Someone asked me the other day what the highest .US domain sale was. I honestly had no idea so I started my search in the DNJournal archives and on NameBio and DNSalePrice. I wasn’t expecting a lot but I was a little surprised when I saw how few .US domain sales reported even break the $25k mark. I understand .COM is the TLD that people in our country recognize and use but .US is still the official ccTLD of the United States.
The .US TLD is the most underperforming ccTLD in existence, I’ve felt this way for a long time. When you look at ccTLD’s like .DE, .EU, .CO.UK, .FR, .CA and even .PL, .NL, .SE and .CC their top sale, sales volume and average sales price all dwarf .US sales stats. Below are the list of documented .US sales above $15,000 (prices rounded to nearest thousand) all the way back to 2004.
Video.us $75k (2007)
Taxi.us $35k
Job.us $35k
SexToy.us $51k
Jew.us $29k
Jews.us $25k
Famo.us $25k
Baseball.us $25k
Voip.us $25k
Foods.us $20k
Football.us $19k
Video.us $18.5k (2008)
Computer.us $17k
Bingo.us $15k
Miami.us $15k
You’ll notice that Video.us is on this list twice. And according to DNJournal this is accurate – the top selling documented .US domain was resold a year later for a seventy five percent loss! Ouch.
I do expect that with the rise of gTLD’s, .US will gain some more traction. .US could also really use some help from its parent company Neustar which has done next to nothing to help promote the .US brand over the last few years.
What I like about the .US registry is that they’ve implemented a hype-free business strategy. People are given the choice to register and buy into the name, rather being forced into it (as opposed to you-know-what). I haven’t seen a major brand exclusively based on .US, but I can assure you it is being used very well on relevant sites. You can take a look at the websites under the TLD by conducting a Google search with the query: site:.us
Many global brands are using .US to direct traffic to their US-based site. I have seen over a dozen examples now, a few off the top of my head include visits from Dove.com originating from the US are automatically redirected to Dove.us. Same thing goes for AirFrance.com, hover over America-Caribbean, then place mouse cursor over USA, which basically is linked to AirFrance.us. IMHO .US is strong, however, its strength is targeted.
I have sold many .US over the last year in the low $X,XXX – High $X,XXX range.
Many of these sales are private, but others have been via SEDO (PestControl.us, CarpetCleaning.us, AddictionTreatment.us and several others).
There is a solid end user market if you target the right keywords.
Brad
We own compensation.us and are selling if anyone is interested.
“You’ll notice that Video.us is on this list twice. And according to DNJournal this is accurate – the top selling documented .US domain was resold a year later for a seventy five percent loss! Ouch.”
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The name was dropped actually, so they lost the lot. Not sure how the buyer fathomed it could be worth $75k. In my view would be worth a lot less than the second sale of 18k today. Would expect under 10k.
“I think it means that the best ones are undervalued”
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In what way are they undervalued? you think they will rise?
“I understand .COM is the TLD that people in our country recognize and use but .US is still the official ccTLD of the United States.”
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What does it matter what the official country code is if everyone uses something else?
If I live in a town where the official drink is tea whilst 100% of the population drinks coffee only then that official status is completely irrelevant to beverage drinkers, the only people who will care is the people trying to sell tea to those who don’t want it.
What about icio.us (aka: del.icio.us)? This is a very popular one, and I can’t imagine what it is worth!
Many .US domains sell for high amounts but the deals just arn`t published as they are sold between savvy .US investors. I`ve been involved and seen deals over $100k many a times since 2002, and especially in 2004 when Neustar released the Reserve list domains. Big guys pay big money, Zouzas, Yakov, Dan Stager, Ron, and many other investors love .US.
It`s a sleeping giant. Buy while they are cheap.
Impossible to sell a .US domain unless you have industry specific keywords as Brad said.
.US sites otoh seem to do well, something that most people don’t like to share since it engenders competition.
That said, it’s probably not the best extension for an investor looking for quick flips or returns.
I own Genetics.us, Genome.us, Nanotech.us, Biometrics.us to name a few and have received several mid to high $$$$ offers each. Holding on as I am hopeful of better future and price for .us domains
Dave Bhatia
The problem with the .com is that it is not the U. S. ccTLD, everyone in the world is a .com. Every country in the world uses there .ccTLD and the .com but in the U. S. we don’t.
So if you live in another country that uses there .ccTLD and are looking to do business with a U. S. company they do not have any way to tell if that .com website is a real U. S. company. It is a problem that many U. S. corp don’t understand. They need to own the two if you are doing business world wide.
I own the most important, relevant .us on the planet and have never heard a peep of an offer from anybody…….americans.us
We own free grocery coupons.us and it’s listed at Sedo,if anyone is interested.
Anyone else wants to unload his/her .US inventory here?
I have seen Shell use Shell.us on all their tv commercials. As Brad pointed out there is a serious end user market in the mid $X,XXX for right keywords.
I feel to that .us is a sleeping giant which might be rediscovered with new gTlds introduction. Only .com and .ccTlds like .us will offer well-known references to internet users among new gTlds jungle.
Proud citizens from many countries love their ccTlds. For instance, Swiss companies think about registering .ch way before .com (until they realize it’s necessary to have both). Americans are proud citizens among all (and this is legitimate if we look at the way your country is evolving and how it has brightfully managed the economical crisis compared to Europe) so it was always a mystery to me why .us are not more popular. This might change and this might be a time to buy. In worst case, I guess that buying great premium generics for a few k$ is an acceptable risk with an acceptable exit strategy.
“I was a little surprised when I saw how few .US domain sales reported even break the $25k mark.”
“The .US TLD is the most under performing ccTLD in existence…”
Hi,
I think it’s more disappointing than surprising.
Aside from .COM over-shining .US, I submit a couple of other reasons for this under performance.
Lousy Marketing = Lousy Results
Do you think NeuStar has done a good job promoting the .US extension?
I don’t.
I’ll bet the average American citizen and small company owner is clueless about the .US extension.
If NeuStar promoted .US the way the .CO folks promote their extension, results for .US might be totally different.
Restricted ccTLD
.US is a restricted ccTLD.
Why?
If Americans haven’t embraced .US for whatever reason, why not open it up to all?
I’d also bet that foreign individuals and companies would embrace .US
in a big way.
Open it up and then you’ll see the .US ccTLD take off with American individuals and companies playing catch up.
Anyway just IMHO.
Own 15 generic purchased the day .us opened – have never had an email on one. I like .us and have been surprised by it’s failure to take off. I think as other country codes become more common .us will take a stronger hold in the domain market but have been writing this sentence for the last 5 years. Looking to sell occupationaltherapist.us.
So as I was reading this blog I just registered about 20 of those suckers. Like makit4.us kittensr.us, etc. Wish me luck!
I own Tag.us and i get offers all of the time. Currently i think .US makes a better domain hack then a keyword and as we all know .com in the us is our ccTLD.
.US is a country-code TLD (ccTLD) extension. Suitable for U.S. market.This ccTLD is exclusively for US citizens, businesses, organizations and government agencies.
What do you think AutoRepair.US is worth to an end user, national chain?
Perhaps, but most likely they will go with a hand reg or .com acquisition imho.