The .co TLD land rush starts next Monday (June 14th). Godaddy is charging $299 to reserve your domain early (you will be refunded minus 10$ if they cant get the domain for you).
Anyway heads up if you wanted to get in on the .co TLD. Does anyone really care?
Here is a list of words I could come up with that end in co sorted by size.
arco
coco
deco
fico
loco
poco
taco
unco
banco
bunco
chico
cisco
disco
guaco
junco
narco
pisco
secco
wilco
alnico
bronco
calico
fiasco
fresco
macaco
medico
rococo
stucco
turaco
zydeco
guanaco
morocco
pachuco
portico
sirocco
tobacco
touraco
alfresco
atamasco
barbasco
barranco
chubasco
classico
flamenco
locofoco
politico
scirocco
magnifico
simpatico
fantastico
nontobacco
antitobacco
About the author...
Jeremy Schoemaker – who has written 2473 posts on ShoeMoney.com.
Hi I am Jeremy Schoemaker and ShoeMoney.com is my blog. 99% of the post here are done by me but you will see others occasionally make guest posts. This blog is fun to write but for my day job I run several online companies.
Images provided by bigstock
What Internet Marketers Can learn From Harry Potter 
9 Random Tips On Being A Successful Online Marketer 
Should I sell my website? 
{ 76 comments… read them below or add one }
Isn’t the real value in the domain creating “misspelling” landing pages that generate adrevenue, i.e. google.co or yahoo.co? This is much like Kevin Ham’s .co domain campaign that made him $300 million in ad revenue.
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/business2/business2_archive/2007/06/01/100050989/index.htm
$299 is a ridiculous price!!
Try here – http://bit.ly/bx4dzR – to register for around $40.00
I see huge opportunities in the .co domains – especially after reading the Kevin Ham story.
Nice, I wonder how it would rank comparing to .com
Also, what does it stand for (COmmercial?)
No, it stands for Colombia (latin america country).
What do you think about them? Would it be worth it to go crazy on these?
Are you planning on trying to get any of those you listed or were you just coming up with names? And do you plan on reserving any .co names ?
It is really a waste of money registering .co
Good times. I got the ones that matter to me
-JT
I wanted dis.co but it was taken.
for me its not really something im gonna get pumped out to but for most domainers out there, im sure theyre gonna get as much as they can
The amount of money being spent in the .co rush right now is insane, you would think that the internet button had been pressed and restarted. I will aquire what few are left after the rush and attempt to monetize. Great post jeremy
So, priority is next week and for public release is next month?
Sounds like a bunch of BS and hype just like the whole .me thing.
IMHO, .me is waste of time. But .co for me is a better domain extension not because the miss spelling traffic or the domains “hack” that we can make but is “another” opportunity to get a domain name that you really want that is not available on .com,.net,.org,.info…
I wonder how people will react to .co vs. .com’s
I just met a guy that was really into domaining, specifically .tv. I really thought that this was sort of falling by the wayside, but apparently not. This is an awesome list, BTW!
meh…..
Huh. Is this about typo traffic?
I had to look this up because I had no idea either. This is what I learned from Domain Name Wire….
“.co is nearly universally recognized. After surveying thousands of consumers and interviewing 600 of them, the company found that 75% of them equated .co with “company”, “corporation,” or “commerce”. It is a popular abbreviation in the United States, but also abroad. In fact, over 20 countries use .co as a second level domain name (i.e. co.uk, co.jp) because of this.”
This used to be reserved for Columbia.
So has anyone pulled out their credit card? I regret not buying up domain names years ago, but am reluctant to go shopping again. Most of my purchases never amounted to anything. Tho .co sounds good. Hmmm….
I just checked pepsi.co LOL! Taken! Bien sur!
Are people going nuts with this? I just tried a bunch of word combos, and there aren’t many available! First come, first serve!
They represent websites from the country of Columbia. Though they are being marketed as the next coming of you know who. Where have we heard this before?
