.info domains

Adam · 28 Apr 2006 at 12:52

I have plans over the summer for a project which will be funded (hopefully!) by advertising. However, the domain I was looking for is not available in my preffered TLD which would be .com or .net.

However, I have found a .info domain which has taken my fancy. Wikipedia states that these are relatively new and .info is the most popular of these newly released TLD's. If I was to use the .info, would I suffer any negative results using AdSense or from a marketing perspective?

Beansprout · 28 Apr 2006 at 13:35

In short, nope.

In long, humans might consider a .info less trustworthy as they're "slighty odd" / "less professional."

Al Vallario · 28 Apr 2006 at 16:06

Beansprout said:
In short, nope.

In long, humans might consider a .info less trustworthy as they're "slighty odd" / "less professional."

Pretty much that ^

It won't affect your advertising/marketing intiatives per se, but generally speaking .info isn't as well known as other top-level extensions. This will most probably reduce the number of type-ins you get dramatically. In addition, they are dirt-cheap which, atleast for me, devalues them.

Adam · 28 Apr 2006 at 16:31

That was my fear, unfortunatly the chance of me finding a .com or .net is quite slim and I cannot afford to buy what I need from a 3rd party.

When you say mention the .info domain being devalued, do you mean from a trust or resale value?

Al Vallario · 28 Apr 2006 at 17:14

Adam said:
When you say mention the .info domain being devalued, do you mean from a trust or resale value?

Both, in my opinion.

If I remember correctly, there was a period in late 2004 when a number of registrars were handing out up to 25 free .info domains to each customer. Even now if you search around you can find them for $4/year - about half the price of a .com/.net. I think this in part explains why there are so many .info domains registered; and also why there are a large number of "dodgy" sites (spam, turnkey etc.) using the extension. As such, I tend to find websites with .info domains untrustworthy in a similar way to .tk domains (Although on a different level).

Of course this is all my opinion, and I expect the majority of your visitors couldn't care less about the value of your domain extension

Adam · 28 Apr 2006 at 17:28

Fair points and thats how I feel as well. While I don't think they are on the level of a .tk, I do think a .net, .com or, at a push, a .co.uk would suit me better.

Sorry for the secrecy, things are still at the planning stage so I havent registered any domains yet.

Toytown · 28 Apr 2006 at 17:58

If I was to use the .info, would I suffer any negative results using AdSense or from a marketing perspective?

Probably not, but the mail server i use (just less than 2k users) bans all emails from .info and .biz domains by default for every user. May sound a bit harsh, but all users are aware of it and none of them have ever turned it off, also never ever had a user complain that he never recieved an email from [email protected]

Beansprout · 28 Apr 2006 at 18:18

Toytown said:
the mail server i use (just less than 2k users) bans all emails from .info and .biz domains by default for every user.

That's stupid. There are far better methods. </rant>

Toytown · 28 Apr 2006 at 18:56

That's stupid. There are far better methods. </rant>

Lol better methods than what? I don't think ive ever recieved any email which hasnt been spam, or something like it from a info/biz domain (on my other email accounts)

The server already filters with spamassasin, sender policy framework, domain keys, greylisting, basian filters, blackhole lists, and others features. With greylisting/blackhole lists being the best kind of defence. When 98%+ of the emails hitting the server are spam, then you use whatever means possible to stop it getting to the users.

Now if you want to post your better ways, then please do.

Beansprout · 28 Apr 2006 at 19:26

Toytown said:
Now if you want to post your better ways, then please do.

If your way is best then everyone would be using it.

There are legitimite info/biz domains and your users don't know everything. People are happy when they're ignorant, that's all.

fwiw it seems most of my spam comes from info/biz, too. But to blackhole two whole areas....reminds me of an Australian ISP who blacklisted all of China, only to forget that..er..IP allocation changes

It's certainly a novel approach and if it works for you and your users don't mind so be it; I'm not such of a pedant to burn you in flames, I'm just kinda shocked at the harshness. And really, really jealous because I can't put a similar policy in place

derfderfley · 28 Apr 2006 at 21:04

Adam said:
I have plans over the summer for a project which will be funded (hopefully!) by advertising. However, the domain I was looking for is not available in my preffered TLD which would be .com or .net.

However, I have found a .info domain which has taken my fancy. Wikipedia states that these are relatively new and .info is the most popular of these newly released TLD's. If I was to use the .info, would I suffer any negative results using AdSense or from a marketing perspective?

Why not see if the .eu is available?

Adam · 28 Apr 2006 at 22:43

I believe it may well be, although I know even less about .eu domains!

derfderfley · 29 Apr 2006 at 09:03

Adam said:
I believe it may well be, although I know even less about .eu domains!

Availabe from most of the big domain name providers, it's the new top level domain for Europe. Seems popular enough with over 1.5million domains registered in the first week that they where available (yes I do have one myself).

Eurid the .eu registry.