Domain Business: Pricing Strategies

As registrations for new top-level domains (New gTLDs) begin, it's worth recalling the pricing strategies used by administrators of existing domains.

Currently, domains can be obtained for free, registered at discounted, regular, or premium prices. Administrators of new domains can use any of these strategies for their domains.

It should be noted that given that the cost of obtaining a new domain under the New gTLD program is quite high (more than $185 thousand), it is unlikely that one can hope to obtain names in such domain zones for free.

Free registration is often used only after a domain extension has been launched for promotional purposes. In this case, domain administrators may impose various restrictions, such as the number of domains one person can register or the number of domains that can be obtained in a certain period of time (e.g., per day or per month).

Interestingly, the New gTLD program has floated the idea of ​​creating a .FREE domain for free domain names. Such a domain extension can be compared to free hosting.

Free registration poses a risk to cybercriminals, who may actively register domains in such domain zones. This could lead to such websites being infected with various types of malware and blacklisted.

Free registration of names in new New gTLDs may also be available to members of a specific community or companies operating in a specific field. An example of such registration is the .BANK domain.

To promote their domain, the administrator of a new domain extension can offer clients registration at reduced prices, for example, cheaper than the .COM domain. Such steps could be effective in promoting domains, especially considering that VeriSign, the administrator of the .COM domain, is gradually raising domain prices.

The discount system will work similarly. However, the risks of this strategy are the same as those mentioned above: a large number of spam-infected resources. The shortcomings of this strategy can currently be observed in the .INFO domain.

Experts believe that using registration costs comparable to those for the .COM domain may well attract users, primarily because they are accustomed to such prices.

High and very high prices for new domains may attract clients who are particularly interested in such domains. This strategy has been successfully implemented with .CO and .XXX domains, and in the future, it may be used by administrators of city domains.