A look at how .xyz domain names are being used.
.xyz is big — about 900,000 domains — but it’s also controversial since many of the domains were given away for free.
Even stripping away the freebies, .xyz is still big. I called upon dataprovider.com to run some numbers. (Earlier this week I used dataprovider to compare usage in .London and .NYC.)
Using data from last month, dataprovider was able to reach about 550,000 .xyz domain names (the rest were inaccessible in their spidering). Here are some of the interesting stats.
The majority of domains, as you’d expect, have registrar placeholder pages. But look at the high numbers for content sites as well.
Network Solutions, which gave .xyz domains away for free, represents 95% of these placeholder pages.
nTLDstats shows that .xyz is popular at Asian domain name registrars, and this pops up in dataprovider’s language analysis. Dataprovider determined that, if a website contains content, it is Chinese or Japanese 68% of the time.
Also, many .xyz domains are being used or forwarded to full-fledged business e-commerce businesses.
Dataprovider found about 2,700 e-commerce sites using .xyz and 1,700 with an SSL certificate.
Over 10,000 .xyz sites have a CMS installed, with WordPress dominant.
Great research. Very interesting. I would not have thought the “real” numbers were so good.
Interesting to see some legitimate usage and a Chinese / Japanese profile. I’d be very curious to look through the list of developed domains in order to ascertain what sort of names are being chosen by those most serious about putting .XYZ to use.
In terms of nTLDs clamoring for attention, the domain markets of Europe and Asia are far less fragmented than the U.S. domain market. Frankly, it’s bizarre that the nTLD program (with its numerous English keywords) has concentrated so heavily on the USA when so much of the world’s economy and growth in internet access rates are non-American.
Much as I dislike and distrust Daniel Negari, .XYZ’s CEO, he’s probably right when he claims that .XYZ’s meaninglessness is a selling point in Asia. Even the most meager exposure to English in school will make the alphabet memorable. Keyword nTLDs rely on non-native English speakers knowing a certain vocabulary, which can be an obstacle. English is notoriously hard to spell. Someone in China or Japan would need to remember both the meaning of “click” and the strange “ck” spelling in order for .CLICK to become familiar. The bar may be much lower for remembering .XYZ.
Granted, giving away .XYZ domains for free and dirt cheap undoubtedly contributed some appeal that has nothing to do with .XYZ itself.
Registries have fewer competitors outside the English-speaking world than in it … as well as a growing appetite for domains. Business-wise, they ought to get out more. While they’re wrestling each other for scraps of the American domain market, it looks as though they’re leaving Asia to Negari without a fight.
“Much as I dislike and distrust Daniel Negari”, wow, what did he do to deserve that accolade, sleep with your wife?
Never interacted with the guy. Simply formed an opinion based on his public statements and non-statements, which to me seem calculated to mislead. Based on that same public behavior, others are welcome to draw their own conclusions.
I don’t believe there is a clear precedent for evaluating the success of new tld adoption. Certainly, it will be a picture that emerges over multiple years – not just a snapshot of one year.
The freebie registrations are almost completely irrelevant and introduce quite a lot of noise skewing the registration statistics and potentially misleading anyone with an interest – be it investors, developers, or small business end users.
Ultimately, the success of new tld’s can best be demonstrated by actual websites developed on a new tld which offer viable products and services. That is a much better representation of the public embracing new extensions.
If someone could track and post examples of companies actually using the new tld’s in conjunction with repeated registration renewals at true market prices – then, and only then, do we have numbers that point to the success of the new alternatives. Also, verified aftermarket sales would be a noteworthy contributing factor.
It’s truth that .XYZ is the Next .COM.
That’s as much likely as me becoming the next president of the United States.