October: A Big Month for NameJet

…And China drove the growth

October was probably NameJet’s best month overall. Remember, the market place set a record in July and then superseded it in September with cumulative sales from auctions over $2k reaching first $1.05 then $1.32 million. Last month ranks third behind those, but it’s just 2% shy of second place. Crucially, whereas the other 2 months each derived more than half their reported revenue from a single sale ($555k then $694k), October’s top auction ($142k) leaves bragging rights to the remaining 138 domains. That’s right: Last month also ranks 2nd for the number of sales – right behind January … but earning 30% more. Yes, 2015 has been kind to NameJet.

It will come as a shock to nobody that much of this buying activity can be attributed to China. How much? Roughly 76 auctions (54.7%) – $704.9k (68.7%) by weight. (The month prior was distributed 51% / 82.3%.) How long this will continue is anybody’s guess. But the Chinese domain market certainly dominates at the moment; so I’ll lead with the asset categories favored by China.

Domain	End $	Domain	End $
742.com	142,000	1865.com	41,000
4976.com	12,422	87155.com	6122
98895.com	6100	78766.com	5956
88878888.com	4560	666635.com	4103
5755.net	3353	599997.com	3010
32366.com	2500	58839.com	2302
78136.com	2244	288887.com	2242
8897.net	2150	53568.com	2120
80707.com	2019	6836.net	2009

The best 3-digit .COM domains have been retailing around the $1 million mark during 2015. Next to those, NameJet’s top sale – a $142k NNN.com – is small potatoes. In all, 18 pure numerical domains + another 6 with the “HG” prefix accounted for $246.2k + $14.5k. Right there, that’s a quarter of NameJet’s sales and 37% of its Chinese-style sales. (Why HG? See this.)

You’ll notice that the pair of 4-digit .COMs differ in value by a factor of more than 3. An unlucky “4” may be the culprit. With so wide a spread, investors had better know what they’re doing! Meanwhile, eight 5-digit .COMs ranged as high as $6.1k but as low as (and probably lower than) $2k. A trio of 4-digit .NETs all sold under $3.4k. And a quartet of 6 and 8-digit .COMs – all with repeating sequences – fell under $4.6k. (We’ve seen them go higher.)

Domain	End $	Domain	End $
HG466.com	2930	HG477.com	2903
HG3599.com	2301	HG3566.com	2205
HG2366.com	2204	HG0026.com	2000

China isn’t all about numbers; it’s also quite fond of short letter sequences. These 7 LLL.com’s totaled $227.2k – another quarter of NameJet’s reported revenue and another full third of its Chinese-style sales. It’s significant that more than half of the top 12 sales at NameJet were 3-letter .COMs; and every LLL.com auction placed in that top 10%.

Domain	End $	Domain	End $
JHG.com	54,000	JLM.com	44,317
MTF.com	39,900	GEY.com	29,377
XUG.com	21,300	HWV.com	20,101
XUH.com	18,220

More than a quarter of Chinese-style domains were 4-letter .COMs; NameJet sold 20 of them. But they amounted to only 10% by price – a mere $70.3k. All LLLL.com’s fell under $10k, all but 1 under $6.7k, and 60% of them under $3k.

Domain	End $	Domain	End $
AZAR.com	9200	GESI.com	6700
FIRI.com	6200	GGGM.com	4220
AIMM.com	4100	DOOS.com	3553
PCCI.com	3550	GGMG.com	3388
GGSN.com	2900	IVON.com	2900
MRTV.com	2800	PSTO.com	2655
CHRI.com	2600	KIAI.com	2550
OBRO.com	2500	CHAB.com	2200
NEVU.com	2100	OIKA.com	2100
MMLS.com	2077	GRCN.com	2000

NameJet sold nearly as many LLL.net domains as it did LLLL.com’s. 14 of them leapt into the $2.0k – $2.7k range. On top of those, a CC.net claimed $5.9k; and let’s not forget NameJet’s #2 sale for the month of October – a 2-letter .NET whose $55k price narrowly beat out all 20 LLL.com’s.

In 1980, American TV viewers were all asking who shot J.R. Well, in 2015, the Chinese buyer of JR.net couldn’t care less about some 35-year-old “Dallas” cliff hanger. He may not even know that he bought the abbreviation for “Junior” – just as Western domainers frequently have no idea what their strings of numbers mean (if anything) in Beijing.

Domain	End $	Domain	End $
JR.net	55,000	9F.net	5865
FXH.net	2720	WGQ.net	2410
PZG.net	2320	DXG.net	2319
KLB.net	2319	ZFK.net	2200
QNR.net	2120	BQB.net	2100
FQD.net	2100	MLR.net	2040
QRL.net	2040	QFR.net	2033
ZRF.net	2002	NMQ.net	2000

China also prizes quality Pinyin domains. I’ve already written about the meaning of the big seller, JinSe.com. It seemed KuangXi.com might apply to Laos, but the buyer is Chinese after all. PengZhan.com may have something to do with a bird spreading its wings (from a proverb), but I’d want confirmation on that from a native Chinese speaker.

Domain	End $	Domain	End $
JinSe.com	30,200	WoWoTou.com	5334
KuangXi.com	2100	PengZhan.com	2000

Last but not least, here are 5 mixed-character .COMs. Many of these will go to China, although that may not apply to the hyphenated K-S.com. NR1 has special significance for me as an ex-submarine officer.

