Domain Name Trends to Look Out For

New kinds of domains have started to emerge and as a business owner you should be able to adapt to stay relevant. Explore domain trends that you should look out for.

Your domain name is a critical part of your overall brand and most potential customers who are engaging with your business will consider your domain name as your brand name itself.

Hence, choosing a domain name that is memorable, catchy, and captures the essence of your brand is extremely important if you want customers to find you easily and remember you whenever they want to do business or buy what you’re selling.

However, the digital landscape and the internet itself are always evolving and business owners need to be able to adapt continuously to stay relevant and stand out to their target audience. Domain names too have not been left out.

With new technology like voice search and the blockchain, we are seeing webmasters starting to register new kinds of domain names and you should know them too whether you are a business owner or domain reseller. So let’s explore some domain name trends to look out for over the next decade!

The growing secondary market

The first and one of the most important trends that is definitely here to stay is the growing secondary domain market. We predict that preowned domains and expired domain sales will equal the number of new domain registrations. It’s only a matter of when.

The market for new domain name registrations has in some ways, flat-lined. In simpler words, most if not all domain names that are simple, short, and comprised of one or two actual dictionary words are already registered.

If you’re looking to buy a domain name that checks these boxes and is keyword-rich, you’ll have to buy one from a reseller or an expired domain. The point is that high-value domains that are available are very likely to have been used in the past.

But that’s not a bad thing. In fact, a domain that has been used in the past and has a good rep with search engines is far more valuable than a brand-new domain. Domain buyers realized this, and domain resellers appeared out of the void to meet that demand.

As a buyer, you’ll be looking to snag domains that have built a great rep with search engines, have high domain authority, have powered high-performing websites in the past, and the holy grail of domains – are currently generating traffic. As a domain reseller, you’ll be looking out for these qualities so you can build a high-value portfolio of domains that’ll always be in demand.

This trend will likely continue to grow and we don’t see it slowing down anytime soon. Preowned domain names are being sold on domain auction sites, and dedicated preowned domain lists like our platform, and buyers and sellers are also exchanging domains directly facilitated by escrow services.

Blockchain Domains

A new type of domain has been born – blockchain domains! Blockchain domains are hosted on a core blockchain network and unlike regular domains linked to IP addresses of websites, a blockchain domain can represent a wallet address, give access to blockchain apps, or also be tied to blockchain websites.

Cryptocurrencies, the Metaverse, and other concepts powered by blockchain technology are quite complex. These systems use cryptography to ensure security and uniqueness.

Addresses of cryptocurrency wallets and access keys to blockchain apps are complex and nearly impossible to memorize. A crypto wallet address contains a cryptographic sequence of alphanumeric elements – up to 42 for Ethereum addresses.

Blockchain domains provide an easy way to send money to crypto addresses, link to blockchain websites, and access blockchain-based apps by representing these complex cryptographic identifiers with much shorter, human-readable names that are far easier to remember and use.

Blockchain domains are also going to be truly owned by the registrant and once you make a one-time payment, you own them for life unless you transfer them out. This is one of the factors that makes them so appealing – regular domains are owned by the registry and you need to renew them… if you don’t renew them, they expire.

Also, you have full control over a blockchain domain – there’s no central authority or governing body like the ICANN with regular domains that determine how to use your domain.

Blockchain domains are also hosted across a network of nodes that power the blockchain so no governing body can restrict or block your access to the domain and you can use it for whatever you want to.

Emerging TLDs

Let’s face it – the .com domain extension or top-level domain is king. It is so widely accepted around the world that it will be a long time before any kind of TLD surpasses it.

However, recently new top-level domains and domain extensions have been emerging. Some popular ones include:

First, like from the previous point, blockchain domains! Blockchain domains feature unique TLDs and these will depend on the platform where the domain is hosted. Some popular blockchain TLDs include .bitcoin, .coin, .eth, .blockchain, .crypto, .dao, .nft, .wallet, .888, and several others. Some web browsers like Opera and Brave already support some of the blockchain TLDs.

Another popular pair of emerging TLDs are the .ai and .io TLDs. Initially, the .io TLD was intended for the British Indian Ocean area but in recent times, has become adopted by technological startups and tech companies. .ai domain extensions too have been on the rise, thanks to the rise of Artificial Intelligence (AI).

Domain name extensions that tell users what a business or website is about, or the industry it’s in have also been on the rise. For example, .blog, .tech, .developer, .design, .writer, etc. These generic top-level domains are making it easier for webmasters to find domain names that closely match what they want if the .com or .net domains are already taken.

