Yesterday I saw the sale of the domain name Sexy.org cross the Sedo.com wire for a mere $7,500.
Ouch.
Sexy is without a doubt a great word for an adult or semi adult site.
Its right below words like sex and porn and certainly well above 2% of the value of those words.
It was just a few years ago that both sex.net and porn.net sold well into the six figures $425K and $350K if memory serves.
At $7,500 Sexy.org well to say the least was a good buy, unless the existence of the .XXX extension has taken a lot of juice out of non .com adult domains.
Its impossible to make a call on just one domain but the price of $7,500 for Sexy.org is pretty shocking and it could well be related to the existence of the .XXX. extension.
If so, as the new gTLD’s roll out it could be a wake up call for other non.com’s in verticals that will have new gTLD’s
For example will a domain like Maineattorney.org be worth the same as it is now once there is a .law extension?
Will NewYorkPizza.org or .net be worth as much once there is a .NYC and maybe a .pizza?
All .com’s are next to worthless (relatively speaking). The selling price of the .org in this article is less a reflection of the gTLD program (which will fail) & more of a commentary on the value of all non-.com’s.
The only other extension that seems to be picking up steam and has long-term potential in advertising and/or web media is .tv.
I meant to write “All non .com’s are next to worthless”…sorry.
no
I don’t really see .org as a fitting extension for adult names. If anything, I would guess that it reflects a fairly accurate market value for sexy.org.
Reading way too much into one sale.
The only thing you can draw from this particular incident is that MHB wasn’t the seller as it would’ve sold for $100+K or not sold at all.
May be a fair price. Sexy.org sounds like plentyoffish for octogenarians.
Adult is becoming more about branding and less about affiliates and SEO. And for branding you need the best possible .com. .Org, .net, dashes are only good for SEO, and it is dying in adult with affiliate commissions dying. .Xxx does not matter in adult as it already totally failed. .Xxx is as complete failure as it gets, much worse than .mobi, much worse than .co.
I always associate .org with non-profit charitable organizations and similar type sites. I find it in really bad taste when I see porn and hosted on that particular extension. Just as you would not use an .xxx to promote a kids after school program, I find it totally inappropriate to use .org for porn and such. Maybe it’s small minded, but that kind of free for all rogue mentality, get what you can greed is what fucks up the internet on some level.
It’s a matter of buyer and seller agreeing to price A versus price B.
Having sold 360.org for $25,500 I can say that unless you ask for more, you won’t get more.
Sexy.org is alright, but I have bought far better NET/ORG for the same price or less. It is basically an adult brand in .ORG, not exactly a great fit.
“For example will a domain like Maineattorney.org be worth the same as it is now once there is a .law extension?”
Sure. I have sold plenty of legal domains in .ORG. ORG is preferred by many lawyers because it provides a legal of credibility right now.
“Will NewYorkPizza.org or .net be worth as much once there is a .NYC and maybe a .pizza?”
Does the .NET or .ORG of that term really have that much value right now?
It is going to be very hard to feasibly support an entire registry when your business model is just selling domains to Pizza places.
Brad
Also as far as an extension like .law goes, there could also be a .legal, .lawyer, .attorney, and others.
In Real Estate you could have Chicago.Homes, Homes.Chicago, Chicago.RealEstate, RealEstate.Chicago, etc.
Also, these registries will not let these top terms go for cheap.
There will be plenty of alternatives. However, building a bunch of crappy houses in the suburb does not lower the value of premium real estate.
Brad
I agree the sale price was cheap for sexy.org. Sexy doesn’t have to mean adult either, it can also mean just looking good, as in fashion.
domains
which should make it even more valuable
A lot of good comments all around, I agree with Tony and Dean, and Brad brings up some great points. If you have so many variations will any of them hold anything more than the marginal value ? Especially since Mike you will be consulting some of these registries how to maximize value selling names on the start of the new extension.
Chicago.home and then Home.chicago or Chicago.realestate, all these variations dilute resale value imo.
Mike would you have bought it if you saw the name at $7500 and could bid $7600 to win the name ?
The main thing that is devaluing these names in adult is one thing imo, Who is paying for porn ? A whole generation is growing up that cannot even fathom paying for an adult site. So that affects affiliate commission, and the amount someone willing to pay for a domain imo.
.xxx conversations right now mean little to me. A look at .xxx a year, year and a half from now will be the key as to what .xxx is doing and what it means.
Again IMO
On a side note, but related to the topic of conversation, adult and porn revenue has gone down considerably since the advent of tube sites and free porn, but there is still some niches and products that are making cash. Guys can only jerk it so much to something inanimate, they want to interact with someone, be it via a phone line or on a cam.
Exactly Dean, the value is in Cam domains imo.
I guess ICM needs more publicity for domain investors to a 2nd look at its failed marketing.
They haven’t been in the news recently.
According to ZFBot, the number of .XXX domain names currently registered stands at 108,439.
Deduct the 90,000 or more defensive registrations and you have “failure.xxx”
Does this mean vcr.xxx is worth more than vcr.com?
Alan: It’d be great to quote the source, DomainGang, as the info you posted isn’t available openly 😉
Also, where the heck do you get that 90,000 figure from? It’s ok not to like .xxx but posting inaccuracies is different.
