An interesting email from Sedo re .CA names in this months newsletter

[jaydub]

Many of you probably got this but for those who didn't...This is in the Feb newsletter from SEDO.....

Feature Article
.CA Domains Going Fast!
By Monica Ibrahim, Customer Relations and Support Specialist

Netfirms, Inc. , Canada′s leading web hosting provider and one of the fastest growing .CA domain registrars, recently announced that the best time to acquire the .CA extension is now. With the US economy not operating up to par as of late and the Canadian dollar performing at historic highs against the US dollar, what better time to invest in the .CA?

In a feature article in Sedo′s October 2006 newsletter, Jay Finnan, now Portfolio Sales Manager at Sedo, not one for aberrations, foreshadowed the status of our northern neighbor′s virtual real estate market over one year ago. "One thing is for certain, the demand for quality .CA domains will continue to grow." He couldn′t have been more on target as we continue to see demand for the extension increase from year to year.

Various factors make the .CA extension desirable for Canadian residents. The overall availability and affordability of the .CA Top Level Domain (TLD) are among the top desirability factors. With only about one million .CA domains registered to date, the relatively low price of $9.95 a year for registration costs and affordable website hosting costs, more and more people are hopping aboard the .CA train.

The .CA also has quite the competitive advantage for any business hoping to retain and expand their Canadian clientele. If you find yourself traveling through the country, you’re bound to see countless advertisements on highway billboards boasting a .CA domain. Presently, when acquiring a generic one word .COM, it has the potential of costing hundreds of thousands of dollars. It makes the most economical sense for Canadian companies hoping to stay competitive to brand their businesses around the .CA.

Just like any other mainstream country code TLD, the .CA can do a lot for national morale and the country’s sense of identity as well. Nowadays, the likelihood of interacting with a business or individual in Canada electing to use the .COM over the .CA is slim to none. Small businesses can retain their client base by priding themselves in using the .CA while growing their web presence. There′s also a trust element involved. Canadian citizens are less prone to fear working with a multinational using the .CA TLD and are more inclined to buy from them, knowing full-well that the business is most likely located in Canada.

So, what does this all mean for Sedo’s users? Currently, there are over 18,000 .CA domains listed for sale in our marketplace. With a clear Sedo presence in North America, it’s easy to see why so many have engaged in transactions on our marketplace. Since Sedo’s US office launch in 2004, the quantity of .CA domains listed along with the sales turnover rate has consistently increased as you can see from the graph below.



Minor Canadian Internet Registration Authority (CIRA) regulations make the transfer of .CA domains relatively trouble-free. Prospective domain buyers will need a Canadian presence in order to own a .CA domain. However, with these slight residence restrictions, the buyer only needs to contact their registrar to have them initiate the domain transfer request. The registrar will then subsequently contact CIRA on the buyer’s behalf in order to request a registrant change.

With the recent push by NetFirms to register more domains with the extension, the possibility of registering millions more two or three word premium domains, and the relative ease in transferring .CA domains in Sedo’s marketplace, the future of .CA domains is only looking brighter. Good news, eh?

*Registration data provided by CIRA’s Annual Report

[hugegrowth]

Very nice, a lot of people read that newsletter. Also some good reasons in there for buying .ca's. We had a thread on here not long ago about what we could do as a group to promote .ca's - maybe we can use some of the points in this newsletter to answer the question "Why buy a .ca?"

[DropWizard.com]

Jim

Any chance of getting you to forward that graph it refers to??


gmartfin "at" shaw.ca

I'd greatly appreciate it!!

[jaydub]

Originally Posted by hugegrowth

We had a thread on here not long ago about what we could do as a group to promote .ca's - maybe we can use some of the points in this newsletter to answer the question "Why buy a .ca?"

http://www.dnforum.com/f356/canadian...ad-273038.html

[nameslave]

Minor Canadian Internet Registration Authority (CIRA) regulations make the transfer of .CA domains relatively trouble-free. Prospective domain buyers will need a Canadian presence in order to own a .CA domain. However, with these slight residence restrictions, the buyer only needs to contact their registrar to have them initiate the domain transfer request. The registrar will then subsequently contact CIRA on the buyer’s behalf in order to request a registrant change.

Does that mean by doing so (letting the registrar initiate the transfer on your behalf), the registrant no longer needs to fulfill the Canadian Presence Requirements (PDF)?? I DON'T THINK SO. And some people even mistake that as having a Canadian ADDRESS, which is NOT required AT ALL.

[liberator]

I found that a little misleading as well...

[RazorNF]

They somewhat oversimplified the process involved and it's going to cause confusion for first time buyers... especially when this email leads them to expect that they can just sit back and the registrar will do everything for them. - when in fact they are going to have to create and maintain a user/pass to both a registrar and cira account and intervene with the multiple acknowledgements.

and of course there's always the main source of confusion - the two types of transfers and that a registrANT change can't be done across registrars...