PALM BEACH GARDENS, Fla. — ICM Registry is offering a $75 advertising credit to existing .XXX domain owners and anyone who renews or registers a domain name by Jan. 31.
The advertising credit can be used toward ads on the company’s Search.xxx site. The ads included in the credit are similar to Google's AdWords, and .XXX customers can create ads and choose keywords related to their sites.
“The Search.xxx Ad Program incentive pushes the effective cost of a .XXX domain down by $75, which is a fantastic value for our registrants with developed sites," ICM Registry CEO Stuart Lawley said. "Many registrars, who are already reporting much higher than average renewal rates, have welcomed this move as in many cases the promotional credit matches or even exceeds their retail price for a domain name.
“We are offering this limited-time credit per domain promotion because we hope that website owners will buy additional ads once they have a direct experience of the quality traffic generated from their $75 credit."
For some registrars like 101Domain.com, which charges $75 per .XXX domain name, the bottom-line cost can be brought to zero if calculating the $75 credit.
Search.xxx will introduce a "full-blown" advertising campaign in early 2013 when credits can be redeemed for ads in prime placements and featured sections of the search results, Lawley said.
Ads on Search.xxx do not displace organic search results, noted Lawley, who went on to say that developed .XXX sites that are listed in the organic index will continue to receive all of the benefits and traffic from Search.xxx at no charge.
.XXX domain names include an entitlement under a previously announced grandfathering program. If ICM Registry is successful in obtaining the rights for .Sex, .Porn and .Adult through its pending applications to ICANN in the new gTLD round, the premium names available in .xxx will entitle the registrants automatically to the matching name in the three new strings at no extra cost.