Agree, but it started at $0 two years ago, so there was always going to be rapid growth in sales totals etc.

On one hand I think think this forum is very new compared to acorndomains, so you wouldn't expect 10% of the members regardless of the actual market for .com.au. On the other hand the .com.au is nowhere near as domainer friendly as the .co.uk market, in terms of prices, transaction costs, ease of selling etc.

I think it will improve over time, not sure it will get to the point of being anything like .co.uk, .com etc.

It doesn't prove anything, just an explanation as to why sales venues have 1:1000 sales rates and the like, because most of the stock is worthless.

Agree.

I don't think this is true in .com.au right now.

Personally I think it will be quite a while before .com.au is completely freed up. It took AUDA 7 years to lift the selling restrictions.


I think there is loads of very usable domains available myself.

I think personally you'd probably be better off focusing on one or two names you can do something with rather registering 3d* everything and hoping for the best. Think about what you have a passion for/interest in.

I'm not sure what you're saying here? If Netfleet was doing $100 in sales a month, it would still technically be 'rapid growth', but obviously I wouldn't be bringing it up, and you would probably be using it as evidence to support your case. I think it's fair to say that 30k/month in sales in 2 years is an indication of a rapidly growing market in both relative and absolute terms.

I think this is a chicken and egg type deal. The forum is new because it couldn't have existed 2+ years ago. All other things being equal (i.e. legislation), there is no reason to asssume why the secondary market in Australia shouldn't potentially be roughly as large as the one in the UK after accounting for population differences.

Why not? Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't AUDA run in a largely democratic fashion? That is, members can vote on policy changes. Members can vote on board elections. Incidentally, anyone who's interested should have a look through the AUDA constitution at http://www.auda.org.au/about/constitution

Agreed, my point wasn't that this was currently the case in the .au market, but rather that this is a natural evolution and will come with time. In fact, it's already starting to happen now - one only needs to look at how much more competitive the dropcatching services have become over the last year.

Again, the ball is largely in our court with this one. There is no reason to wait another 7 years for the changes we want.

Usable, yes. But try finding a good generic product/service domain with a decent number of monthly exacts that's free to reg these days. You can still find them with a bit of luck and hard work, but they are getting few and far between.

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Snoopy, you fail understand is that big markets aren't always the best markets to invest in. The best markets to invest in are the growing markets and there's no question that .au (and many other ccTLDs) is just that (and .com is stagnant).

You said yourself that in .au there has been over the last few years but at the same time, don't believe that investment 3 years ago, 10 years ago or even now makes sense?

Despite so many indications to the contrary (including your own .au portfolio).

I tried to buy one of the few .au domains you'd hand registered (7 years ago wasn't it?) from you last week. You stated that you wanted 5-figures for it because it's making you so much money just parked. Was that a dud investment? What about your other .au's - any of those you'd let drop? Any you'd sell for less than $1,000?

The other thing to bear in mind in change. For any investment value to fluctuate it needs change (often more people buying or selling) and fundamental change is what can really make a difference to the investments value index.

Eg a cold winter in the US will raise the price of oil. Mad cow disease will raise the price of beef. Fear of global conflict raises the price of gold.

So what change could we conceive in the domain space.

in .au, there's plenty of possibilities to look forward to

1) increasing maturity of a very juvenile market
2) more people & businesses coming online
3) strong increase in population
4) NBN rollout
5) potential for 6-mth transfer limit to be lifted
6) transfer process to be automated so transfer fees abolished
7) removal of ABN requirement for domain regsitration
8) allowing overseas companies to easier register .au
9) reduction of registration costs
10) removal of some of auda's 'grey area policies'
11) more domainer-related investment pushing up values

Disclaimer: I'm not necessarily advocating all these policy changes!

In .com, the market it already bloated (that's why values have plummeted in the last few years). The few domainers that enter are outnumbers by the 100's of 1,000's who exit the market with their fingers burnt. com reg fees are steadily increasing. Com registration policies are as open as you can get. End-users are turning to their local ccTLD in preference to com.

Snoopy, 10 years ago, com was the place to invest., I wish I'd sunk some cash in. But by 2005/2006, that ship had sailed. It's now the turn of the ccTLDs and .au is, in my very biased opinion, one of the best to look at.

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"Growing" doesn't mean something is highlyy profitable. The .com.au market after has gone from $0 so growth was always going to be rapid. Is a lot of money being made speculating in it? I don't see it personally. The average fairly good name is worth a few hundred dollars, eg basins.com.au which sold for about $331 yesterday. If you'd registered basins.com.au 5 or 10 years ago where would you be today? You wouldn't have a very good ROI in comparison to the rest of the market, and that is for an obviously solid ecommerce term.

The actual ROI that I have experienced has been low. If I banked on .com.au 10 years ago I doubt I would be in this industry today. I'm not sure what you are getting at when you ask if I'd drop, sell for $1000 etc. I'm not saying the names are worthless. I'm saying the overall ROI has been nowhere near the rest of the market.

I'm not sure what you mean by bloated, but the .com market had a huge boom from 2002-2007, values up perhaps 10-20 fold, then it had a big bust, values down maybe 60% for the premium stuff. Then there was all the PPC revenue. It is a market that has historically had big boom and big busts, it is what it is.

Hang on, you were saying investing in .com.au 10 years ago made sense? (and have been arguing that for about 6 months) :see below:

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The question still remains, if you don't think these names are worth $0 what do you think they can actually be sold for?

All I'm saying is that I would rather invest in a growing market than a shrinking market. If you think differently, that's entirely up to you!