My take on all this is that new domains may be competitive to some keywords like chicago.homes for example would be similar to chicagohomes.net . But how many of these new domains are going to allow for a wide demographic of keywords. I think they may serve well to get in on a niche segment for an individual industry, but few will appeal to a broad range of industries and keywords. I’m currently thinking that the domain market will be impacted slowly, as I would think registries will only embrace extensions that serve a broader market.
You really can’t have it both ways. If new tlds negatively affect domain prices, this will be across the board on all tlds, including .com or maybe even especially so since the domain prices are most inflated in that extension.
Though imho, I think good keywords existing tlds will be that much more expensive with new tlds launch, not everyone wants the best location in Ulan Bator as compared to ocean front property in LA except those that can’t afford the latter.
Had written about existing domain values in light of the new TLDs in Aug 2010, don’t see much has changed since then, click the link in the postbit to read it.
Any news on .xxx auction results yet, Michael ?
Price doesn’t seem low to me, the adult industry has been in a steady state of decline for years and this is a wishy washy term without clear focus. As RH said in this thread “who pays for porn?” Fewer and fewer each month. Would have expected less personally.
First weeks auctions are over, second week ending in two days.
Funny no news about prices, is everyone afraid to skew the prices for their next auctions?
Over 198,000 domains under management since launch.
Circa 110,000 since December 6th
First wave of auctions closed , highest auction figure for closed auction was yesterday , eight character name for $121,000
Next wave of announcements coming soon
Just had a couple of weeks off after a pretty hectic 2011;-)
Thanks Stuart, great news. Professionalism and integrity always pay off large. I feel that the domain I tried to register in October is the one that sold for $121,000 🙂 ( if it starts with P and ends with Y!) I am just guessing , not sure, I could be wrong. Anyways, all the best of luck to all bidders and sellers, and I look forward to hearing more news from ICM Registry in the near future. Keep the hard work…
For me who is into domain development these would be great news if I could get .org or .net domain names for low prices and turn them into decent money making websites.
Adult niche isn’t my favorite but it’s never too late to jump into it.
btw: broadband.org sold for 12500 and I think it’s low price for domain name that has 110 month searches and 10 euro CPC, so there is something wrong with latest .org sales not jus tin adult niche.
On any given day, someone who needs money is subject to sell a domain for less than it may be worth. Its just like watching Pawnstars or AuctionHunters. If someone needs money, and a buyer is waving cash in front of them for something that has value but maybe isn’t that easy to sell, or they just don’t have time to wait, they may just grab the cash so they can pay the rent. That’s why there is still opportunity out there. Its what drives estate sales, garage sales, pawnshops, and sometimes domain sales too.
By the same token, the recent $100k Touch.com sale would seem to indicate .com and/or devices driven by touch are declining. 🙂
Can’t read too much into a single sale. Sometimes sellers don’t know what their name is worth and a buyer is able to sniff out the deal.
Sexy.org sells and your first thought to pen is “.XXX extension has taken a lot of juice out of non .com adult domains.” Really? Perhaps you should view your site with an adblocker so that your journalistic intentions aren’t influenced by ads.
.XXX may take a lot of juice out of … I’ll keep it clean…. but .org?
RH says it best. Porn is almost all free/stolen.
The only porn that isn’t is controlled by very few major companies. I don’t think Corbin Fisher, Vivid, Hustler are looking at Sexy.org as particular threat… do you?
Also recently you stated… You can’t sell a domain for $20K if you sell it for $3K. Maybe your first thought should have been to re-iterate that statement. That even has sense, logic and experience attached to it.
I registered VCR.xxx .
“You can’t sell a domain for $20K if you sell it for $3k is only half the equation. We’re not reinventing the wheel here with domain sales. It’s simple economics. It is supply and demand. You might not sell it for as much but you can sure sell a lot more domains for $3K than you will for $20K. You have to decide if you want to sell volume and make a less margin or sell for high margin but sell very little. It is my opinion that there is a lot more money to be made selling volume than holding out for a high price. It’s a numbers game. You might win the lotto playing power ball but the weekly scratcher have a lot more winners. It’s built into the numbers. So is it with domain names. There are thousands of people holding on to the few domains thinking they are going to win the lotto. Little do they know they might hold on until the next great extension makes theirs obsolete and worthless. Non-the-less I tend to agree with with the concept of holding out for more. If I’m into a domain for a few bucks why sell cheap. I don’t have much to lose holding out for the big bucks so why not hold out?
“Will NewYorkPizza.org or .net be worth as much once there is a .NYC and maybe a .pizza?”
Not to mention .web, .shop etc. They’ll surely lose more value – if the extensions arrive. .info & .biz started the trend. .com owners are now less bothered about locking up the .org and .net too. Not that the .com owner has anything to celebrate either.
I don’t think .com are declining, well they shouldn’t be. A very low sale price for a very nice name with excellent potential and such a memorable name with all the feel good happy stuff that goes with a good .org
So many uses for this name, from a celeb site, to dating and the obvious adult shop, or even an adult organisation. Cracking buy for the buyer!