Tide of alternative TLDs — The rising
The sale of Camping.info for $28,100 is one example of the rising tide of alternative domain names.
Many of the domain name industry’s big players sware they’ll only touch .com domain names. But as .com domain values skyrocket they are bringing the value of alternative domains, such as .info and .biz, up with them. This stretch’s sale of Camping.info at Sedo (source: DNJournal) is the highest .info sale ever disclosed and is just one example of this rising tide.
In the 2006 Reglike survey, I asked domainers which domain extension they would register if .com were by now taken. The choices excluded country code domains. 63% stated they would register a .net, 18% a .info, 15% .org, and 5% .biz. Of course your choice of domain extension depends somewhat on the topic of the domain. Camping.info is a great domain for information regarding camping sites, camping supplies, etc.
Keyword .info domains can be a great investment. Single keywords are notable for search engine rankings. I recently paid under $1,000 to acquire Nutritionist.info. On the surface it’s just a decent domain. But it now ranks #2 on MSN for the term “nutritionist” and gets a lot of traffic. It will pay for itself in less than a year. (I created a simple site in XsitePro in regarding 2 hours to optimize for search traffic).
I’ve also had a lot of success with Fax.info, which I purchased for under $2,000. With a little bit of content and search optimization it has by now paid for itself in just a few short months. I also own Blogs.info — a domain with lots of potential. My Deals.biz domain hasn’t been quite as successful but was still a good investment.
Quality .info and .biz domains can still be purchased for under $1,000. You ought to check out Sedo and Afternic for good keyword domains. Make a reasonable offer and you might be surprised by how affordable some of these domains are.
