Fresh stars at Asia’s Top 1000 Brands reveal domain preferences
Short .com domains dominate fresh entrants to Asia’s Top 1000 Brands list.
Domains are meant to be used by end users, so studying Chinese brands may tell us what domains corporate China likes to acquire.
Recently, Campaign Asia-Pacific published Asia’s Top 1000 Brands in 2021. The note lists 57 fresh entrants from China. Following removing Fila (Korean-owned) and Shanghai Jia (domain not found), I studied the remaining 55 Chinese brands by using Baidu to find their domains. The full list is at the end of this post. Let’s start with a summary.
| Extension | Share |
|---|---|
| com | 82% |
| cn | 16% |
| me | 2% |
.com is still king. In other words, .com is the first choice for most Chinese firms, followed by .cn. The .me extension is an interesting case. The food delivery startup Eleme employs it as a domain hack (Ele.me).
| Length | |
|---|---|
| Medium | 6 |
| <=10 | 85% |
Short is still the trend. The medium length of domains (excluding the extension) is 6 characters only.
| Language | Share |
|---|---|
| English-based | 44% |
| Pinyin | 27% |
| Numeric | 2% |
| Acronym | 15% |
| Mixed | 13% |
Interestingly, Chinese firms actually prefer English-based domains. Also, a few brands use mixed domains, such as NewHopeLiuhe.com, which contains both English with Pinyin.
16% of domains are not brand-matching. If you study the list, you’ll discover domains that can serve as upgrades for these Chinese firms. Some examples are Dali Food (Dali-Group.com), Moutai (MoutaiChina.com), and Three Squirrels (3songshu.com).
Finally, there is good news for investors who own only English-based .com domains. In the list, 36% of the domains are English-based domains in .com. This is significant since it means that you can sell your English-based .com domains to a Chinese firm. Just make sure you list your domains at a marketplace with retail outlets in China, such as Afternic.
Here’s the full list of fresh entrants from China:
| Firm | Domain |
|---|---|
| Meituan Waimai | Meituan.com |
| Eleme | Ele.me |
| Shein | Shein.com |
| Youngor | Youngor.com |
| Bosideng | Bosideng.com |
| Gree | Gree.com |
| Flyco | Flyco.com |
| Galanz | Galanz.com |
| Skyworth | Skyworth.com |
| TCL | TCL.com |
| AirChina | AirChina.com |
| Moutai | MoutaiChina.com |
| Wuliangye | Wuliangye.com.cn |
| Tmall | Tmall.com |
| VIP | VIP.com |
| Fresh Hope Liuhe | NewHopeLiuhe.com |
| Three Squirrels | 3songshu.com |
| Dali Food | Dali-Group.com |
| Hsu Fu Chi | HsufuchiFoods.com |
| Tsingtao | Tsingtao.com |
| SnowBeer | SnowBeer.com.cn |
| Harbin Beer | Harbin-Beer.com.cn |
| DJI | DJI.com |
| Vivo | Vivo.com |
| OnePlus | OnePlus.com |
| Li Ning | LiNing.com |
| Anta | Anta.com |
| Chinese Super League (CSL) | CSL-China.com |
| China Life | ChinaLife.com.cn |
| PICC | PICC.com |
| Ping An Insurance | PingAn.com |
| CPIC | CPIC.com.cn |
| QQ.com | |
| Lenovo Legion | Lenovo.com |
| Douyin | Douyin.com |
| 360 | 360.com |
| Kingsoft | Kingsoft.com |
| Sogou | Sogou.com |
| Bilibili | Bilibili.com |
| V.qq | QQ.com |
| Youku | Youku.com |
| Alitrip | Alitrip.com |
| Qunar | Qunar.com |
| Tuniu | Tuniu.com |
| Tong Ren Tang | TongRenTang.com |
| Yang Sheng Tang | YST.com.cn |
| Lao Feng Xiang | LaoFengXiang.com |
| Chow Tai Seng | ChowTaiSeng.com |
| Agricultural Bank of China | ABCbank.com |
| Shanghai Pudong Development Bank | SPDB.com.cn |
| Luckin Coffee | LuckinCoffee.com |
| Supor | Supor.com |
| Bridge Pet care | bPet.cn |
| ZTO Express | ZTO.com |
| Meiyijia | Meiyijia.com.cn |
