Aussie Domain Market Still In Infancy Or Stalled?
With the recent changes announced by the Australian Domain Authority’s (auDA) policy on change of domain ownership, a lot of people thought that domaining would really take off in Australia.
A couple of auction websites were launched eager to build on the initial excitement and publicity generated by the auDa announcement.
A lot of people were seeing big things in the future of the Aussie domain market which has in the past seen little movement as a result of the previously strict rules and regulations.
From the results we have seen so far, since the auDa changes, Aussie domainers’ hopes of a fledgling domain trade turning into a booming industry have not eventualised. Domains are selling slowly, if at all. The two domain auction websites mentioned above are still in an infancy stage and boast a limited collection of domains for sale.
Builder.com.au notes that even though sites like netfleet.com.au have attempted to auction of high profile domain names like mail.com.au for as much as $1,000,000, there have been no takers.
The apparent disinterest in the domain trade down-under is probably not helped by the fact that auDa still explicitly forbids companies “to register a domain name for the sole purpose of resale or transfer to a third party” - a fact that probably stops many domainers from investing heavily in the tld.
Additionally, I believe a lot of people are turned away from investing in .com.au domain names due to the public belief that you can only register a domain name of your company - a fact brought about by the previously strict regulations.
One major advantage the Aussie .com.au tld has over it’s .com counterpart is the general public’s awareness of the .com.au domain name as an Aussie brand. Aussie’s are by nature more likely to visit a .com.au domain name as opposed to a .com domain name simply because .com.au represents something “Aussie” while .com is seen as American.
With more people becoming aware of the potential of .com.au domain names as investment opportunities and perhaps as a result of a further relaxation of auDa’s rules, I do believe that the Aussie domain trade will take off. It has not stalled, but rather is still in infancy.
I would love to hear thoughts from Aussie and overseas domain investors on this matter. Do you agree or disagree? What do you see as the future of the .com.au domain name in Australia?
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7 Responses to “Aussie Domain Market Still In Infancy Or Stalled?”
July 24th, 2008 at 2:58 pm
I would refer to this article.
Seems to tell the story.
http://www.thedomains.com/2008/06/15/comau-gold-rush-june-2008-major-corporates-start-buying-up-generic-aftermarket-domains/
Although the last comment seems to disarm it a little.
But I believe its in its infancy.
July 24th, 2008 at 4:17 pm
People are asking to much for the market to even begin. I think sellers need to lower their expectations. .AU will never be a .COM, though, it is worth what people are willing to pay for it.
July 24th, 2008 at 11:36 pm
Its hard to gauge sometimes but I really think that the whole Aussie internet market, be it domains or websites, is in the infancy stage.
July 25th, 2008 at 3:30 pm
It’s the same thing with the .CA. If you have a site selling to canadians, the .CA extension will get way more traffic than the .COM. These are goldmines, just sit on them for a few more years till people get to become more familiar. Personally I prefer to register domains with the country extensions right after the domain. xxxxx.CN or xxxxxx.CA
July 26th, 2008 at 5:10 am
a country of only 20 million population and someone is asking $1,000,000 for mail.com.au?
US has 300M+ population and not to mention the rest of the world who would type in mail.com, you think someone is gonna pay $10M for the domain name without a second thought?
Most of the .com.au’s listed for sales these days are obviously over priced.
.com.au has potential, but there’s only so much space I reckon.
August 21st, 2008 at 8:06 am
Very hard to judge the value of .au’s at the moment.
Without a sales history it makes it very hard. Just imagine if nobody had ever bought or sold a house in Australia, then suddenly you put your house up for sale. Would it be worth $200K or $2M (of course it’s worth whatever anyone’s prepared to pay)
Anyway three positives:
1) aftermarket trading in infancy. can only grow
2) .au strong in Aus (moreson than any other cc-TLD from what I can see)
3) supply/demand. More websites being created each day, only limited number of domains - leads to value appreciation
August 24th, 2008 at 2:19 pm
Most people whose country has adequate internet facility and development like to use their country domain.
I think the market is still infant. With such regulation, no business can be thriving.