Making a fortune with 88.com
The owners of this domain name might cash in with email addresses.
China may be the only country I know that embraces numeric domains. You can find their use in many industries. Today, I’ll talk regarding a numeric domain being used in an interesting way with great profit potential.
Numeric domains are popular in China. Just look at the 2019 Top 100 Chinese Internet Firms Note. It has 7 firms on the list using numeric domains: 360.com (#9), 58.com (#13), 37.com (#23), 4399.com (#42), 2345.com (#64), 71360.com (#70), and 253.com (#92). The love for numeric domains can be found in the domain industry too. Examples are 4.cn, 10.cn, and 22.cn. They are short and easy to remember.
The focus today is 88.com. This fantastic domain was purchased by game publisher Perfect World (完美世界) recently. (Whois record shows an update on June 30.) Perfect World is a public firm listed in both China and the US and operates from PerfectWorld.com.
The number 88 appeals to Chinese since it is a lucky number. 8 rhymes with the Pinyin word Fa (发=making a fortune) and 88 makes it even better since we love double words. We even have the saying Hao Shi Cheng Shuang (好事成双=good things come in pairs). So, 88 is a very good number.
88.com has by now gone live as an email service provider. Its online store offers vanity email addresses at varying prices. You can buy numeric names such as [email protected] for $24,000, English names such as [email protected] for 109,999 $16,000, and Chinese names such as [email protected] for $19,000. If you are tight on your budget, you can go for a cheap random 5-digit numeric name for $12 only. (Hey.com, a fresh email service, is also selling short @hey.com address for premium prices.)
As stated by top investor Yue Dai, “88.com to bring $100 million in profits to the firm this year… I expect more than 30 million people to sign up soon.”
If execution is as good as the plan, then 88.com will be a very “Fa Fa” revenue producer!
