In a recent post, XYZ Registry CEO and founder, Daniel Negari, gloated over the company’s growth in 2016.
Negari stated that .XYZ registrations outsold those of .COM by “over 1 million in June.”
That number might be true: more than 3 million .XYZ domains were registered in June, 2016, when an ongoing “penny” promotion allowed anyone to register .XYZ domains for $0.01.
According to stats from ntldstats, .XYZ had 2,920,917 domains on May 30th, the eve of the massively discounted promotion. On June 2nd, there were 6,091,042 .XYZ domains – a delta of 3,170,125.
The promotion continued through the month of June from various registrars, at lesser discounts, ranging from a couple of dimes to a dollar, increasing the total number of .XYZ domains to almost 6.5 million by the end of June 2016.
Effectively, .XYZ more than doubled its registration numbers at a loss, through the penny promo. Negari stated that the registry incurred a loss of “7 figures in ICANN fees.”
Domain analyst, John McCormac, operates Hosterstats. In a recent comment to DomainGang, John stated:
“Renewal rates on freebies tends to be in the region of 5%. Sometimes it can be slightly higher on Western registrars but most of these freebies and discounted registrations will not renew. I’ve already run the historical data and am testing a renewal prediction model on some gTLDs.”
If the 5% rate holds for the $0.01 .XYZ registrations, the Registry is looking to retain 158,506 domains and lose more than 3 million domains at anniversary time, June 2017.
Renewal fees for those retained domains just might equalize the 7 figure loss in ICANN fees, thus matching the June 2016 promotion costs.
Brilliant or dumb?
“Brilliant or dumb?”
Disaster!!!
Yup, agree with Konstantinos, I don’t think the these penny promotions are helping new domain extensions much.
Companies can lose in the beginning, part of marketing, then profit im the end.
A company can lose in the befining, part of marketing, then profit in the end.
My Butler says …..Dumb
Total disaster. Even the employees see the writing on the wall, which is why the majority of them have quit over the past year.