Are .US Domain Names Undervalued?

Knowing the Market

With the increasing valuations of country code Top Level Domains (ccTLDs) recently, there has been lots of market hype.  This buzz is no surprise to HEXONET, as we have long touted the intrinsic value of ccTLDs and is the very reason why ccTLDs have been core to our business years earlier.  As a result, HEXONET today has one of the widest selections of ccTLDs anywhere including many real-time features and support not available elsewhere.

A perfect example of HEXONET's focus on ccTLDs is in the field of domain backordering.  Though there are many established backordering service companies like SnapNames, Pool, and NameJet, typically ccTLDs are not available in their service sets.  ccTLD procurement requires specialized expertise and many years of operational knowledge to get it done correctly.  Because HEXONET has been on the forefront of ccTLDs for years, this is why we can today offer 14 different TLDs to backorder, many of which are ccTLDs.

The Potential of .US Domains

Having first hand knowledge and expertise on ccTLDs, one ccTLD that is of interest to HEXONET is .US.  A key metric that we consider in determining the potential upside of a ccTLD is the ratio of registrations to the overall population of the respective country.  For instance, for Germany this ratio is 16% (13.5M/83M).  The UK the ratio is 13.9% (8.5M/61M).  And for the Netherlands the ratio is 22.6% (3.8M/16.8M).  The interesting part for .US is that this ratio is extremely low at 1.5M registered .US domains with 310 inhabitants (0.5%).  Even after one considers the effect of .COM being the preferred TLD for most Americans, this ratio is still significantly low.

Over time and with recent efforts from the Registry to delivery new services like a Registry Lock Service or provide a .US URL Shortener Service, awareness will grow and the upside potential is huge.  The following facts about the .US ccTLD and the United States in general are very compelling:

• Many desirable Internet addresses are still available
• Businesses use .US domain names to promote themselves as American companies to inspire consumer confidence and to encourage consumers to “buy American.”
• .US enables domestic and international firms of every size and industry classification to protect their trademarks and establish their corporate identities online in the United States
• 
• Recently, .US has been positioned as US, a social community based domain with presence here in the United States and around the world
• Most of the .US domains (86%) are registered and used in USA as expected
• Business related domains provide a strong registration base - 25.9% of .US domains fall into the Business category

.US Domain Promotion

To make the purchase of .US domain names easier, HEXONET is throwing a great promotion for .US domains. Until July 31, 2010, HEXONET is offering a special price of 7.97 (net price: 6.70) USD per Domain/Year on .US domains for single and multi-year registrations, as well as, transfers and domain renewals.

Rules:

• End Date: July 31, 2010
• New one (1) year .US registrations eligible.
• Multi-year .US registrations eligible.
• Renewals and Transfers eligible.
• IDNs eligible.

If you are interest in transferring or registering .US domains in bulk, feel free to contact HEXONET to negotiate better pricing at [email protected].