The internet now underpins most of the world’s social activity. Over 66% of the global population (4.6 billion people) now have access to the internet.
The digital economy is growing seven times faster than developed economies such as the US. It has created millions of jobs, building new opportunities for self-employment in the new online creator economy.
The internet opens access to enormous business opportunities for brands that have robust digital strategies. The perfect premium domain name is the cornerstone of a solid digital strategy. A premium domain name can be all that stands between you and a $5.55 trillion global eCommerce market.
Businesses operating in a borderless world use domain names as addresses. A domain name helps people navigate to your digital location. It also informs web browsers where to access your website content. On top of that, a domain name is the most recognizable aspect of your brand or its digital persona.
Premium domains vs. regular domains
A premium domain name registration may go for the price of your morning cup of java but will sell at a premium. Domain names that extract only the most meaningful value from a brand name are at most one word. com versions of a business’s use case.
It costs more than an ordinary domain name because a registry or a person owns it. As a result, internet domain brokers have made millions by simply snapping up the best domain names and selling them to the highest bidder.
Dozens of domain name registrars and marketplaces sell new or expired brandable names. Then, only one brand can purchase and use that domain name, making the premium domain names a rare commodity.
Regular domain names use a portion of premium domain names or are spin-offs of top-level domain names. Consequently, they are cheaper than premium domain names.
Some features of a premium domain name are;
They are top-level domains
Top-level domains (TLDs) lead in the domain name hierarchy. There are thousands of TLDs in the market. They are regulated by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). The most expensive premium domain names have a .com domain name. The ICANN delegates TLD regulation to various organizations, such as VeriSign in the US, that operates all .net and .com TLDs. Other popular but less expensive TLDs are .org, .net, .info and .biz domain names.
They pass the Radio Test.
The best premium domain names are easy to understand, memorable, and sound good to the ear.
They have the right spelling.
Domain names that use alternate spellings in the place of the right spelling have a lower value than premium names.
They are brandable
A short and catchy domain name is an excellent branding tool.
They have meaningful keywords.
A premium domain name is short but has in-demand keywords.
They are already ranked and indexed by Google.
An older name is better for SEO than a freshly registered name. An added benefit is that it may already have traffic enhancing your brand’s discoverability.
Why companies would buy premium domains?
Do you know that some of the most successful internet businesses have paid massive sums of cash for premium domain names? As an illustration, Buffer, the all-in-one social media toolkit for entrepreneurs, was known as bfffr.com in 2010.
At the time, Buffer co-founder and CEO Joel Gascoigne thought that domain names did not matter much when starting a business.
“One thing I’ve learned and embraced with naming my startups is that the domain name doesn’t matter at all… Pick a great name, go with a tweaked domain name”, Joel wrote in 2014.
The business rebranded to bufferapp.com, but as their business grew, the need for a recognizable and consistent brand image scaled alongside it. As a result, the Buffer team realized that they could no longer hold off acquiring the Buffer.com premium domain name.
They realized that the premium domain cost was also rising alongside their business. As a result, Buffer finally acquired a premium domain name in 2015. However, the domain seller said he had received many other offers from buyers who could have used it to undercut Buffer’s digital strategy.
Buffer does not disclose how much they paid for their premium domain name. The most expensive premium domain name sales in history include voice.com at $30,000,000 and sex.com, which sold for $14,000,000. Tesla.com, and Hotels.com sold for $11,000,000.
Businesses buy premium domains because they are memorable and brandable. In contrast, random domain names introduce challenges such as errors amongst users when naming or recalling your domain name. Consequently, many of your would-be customers will send emails to the wrong address or confuse your website with your business rivals.
Then, when a business acquires a catchy premium domain name, it is off the market forever. To this end, the only way to own the most memorable and brandable domain name is to purchase a premium domain name.
The alternative is to purchase the company that is currently using the premium domain name that would work best for your business. Purchasing a business is more arduous than buying the best premium domain name.
Other reasons why companies buy premium domains are;
To give their businesses the best name in the market
To enhance authenticity and authority
To access organic traffic from visitors that key in a domain name to a relevant website when seeking goods or services.
Organic growth and why some domain names bring more traffic
Choosing the perfect domain name is a crucial component of business growth. Premium domain names will capture the largest organic market. They will attract more clicks, enhancing your revenue generation.
The benefits of organic traffic include;
Lower costs of advertising, giving you an edge over your competitors
Organic traffic helps you rank higher on search rankings, effectively shadowing the visibility of your competitor’s online presence
Organic traffic often brings in highly qualified leads since typing in a search query signals specific intent. These leads will quickly convert into paying customers.
Organic traffic offers a sustainable approach to digital business development. Paid traffic is costly and inconsistent, while organic traffic is regular, engaged, evergreen, and long-lasting.
Conclusion
According to Verisign data, there are over 172.1 million top-level .com and .net domain name registrations. Consequently, finding the perfect intrinsic domain name via centralized domain name registries is slim and ultra-expensive.
Decentralized domain name services ease access to premium decentralized domain names and addresses. DNS services on the blockchain are the next iteration of domain names offering early users access to new premium domain name extensions.
Decentralized domain name services also offer new functionalities that will benefit your business in the Web 3.0 era, such as non-fungible tokens (NFTs) technology, transparency, and privacy.