Data issued by DNJournal, Domain-Spiegel.de and Sedo.com indicates that the rebound from the dot-com crash in the 1990s is in full swing and is showing record sales for the Internet's most valued commodity: secondary domains.
Attributing growth to the increased availability of new domain suffixes, like .us, .biz and .info, DNJournal reported that more than 1,400 domain name transactions occurred last year, whereas only 500 transactions were reported in 2003 and even fewer the year before, suggesting a severe drop-off from the more commerce-crazed years of the Internet boom.
"Though we'll likely never see the sale prices of 1999 when domains like business.com fetched $7.5 million, valuations for key domains have definitely begun to elevate to demonstrate their importance to business and organizations all over the world," Daniel Dingeldey, of Domain-Spiegel.de, told the Commerce Times.
Sales for suffixes like .info, one of the more popular and recently added extensions, increased from 27 reported sales and a total volume of $68,571 in 2003, to 149 reported sales and a total volume of $367,045 in 2004, Domain-Spiegel.de, a Germany-based publication, reports.
Showing weaker growth but steady activity, three .biz sales were reported in 2003, compared to 45 reported sales in 2004, and the .us suffix increased from 22 reported sales in 2003, to 60 reported sales in 2004.
According to Matt Bentley, CEO of Sedo.com, an estimated 67 million new domain names are being registered worldwide and website owners are renewing their domains in record numbers.
"More people are putting their websites to good use," Bentley told the eCommerce Times. "Though we'll likely never see the sale prices of 1999, when domains like business.com fetched $7.5 million, valuations for key domains have definitely begun to elevate to demonstrate their importance to business and organizations all over the world."
Bentley credits steady Internet sales traffic as the driving force behind the sales rush of domain names. He also credits more sophisticated tracking systems so that web owners can pinpoint their exact consumer base and search engine optimization techniques.
"Highly targeted traffic based on keyword marketing is making a ton of money," Bentley said. "As a result, domain names are now worth more money to sellers."
As for another dot-com crash, Bentley and other analysts think it is highly unlikely since the Internet is more firmly routed in traditional business models.
"The strength of our industry is the leading indicator of how e-commerce is growing. When the crash hit previously, domain name sales were the first part of the industry to suffer," Bentley told the eCommerce Times.