I just called GoDaddy. The call volume is starting to increase.
If you buy today, you’ll pay $299. If you wait, you could get it for far less. Shoemoney does not seem too into it, based on his comment, but I think I may invest. .co is so close to .com. It seems like something to consider.
Well… Let’s think about this. 800oilspill.com is up for auction at $10,000. notepad.com is on sale for $350,000. runningshoes.tv is up for sale for $5,000.
There are still one word domains available at .co
Silly little sheep. Squandering away your precious dollars. Dumb move, in my opinion.
It would be interesting to see how .co and .com would be in a year or two. Thanks for the heads up! Do you have one yet?
I spent a lot of $$$ doing this in 2008. I have sold a few domain names for up to $1,000, but it still has not paid off for me. I am with Shoemoney. No Thanks.
TLD = Top Level Domains, in case anyone was wondering. LOL! I had forgotten too. Had to think about that one.
I used to like this kind of clever domain naming, but now I’m really happy I didn’t shell out a few thousand for one.
It looks cool when written, but most of the times it confuses a lot of users. Especially nowadays, when everyone is moving to video- and audio- casting.
Take for example, Tobac.co. It looks great on paper and in the address bar. But just try and tell someone this domain name and you’ll find it’s quite hard (even annoying).
You will most definitely find yourself in a situation where you say something like: “Tobac dot co… Get it?… No, not Toback, Tobac with a “C”! NO, not dot com, dot co!”, which is really not cool
.
The only way for people to appreciate your fancy new domain name is by having it in every email and link you post, BUT even that is hard to do nowadays because everyone links using keywords like “check it out”, “Tobacco company”, etc.
And of course, the TLD has no influence whatsoever over your SE rankings. Not worth buying, IMO.
Jake, I was thinking exactly the same. And you explained it very well too ! Thumbs up !
Agreed. That’s pretty much way I haven’t bought into this fad. It may look good, but I guarantee you the people the .co owners give their addresses to will remember .com addresses over theirs any day.
So I take it that the difference between “Priority Pre-Registration (Landrush)” and “Standard Pre-Registration (General Availability)” means that if I apply for a domain name the “standard” way, somebody who’s willing to shell out $300 bones can snatch it away from me? Boo.
BTW, did anybody ever consider that maybe shoe’s bluffing about how unimportant he may think this is?
Yup. That’s why a lot of experienced shoppers wait until this phase is over. They go in for the leftovers or wait for the auctions. Or so it seems.
Good call on the bluff! I never thought of that! I kind of like to think that Shoe is pretty obvious with what he likes and doesn’t like.
I think he thinks it’s a dumb idea.
THere are a limited number of places that are selling the .co’s. I suggest shopping around. GoDaddy is expensive. Try OpenSRS and eNom for better deals.
I’m surprised there’s not more debate on the topic. The .com rush was highly lucrative for a lot of people, and continues to be so. I do think that the .co buying opportunity holds tremendous potential. I can’t claim to be an expert, but a $29.99 investment could pay off, especially in a situation where a TLD owner holds the .com, .org, .net, and wants to hold onto everything associated with that TLD. So you buy, and they may want to buy back from you.
or sue the shit out of you. With my luck, it would be the latter.
This is a goldmine for the .co registrars. Think about it: thousands of people will register for the .co’s. They may or may not get the .co that they attempted to register.
It works like this: If no one else bids on the .co, it’s yours. If someone else bids on the .co, neither of you get it, you get your money back and the .co goes to auction. In the meantime, GoDaddy or one of the other registrars will have the opportunity to hold your money for a month. The registers get the chance to hold and invest your money and the collect your application fee in the meantime.
There are many .co registers that probably do not share information. So you may buy the .co at GoDaddy, while someone else is trying to buy the .co at eNom. I would bet that the registers don’t share information. So it seems to me that chances are slim that you will action end up with a decent .co, but it does seem inevitable that the .co registers will make a lot of cash off of you.
