massive growth in real EU ccTLDs like .de, .uk, .nl etc.

2006-2007: Domain tasting becomes the main focus for .com .net .org and .info gTLDs. The .mobi TLD launches and holds auctions for "premium" domains. Flowers.mobi sold for a very high price. In Mid 2007, Domain Tasting in .com and .net begins to destabilise the TLDs as domains were being tasted, dropped and tasted again (domain kiting). This almost killed natural development in these TLDs because those wishing to develop domains could not register them. It also caused crazes like the 4L/4 character domains in .com and to a lesser extent .net TLDs.

Late 2007: Legal action taken against a group of Florida based registrars over domain tasting cybersquatted brand names results in Domain Tasting being almost killed off. After September 2007, the growth patterns for .com and .net begin to stabilise.

2008-2009: ICANN shamed into taking action against Domain Tasting by introducing a fee based on the percentage of domain cancellations in the five day window. The .asia TLD launches but fails to make a major impact in the way that .eu did for the European Union. The .asia sTLD peaks just below 300K domains.

2009-2010: Falling PPC revenues and braindead domain tasting algorithms make some domain tasting uneconomical. Search engine algorithms change too make development more important. The rise of ccTLDs threatens .com and .net sales but .me seems to be tapping into a market demand for personalised domains in a way that .name failed to do. The launch of a repurposed .co as a global business type TLD.

End of 2010: Growth patterns in .com and .net are largely similar to those in 2005. Some domainers have adopted a more rational approach to what the register but some of this is due to the easy credit which fueled the 2005-2009 Domain Bubble disappearing.

I just finished doing a large drop list for com/net/org/biz/info/mobi/asia over the years 2000 to 2010. The number of dropped domains (and currently unregistered) is over 142 Million. Based on looking at these lists, there's a possibility that many domainers start out with irrational exuberence but run out of credit before they can really go insane. Development is far more important these days.

Regards...jmcc

[aldwin]

Well jmcc, that's exactly what I needed, many many thanks
So I guess now it's somewhat like in 2006 with some more focus on developing rather than parking, right?

Probably the best lesson from all of this seem to be that .com will hardly be beaten by any other tld, despite some .ccTld that may be a strong competitor in that market.

[Aleksandar]

Buon giorno,

The biggest change since 2006 would be .yu dividing into .rs and .me

[Acro]

Buon giorno,

The biggest change since 2006 would be .yu dividing into .rs and .me

I'm dreaming of a .tito TLD

[Aleksandar]

I'm dreaming of a .tito TLD

Dream no more!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sponsored_top-level_domain

[Acro]

Aleksandar, finally we can have .communism again

[aldwin]

Aleksandar, finally we can have .communism again

Ins't that what .com is for?

[Aleksandar]

.comedians eh?

[jmcc]

Well jmcc, that's exactly what I needed, many many thanks
So I guess now it's somewhat like in 2006 with some more focus on developing rather than parking, right?

Yes. The growth patterns are closer to 2005 but the ccTLDs are the ones to watch because that's where a lot of development is taking place now. One of my theories about the continued growth of .com is that some of it is down to ccTLD/com pair registrations where someone registering a ccTLD domain will register the same domain in .com if it is available.

Probably the best lesson from all of this seem to be that .com will hardly be beaten by any other tld, despite some .ccTld that may be a strong competitor in that market.

As a global TLD, the .com has no equal. But it is losing ground against ccTLDs. Some countries have already gone ccTLD positive (more ccTLD domains registered there than gTLD domains) and this trend is likely to continue.

I've been working on the drop lists for the last ten years or so and I did some crunching on the stats for drops versus reregistered domains for .com:

Year - Avg Drop % - Avg Rereg
2004 | 33.42 | 66.58
2005 | 38.43 | 61.58
2006 | 43.17 | 56.83
2007 | 59.81 | 40.19
2008 | 70.92 | 29.08
2009 | 73.90 | 26.10
2010 | 82.99 | 17.01 * To November 2010.

A drop in this is a domain that is deleted and never reregistered. A rereg is a domain that is deleted and subsequently reregistered. The effect of domain tasting on the growth of .com is visible from 2007 onwards. The average percentage of drops increases dramatically from 2007. Normally the reregs are generics and other keyword domains. Some of the drops are business names that are dropped where the registrant goes out of business. But the effect of domain tasting and falling PPC revenues can only be seen in the long term. These drop lists are interesting because the drops before 2004 seem to have escaped much of the domain tasting and speculation. Though with 105 million .com drops to look through, I've only run a limited keyword check. I may even put the complete set of lists up as a searchable database if I get the time.

Just remembered something that I missed from the timeline - .tel launched. It is technologically innovative but it hasn't really taken off as a TLD because it has the characteristics of a Pay For Inclusion web directory implemented via the DNS. It is still ahead of .asia in registrations though.

Regards...jmcc