Many online businesses are also now using country code top-level domains (ccTLDs) to better target local audiences. If you run a business catering to a particular region or area, a ccTLD can do you a whole lot of good and will be more trusted than a generic overarching TLD.

Voice-optimized domains

The age of voice search is close, thanks to Artificial Intelligence. We already have a good glimpse of what using voice for search will be like thanks to assistants like Alexa (from Amazon), Google Assistant, and Apple’s Siri.

The convenience of speaking into our phones and PCs rather than typing long queries is going to mean these searches will be more natural and conversational. Website owners and content creators will have to adapt and target more conversational, long-tail keywords in their content.

Domain name choices are beginning to change too. Today, exact-match domains don’t really boost SEO, but in the age of voice search, they’ll likely regain prominence. When a domain name is an exact match or is included in a voice query, it will have a higher chance of ranking well in voice search results.

It’s likely that a domain name closely matching a user’s voice query will indicate to voice engines that it is highly relevant to the query. The more specific a domain name is, the more likely the content it is linked to is also specific to that industry. With these new domain names, users will find more accurate results that answer the questions they are asking or provide the information they need.

Brandable domain names

A brandable domain name is a unique domain name that doesn’t necessarily describe what a business does but is associated with a particular brand or business. A brandable may or may not contain keywords that are relevant to your business or industry and your potential customers will need some more awareness to know what you ae about.

Think of it this way – with a brandable domain name, anyone who hears it pronounced will immediately think about your brand or business and not just your general industry.

Google (Google.com) is the most popular search engine in the world. The word ‘Google’ is not an actual word, but was made up to relate to something about indexing large amounts of data. Initially, they went with “googolplex,” then later “googol” and mistakenly typed “Google” when searching for the domain’s availability and stuck with this.

The word ‘Google’ at first glance, doesn’t suggest anything related to making searches or queries on the web. Domains like ‘Google.com’ are brandable domain names and are just used to refer to a particular brand or business and don’t necessarily describe what a business does or its core purpose.

A brandable domain name gives you a unique identifier to build your brand into.

Brandable domains are becoming incredibly popular especially since most keyword domains are already taken. With a brandable domain, you can get as creative as possible and there is almost an infinite number of brandable domains you can have compared to the limited keyword-rich domains.

A brandable domain helps you stand out and allows you to scale your business in the future to include new products or services without compromising or confusing potential customers. They are also less competitive and can turn into a household name.

If new domain name registrations will continue to surge, they will likely be from brandable domains.

On ExpiredDomains, we rank preowned domains according to our patented brandability score which gives you a good idea of how brandable a domain name is.

Domain privacy is becoming more prevalent

When registering a new domain name or buying a preowned domain, you will need to submit your personal details – name, address, phone number, email, etc. as required by the ICANN’s WHOIS policy. This ensures that owners of illegal websites can be traced.

The registrant data is also publicly available and anyone can run a WHOIS lookup on your domain to find your personal details. This is a double-edged sword as your data is exposed to bad actors.

Enter domain privacy – a service provided by most domain registrars where your personal details are replaced with proxy details that belong to the registrar itself so you are shielded. When you run a WHOIS lookup on a domain with domain privacy enabled, you’ll see these proxy details.

Many registrars offer domain privacy for free, but some premium packages will require you to pay a little extra fee to have it enabled on your domain.

Cybercrimes are on the rise as bad actors become more tactical, but on the bright side, more webmasters are becoming more aware too, and are employing domain privacy on their domains. In the near future, there’ll probably be no domain that doesn’t have domain privacy installed.

The only time you would need to disable your domain privacy is when you are transferring the domain out to a new registrar or transferring your domain to a new registrant.

Rounding Up

Domain names are essential for any individual or business that wants to have an online presence – and you definitely should if you want to reach as many customers as possible.

However, as new technologies emerge, the internet landscape as a whole is changing and domain name choices are also evolving to flow with the changes.

The secondary domain market is growing rapidly, blockchain domains are emerging and revolutionizing domain ownership and control, and new TLDs are being used for better marketing effectiveness. Voice search is also demanding exact match domains, brandable domains are on the rise, and domain privacy is now a must for every domain owner.

As a website owner or domain reseller, it is important that you monitor these domain trends and let them guide your domain choices when these emerging technologies become mainstream!