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Unstoppable Domains raises $4 million for blockchain domain names

by — Services 4 Comments

Domains-on-blockchain company gets major funding boost.

Unstoppable Domains logo for company creating blockchain domain names

Unstoppable Domains, a company that is launching domain names on blockchain technology, has raised $4 million in a Series A financing.

Draper Associates led the round. Previous investor Boost VC also participated in the round.

The company has raised $4.7 million to date.

Unstoppable Domains founder Matthew Gould explained the concept in DNW Podcast #224 in February.

The domain names can be used for both payments and websites, although domains that aren’t in ICANN’s root will not resolve for most people.

One benefit the company touts is that a domain name can’t be taken down by the players that typically participating in the domain name system. Hence, the name Unstoppable Domains.

The company is trying to introduce both new extensions and to bring blockchain features to existing extensions.

Unstoppable Domains also wants to apply for .crypto whenever ICANN gets around to opening applications for more top level domains.

3 Podcasts for domain name investors

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Here are three interviews with domain investors that will teach you a lot.

Image of microphone with computer monitor in background showing audio recording. Word "Podcasts" overlayed.

I interview many types of people on the DNW Podcast: domain investors, end users, service providers, domain developers, etc. Here are three podcasts that will help domain name investors that are trying to learn from others:

Logan Flatt – Logan has a background in finance and takes a very analytical approach to domain investing. He runs strict financials against the portfolio and treats it like an investment class. On the podcast, Logan explains how he manages and monitors his portfolio, and how he runs tests to figure out the best way to sell his domains. Listen.

Joshua Schoen – Joshua invests in high-value domain names. He’s fairly new to domain name investing but has acquired some spectacular domains. He explains his approach to buying domain names that aren’t actively for sale. Listen.

Mark Levine – Mark invests in lower-priced domains and sells them at reasonable prices. It’s a volume play that many domain investors try to emulate. He’s not making retirement money but is building a solid annual income. Listen.

If you want to hear some domain development stories, listen to an update with Drew Wash, who tried to build three exact match domains into businesses generating $25k/month in recurring revenue within a year.

On Tuesday I’ll release an update with Peter Askew. He talks about his recent article about selling onions that went viral and how much traffic and sales it sent to his sites. He also talks about the “failure” of his call tracking business that he discussed on episode #163. It failed but he turned it into a six-figure domain sale.

Thanks for listening.

What domains P&G and others bought

by — Domain Sales 3 Comments

Procter & Gamble, a pharmaceutical company and a Chinese tour company all bought domains last week.

graphic of briefcase full of money related to end user domain name sales

The household products behemoth Procter & Gamble bought a new exact match domain for its extensive portfolio at Sedo last week. Other buyers include a pharma company that paid $25,000 for RAPT.com.

Here’s the list of Sedo end user sales from the past week. You can view previous lists like this here.

Rapt.com $25,000 – FLX Bio is a pharmaceutical company that develops orally-administered drugs for cancer and other inflammatory diseases. It is forwarding the domain to its main website and I can’t find anything on it about RAPT. Microsoft appears to be the seller.

SilkRoadTravel.com $11,500 – A tour operator in West China.

Vigantol.com $9,900 – Procter & Gamble. Vigantol is a form of Vitamin D3. This was a SedoMLS sale.

A-Rent.com $5,500 – Under development for a Chicago-based company specializing in renting electrical testing equipment.

TheContext.com $3,600 – Not yet developed but this was purchased by Contextual Reports, LLC, a firm in Palo Alto.

MoneyIs.com $3,366 – New website for Real Estate mogul Andrew Cordle where he shares wealth advice via video content.

BestSecret.ro €3,000 – Forwards to BestSecret.com, a “Member’s only” online high-end clothing shopping club.

Mashup.in $2,800 – Not yet developed but this domain was purchased by Half Ticket, an Indian online clothes retailer.

ShopMate.de €2,400 – SPARWELT GmbH has a product called ShopMate. When someone purchases from a partner e-commerce company, they get a promotion for another partner company.

Ehpad-Invest.net €2,000 – Forwards to Ehpad-Invest.com, a French investment service provider.

Google registers Driverless Car .app domains

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The timing of these two domain registrations suggests momentum with driverless taxis.

Photo of a Waymo Google driverless car.

Me next to a Google/Wayme Driverless test car in Austin.

Google just registered a couple of driverless car domain names in the .app extension, showing progress on its driverless car activities and the future of driverless taxis.

The company registered Driverless.app and DriverlessCar.app this week. Neither domain resolves to a website at the time of this story.

While Google owns the .app top level domain, names in .app are open for registration by anyone.

The company’s Waymo unit launched the Waymo One app last year for users of its driverless taxi fleet in Phoenix. I find it interesting that it just registered the driverless .app domains now. Does it signal a wider rollout or progress on its driverless car program?

The .Com memorability factor

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Study shows that people remember domain names as having .com on the end.

One of the problems with using a top level domain name other than .com is memorability. While it might stand out to people as new or unique, many people will remember your domain name as a .com.

This is especially the case when people can’t see it, such as hearing a radio commercial for a website. But it’s even a factor when people do see the domain name, and that’s clear in a clever study performed by Kyle Byers of GrowthBadger.

Kyle surveyed 1,500 people and didn’t tell them the study was about domain names. He asked them how trustworthy a site was and the only information he gave them was a domain name. It ended in .com or one of seven other domain name extensions.

Overall, the ones that ended in .com had the highest trustworthiness score.

But the most intriguing thing to me was quantifying recall. After asking about the website, Kyle threw in a bunch of other questions to create some time between reviewing the domain and a final question: what was the domain name they saw on the first screen?

People were more likely to remember the domain if it was a .com. And if they misremembered the domain extension? They almost always misremembered it as .com:

Graph showing people who misremember domain names and which top level domain they choose

If they misremember the TLD, most remember it as .com. Graphic courtesy GrowthBadger.

This doesn’t surprise me but quantifies the effect.

Kyle has an interesting takeaway that domain investors will like:

The domain he tested was MattressRankings.TLD. The .com is on the aftermarket for about $4,000; the others can be hand registered. Kyle asks, isn’t it worth paying extra for the aftermarket domain in light of the findings?