Domain	End $	Domain	End $
KM8.com	4088	K-S.com	3400
NR1.com	3000	00F.com	2520
DI2.com	2410

That concludes the portion of this article devoted to China. From here on out, domains will have individual personality. Before we get to .COM, let’s spend a minute on other TLDs.

.NET had a great month, with 22 sales clearing $2k at NameJet. Here the Chinese market was keenly important. Indeed, just 3 .NET sales belong to the Western hemisphere. With bidders distracted by China, these buyers got great deals. I know that first hand because I sold CloudBackup.net for the same price as Backup.net, and the latter is surely better. Medikamente.net is German for “medication”. Not a small industry, that.

Domain	End $	Domain	End $
Backup.net	5601	Gadgets.net	4705
Medikamente.net	2535

“Gadgets” sold in both .NET and .ORG for effectively the same amount. Interesting that Gadgets.org, which are fun little machines, went for double the price of Machines.org. I suppose that’s because “gadgets” is more likely to refer to the latest consumer electronics, whereas “machines” would tend to be heavy-duty industrial equipment – products with less mass appeal. Apparently UNCJIN stands for the United Nations Crime and Justice Information Network.

Domain	End $	Domain	End $
Gadgets.org	5087	Machines.org	2622
UNCJIN.org	2400	Liquid.org	2200
VHF.org	2050

.NET and .ORG aren’t the only “not COMs”, although they are the 2 gTLDs we see most. Actually, this October chart is unusually diverse. 34 out of 139 sales (24.5%) were “not COMs” – a better showing than I’ve ever reported. Granted, 2/3 of those were .NET and mainly due to China. But you’ll also see a terrific .CO, a pair of .ME domains that span the dot, and 5 .TVs. Believe me, I’d report nTLD sales if NameJet had any.

Domain	End $	Domain	End $
Contact.me	7601	JT.tv	6100
HOT.co	5100	FREE.me	5000
HO.tv	4800	NO.tv	4010
AX.tv	3500	England.tv	3000

2 of the 7 English .COMs below aren’t ordinary words; Energist.com and Matchable.com would be more or less invented “brandables”. Unfriend.com wouldn’t be a word either had Facebook not given us the opportunity to conspicuously detach ourselves from people we know but can’t stand. Fertilize.com makes a lot of sense for lawn care. But the best grass here must be Blazed.com, meaning high on pot. Quite a good brand name for the burgeoning recreational marijuana industry.

Domain	End $	Domain	End $
Blazed.com	10,000	Fertilize.com	3622
Unfriend.com	3022	Energist.com	2700
Eternally.com	2500	Matchable.com	2223
Walked.com	2199

The next 5 domains are all personal names – except for Anoka.com, which is the name of a city and county in Minnesota. Surnames are often applied to companies or other institutions, and Goldwater.com is no exception. Apart from a law firm with an atrocious domain, there’s also a Goldwater Institute named for Barry Goldwater, who ran for U.S. president unsuccessfully in the 1960s.

Domain	End $	Domain	End $
Goldwater.com	15,100	Michelsen.com	4100
LuAnn.com	3899	Anoka.com	3395
Trivedi.com	2555

The next 3 domains each correspond to existing brands. ESPN is a household name; so I’d consider that domain taboo. In contrast, there are several banks with names like ValleyBank.com – no single 1 of which can lay sole claim to the domain. MontrealMirror.com sounds like it is or was a newspaper.

Domain	End $	Domain	End $
ValleyBank.com	4400	ESPNStar.com	3625
MontrealMirror.com	2090

These 2 non-English domains (French and Spanish) are worth highlighting both because of their price and their shared form: “the” + a word.

Domain	End $	Domain	End $
LeShop.com	9020	LaCasa.com	6317

If Stime.com had a second “M”, it would be German for “voice”. Perhaps it’s a typo. But here it leads a table of words with single-letter prefixes. iChem.com I’ve written about already. If you have any information on the others, please share.

Domain	End $	Domain	End $
STime.com	4532	iChem.com	4488
MBeacon.com	3000	UShow.com	2815
VPorno.com	2100

Finally, what a few of you have been wading through Chinese domains to get to – keyword-rich English .COMs! Unfortunately, by this point you’re too fatigued to read about them; and I’m too knackered to write about them. Some of these are covered already in my weekly articles about the expired market: for instance, AutoPricing.com or MyTaxReturn.com or ChipIn.com or the Cook-Islands.com.

Domain	End $	Domain	End $
InternetAccess.com	32,700	3DCasino.com	16,600
ChipIn.com	12,119	Hair Conditioner.com	12,100
WeekDays.com	8100	Price Tracker.com	7400
IPAttorney.com	6512	MSLaw.com	6112
MindGame.com	6000	Online Assistant.com	5400
StoneHouse.com	3988	Laundry Basket.com	3950
MyTaxReturn.com	3852	Strategic Advisors.com	3656
UltraMedia.com	3619	Refinance Mortgages.com	3600
Cook-Islands.com	3511	BeautyNet.com	2910
OffsiteBackup.com	2300	Barbecue Chicken.com	2277
Tattoo Equipment.com	2266	NewWork.com	2200
CaribbeanSea.com	2100	BuyPlants.com	2020
AutoPricing.com	2000

The next time you shower with HairConditioner.com, eat BarbecueChicken.com, or toss a dirty sock into a LaundryBasket.com, will you see phantom price tags next to each object in your daily life and think back to the domain auction? If such ghosts haunt you, then you’re a domainer.

[Editor: This story originally was headlined “A big month for expired domains”. As author Joseph Peterson points out, many of these sales are non-expired.]