As for basins.com.au, it was advertised for just a few hours and sold into what I freely admit is quite a small but emerging domainer's market. 'Wholesale' if you like rather than 'retail'. Sell it in a structured 7-day auction and you'd get double I'd suggest. Contact end users and you're looking 4-figs plus.

Also basins.com.au, I would bet was available to register 5 years ago. I remember in 2005, those were the sorts of names that were about.

So if you regged it back then, paid your reg fees ($80), earnt a bit through parking (say $25), it's cost you $55. Then you sell it for $331 (daily auction) or $600 (7-day auction) or $1,000 (end-user auction). Even at the worst case scenario your retun over those 5 years is 600%

And that's you're cherry-picked example of how bad an investment .au can be... lol
2001- 2005 com investment showed better ROI than .au
2005 - 2010+ .au investment showed better ROI than .com

2001 - 2010 .au showed a great ROI (as evidenced by your own hand-reg domains that are now worth $10K)

Yes and I still believe that. What makes you think I've changed my mind?

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CocktailRecipes.com.au ★ Photographers.com.au ★ DebitCard.com.au ★ Hockey.com.au ★ Boxing.com.au ★ DomainName.com.au

I really hate to come between you two ....... however .......... question, are either of you relying on the income from domaining as your sole source of income?

Just as an observation - domaining in Australia seems to be very cliquey, like an old school tie club. Is that because of the small number of domainers or is it because of the domainant () influence of a small number on others? I've only been at it 4 months or so and feel like I know everyone. Speaking of everyone - if there are only about 3-400 active domainers in Australia as per a number suggested earlier in this thread then EVERY one of them has viewed aud.com.au at netfleet - or a few are going back often, lol - 386 views as we speak. I could probably figure it out if I bothered to read all the info but I am bewildered as to how the quality ranking works - obviously numerals earn negative demerit points (cannot be negative demerit otherwise it would be merit).

That aside the most interesting comment so far was that made in the last post above - there was actually mention of ........................ wait for it ............ "end user" - I had to look it up in wiki to refresh myself as to what that elusive creature was.

Slowly but surely, very slowly but certainly very surely I am learning about what this business isn't - there I've said it. I will play some elevator music whilst you absorb and reflect on my philosophical wit. How does the subject of accounting and enormous %age profits gain a mention on the same page as domaining (by the way, the %age profits previously mentioned are not profits but moreover a markup factor - profit is different ) Where do these rather timid creatures with deep pockets have their habitat.

It is painfully obvious that selling a .com.au domain for any semblance of the term profitable gain is about the same as finding a gold nugget whilst holidaying in Ballarat - same odds.

Problem is one cannot even have a fire sale because the only lookers and hence only potential buyers are also trying to offload. If you do know of one of these elusive speculators / investors with real money who would like to make a significantly undervalued offer for a portfolio then send him my way, I will roll out the red carpet and revel in the miniscule penny ante offerings for my blood, sweat and frayed nerve endings.



So, when do you think the .au bubble will burst?

In all that has been said about the stagnancy of dotcom, the boom and bust, the imminent end of its usefulness as a means for making money there seems to be a few considerations missing. The world itself goes through boom and bust cycles, particularly the economic aspect of our society and as much as many are appalled by it the fact is that the world revolves around money. Remember the HiTech internet market collapse - wish I had shares in some of those companies that busted then boomed - oh yes, the GFC - it actually started about 4 years ago but like a pot of water it took a while to get to boiling point, currently it is simmering, not all that far from the boil (the still very fragile US economy being the fuel that could turn up the heat). Oh, and the population is growing - more people. Oh and small business growth is very strong. And many having been thrown on the heap after many years of hard work, dedication and loyalty are starting their own small businesses, many from home. Statistics show where the growth in numbers are - in a year from now there will be more businesses operating globally than the expected number according to normal forecast formulae.

Dotcom is far from finished, it has been having a rest (the rest it had to have) and whilst the world economy, and indeed social structure of many countries, went through a necessary adjustment so did dotcom.

I for one will offload what I can of my .au domains and continue to invest in .com - if .com does happen to fall over at least I will know I had my money on the form horse in the race.

cheers and thanks for listening, you have been a wonderful audience (I would finish with a smiley however I have expended my allowance)

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We're 6 years behind the UK.

Thats a long wait but Aust is slowly slowly at a snails pace getting there.

Yes its paper shuffling at the moment and will be for the next 24 mths is my guess until competition in selling platforms hits in a big way.

You don't think the Yanks are looking at this forum?

I haven't seen one deal in Oz yet that resembles the UK market back in 2004.

In terms of Boom try and find a story on a comapny called Boo back in 2001.

That was a boom bust alright.

Hey Billy,
What do you mean by this, are you saying 10x prices, 5 x prices ?

Don

.AU names have not yet realised anywhere near their
intrinsic potential yet.

People are selling keyword .au names for less than what simiiar ccTLD's or gTLD's would sell elsewhere.

Aussie Domainers (and I use the term loosely as I consider most .au domain owners as only hobby investors, not TRUE domainers) should spend more time talking UP the .au marketplace. Not talking it DOWN.

Biggest mis-conception Aussie Name owners still have is that a .com.au site is only usable locally.
BS!

I get more traffic to a couple of my sites from Canada and Indian sub-continent than Aussie traffic.

It all depends on the content, SEO and Development not pointlessly hoping for "TYPE-in TRAFFIC to park sites". Aren't going to happen !


Get out there and start promoting & developing your .au names and it will benefit all of us when the names & sites have escalated in value.

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