.MOBI Less Than Solid Sales
*Monte Cahn clarifies some of the details related to the .mobi TRAFFIC sales issue that’s just popped up.
http://www.domainstate.com/showthread.php3?s=&threadid=83941&pagenumber=3
The original issue: Adam Strong writes that a .mobi buyer from the last TRAFFIC auction is putting their .mobi’s up for sale only shortly after buying them.
http://www.domainnamenews.com/domain-aftermarket/mobi-buyers-remorse/1300
Regular readers of my blog know how I feel about .mobi and other new extensions like it. For the benefit of newcomers my advice is: “Buy .com names, really really good .nets and orgs or the CCtld of the country you live in (like).. Avoid all others.”
Related:
Josh writes: “Taxi.mobi reportedly sells for $75,000. Taxi.mobi is a good domain name, imo. So is Taxi.com. I could see cell phone users typing in Taxi.mobi, if the site was built right and promoted well.”
http://domainnamewire.com/2007/11/07/taximobi-lights-up-domain-auction-at-75000/
***FS*** I am suspect about these .mobi sales.. always big numbers.. always round numbers… often the same (associated) sellers. There could be affiliate credits, rebates, bonuses involved.. (11/11/2007: monte comments on this rumor) I have never seen a namespace with so many smart people saying “it’s not the kind of space a domain investor wants to invest in”, where big dollar sales still happen so consistently. JMO
Without clarification of which four names have not resold, it is a bit difficult to know whether this is good or bad. The top four names make up the nearly all of the value. Just confirmation that the top two had resold, would be sufficient information.
Totally agree about .mobi not being a good investment.
If the purpose of these domains is to create a clone of your site that is built for the smaller mobile phones, it is flawed out of the gate. People don’t want a “mobile internet.” They want to be able to see the internet that they are used to on their phones.
I don’t see the entire internet changing to support mobile users…I see phone manufactures changing their phones to support the internet as we know it.
Frank,
According to Moniker CEO, those 6 Premium .mobi domains abandoned by that one investor have been quickly bought up by other domain investors.
If .mobi is so terrible Frank, why is ESPN marketing ESPN.mobi?
Why is the largest U.S. bank, Bank of America advertising BOFA.mobi?
Why is Disney advertising their High School Musical brand around the world using HSM2.mobi?
Why is Skype & Three marketing 3Skype.mobi?
Why is Ford marketing .mobi?
Why are thousands and thousands of BIG and small brands launching and marketing dotMobi sites?
Why did the founders of .mobi hire the Edelman Agency, the most prestigious Madison-Avenue Advertising Agency in the world to advance the dotMobi namespace? (BTW- their clients include UPS, Microsoft, GE, Samsung, MySpace, and many others)
Why have we seen several $xx,xxx and $xxx,xxx dotMobi sales occur within the last year.
DotMobi is only 14 months old.
How old is .com, .net, .org?? 15-20 years old!
Why is Google promoting .mobi on Google.com?
http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=72462
dotcom is king, BUT dotMobi is increasingly becoming the most successful, accomplished extension to emerge since dotcom
With Respect,
-Anthony
[…] in both, it is your DUTY to question what is going on. Frank rightfully stated few days ago he questions the validity of .Mobi sales. Yesterday Jay at DomainTools Blog also raises some important questions. Larry Fischer states they […]
[…] in both, it is your DUTY to question what is going on. Frank rightfully stated few days ago he questions the validity of .Mobi sales. Yesterday Jay at DomainTools Blog also raises some important questions ,and word is Greg M. of […]
[…] I just spent the last half hour of my life reading Frank’s, Jay’s, Rick’s and Sahar’s blogs along with posts on a couple of forums about […]
I posted about this on Rick Schwartz’s blog. But to sum it up: Why do I need a .mobi when websites already recognize I am on a mobile phone web browser?
I am not saying .mobi has 0 chance of succeeding. However, big companies are going to need to start dropping countless millions on promoting the .mobi versions of their own sites. That is the only way the extension will begin to register in the “public conscious.”
May be Anthony is right, but the money will need to continue being spent with very high visibility for months and years to come.
Right now its likely nothing more than a “test” play. I could run off a list of all the gigantic Fortune 500’s which invested money in a Second Life presence..