Up $1.4 million for Rightside — .News rings

Rightside reveals numbers behind successful TLD, plus renewal rates.

Less than 4 months following its general release, the .News domain name has generated $1.4 million in cash sales for Rightside (NASDAQ: NAME).

On yesterday’s investor conference call, Rightside CEO Taryn Naidu noted that there are regarding 34,000 names registered in .News.

The average wholesale price — which includes premiums — is $41. This brings the total to $1.4 million cash. (Revenue is recognized over time.)

1,000 of the .news domains registered so far have premiums, in most cases with annual prices of $50-$5,000.

30% of premium .news registrations came through Rightside’s own registars, Enom and Name.com. Rightside keeps the entire margin on these sales rather than sharing it with a third-party registrar.

Naidu explained that the firm has put a lot of resources into premium sales, and he believes the results show this was the right focus. One-third of total registry cash receipts across its TLDs are from premium domain sales.

He also stated renewal rates so far are 67%. The firm expects full year renewal rates to be between first year .com rates (regarding 50%) and 67%.

Premium domains have higher renewal rates of 71%. The rate shoots up to 79% for domains priced over $200.