Initially meant for websites featuring adult content, the online answer to the red-light district has boomed recently with 55,367 .xxx domains selling in the first hour of their release.
So who’s buying them?
You might think that it’s adult websites, seizing an opportunity to secure their own domain suffix for the first time. But this isn’t entirely the case. Besides the huge money-making adult sites, a lot of smaller sites depend both on search engine searches and browsers finding them accidentally – mimicking well-known brand names and using popular terms as their URLs to encourage visitors.
In reality, it’s other, much better-known businesses and institutions that are buying up these .xxx domains, for very different reasons.
Companies fearing PR disasters are purchasing the .xxx version of their brand URL, in order to prevent association with these pages, in case they are bought up by unscrupulous competitors or spammers who fill them with derogatory and/or adult content. Not only would this be a disaster for the companies brand image, it could also mean some serious SEO problems if and when these pages started to rank in Google.
Major universities and companies, including Coca-Cola and the University of Kansas are just some of the institutions that have purchased the .xxx version of their URL. Interestingly, these triple X domains are much more costly than regular .co.uk or .com URLs, with the University of Kansas reportedly paying $3,000 for a number of .xxx domains associated with the name of the university.
So, companies are prepared to pay big bucks for these URLs – but then what? The irony here is that these triple X domains will never even be used by these businesses, since they are purchased purely as a defence mechanism to safeguard them from internet pranksters.
So when you purchase a domain name, whereas before your goal would have been to secure branded web space, the introduction of these new domains has meant that the point of purchase is led by a focus on safeguarding your brand from others using the name in a derogatory manner.
So who’s winning here? It’s not the adult websites – as if they do decide to buy an .xxx domain they’ll be charged over and above what they would be for more traditional URLs. It’s also certainly not the companies and institutions that are paying astronomical sums of money to buy web space that will never even go live.
So is there a winner? Or are these domains inherently a failure?
There is a winner here, and it’s the domain registry websites. Registration sites such as 123-reg are cashing in on these triple X URLs and charging users £79.99 per year to host on them.
Other than creating an interesting argument around safeguarding brands in the public sphere, we believe that all the new .xxx domains have done is to create an upside-down approach – turning tradition on its head. As far as we can see, these URLs serve only to line the pockets of those selling these domains, while creating another challenge for companies who work hard all year to safeguard their brand identity – and charging them extra for the privilege.