That is what I call it “domain name registrar business”. That is how they make extra millions of dollars, that happened with .me and will happen with future new domain name extensions.
Hello,
I wish I had seen your posting before March 19th, 2010. I pre-registered about 20+ .co domain names, only to be told a few days ago that the registry was holding back many if not most of the names I had pre-registered, one word names, not trademarkable, but highly desirable… and I could not get my application fee back. SO… a few names, yes, were pre-registered in Columbia… I understood that that could happen, but, to hear that the registry, “.co internet s.a.s” could actually hold back names themselves, to sell later but still collect pre-registration application fees in the .co Landrush AND keep those fees after denying applications.. to me that feels incredibly unethical and dishonest. Is there any recourse? Please, let me know… I want to do something about it… It’s like saying, compete in my contest. There will be many applicants but you all have a chance, and then, later, I will walk away with the hundreds of thousands of application fees and I will KEEP my domain names for later… Grr-rrr! Anything I can do about this? I was told by godaddy.com that “an error had been made in my purchase and that I needed to contact them to re-register the names.”
Ooh,
Thanks, Ruby.
Hey thanks for sharing your insights. I decided not to pull out the credit card for this one. Just seems like more hype than anything.
Domain Hacks!
Proceed with Caution
Could be worth a few long tails. I am not sure what this would do to search. Wouldn’t you have to brand the .co to rank here in the US? I have no experience with domain names, but I would suspect that this might work better if you work with words that may actually be of use in Columbia. Is this what you’re suggesting Shoemoney?
Hey thanks for the heads up!
Why didn’t some of the big brands register their .co’s? I typed in Chrysler.co and it showed up as available. I’m confused.
Didn’t everyone get super excited about .mobi? That never went anywhere. I think I’ll wait until after the landrush to investigate the leftovers.
Don’t you mean $29.99?
You get priority for $299. YOu can buy for $29.99, but your application will be trumped by anyone who comes along and bids more.
i think for now .co only worth for one word
yeah, i wouldn’t waste money on these. I got some cool .me that did absolutely nothing. Just a waste of time and cash.
Remember that the person at the .co registration center is acting as a sales / customer service rep. They know the art of the up sell.
I think i will leave this landrush to the big boys.
.CO is the best type-in domain extension typo there will be.
Just do a search on compete.com for google.cm, google.co, google.om
You will see that .CO is the most mis-typed extension of .com.
That’s the simple fact behind why it is so popular.
In theory those domains would be great, except that most of those with type-in typo traffic are trademarked.
Here is the reason you won’t make real money without spending some serious cash in the .CO rush:
1. Any domains of real value are held by the .CO registrar to be auctioned.
2. Domainers with long term expertise own trademarks in other countries where it’s much easier and cheaper to get than the US. Then use these Trademarks to pre-register lots of domains.
(there is even a clause with the .CO register where if two trademarks are attempted to be registered then the domain will go to auction between the trademark holders)
3. The insane prices of the Land Rush make it impossible to register a decent domain and make money with PPC from the typo traffic.
Don’t get me wrong, there is money to be made everywhere but these domain launches are so greedy and so hyped up that the average person gets taken.
Just my two cents.
Finally some insight! I have been combing the internet for some expertise on domaining. I am getting mixed messages. But this comment, along with a few other comments, provided some insight. I spent about $2000 on .co’s in the past few days. I hope I didn’t get taken…. but I’m thinking that I’m destined to lose this game. It’s actually kind of shady when you think about it.
History repeats itself. Check out Shoemoney’s post on .me. Be sure to browse the comments.
http://www.shoemoney.com/2008/07/17/the-me-registration-not-going-so-well/#comments
I also recommend checking out
http://www.searchengineoptimizationjournal.com/2008/07/17/godaddy-failed-me/
What do you think about them? Would it be worth it to go crazy on these?
The domain squatters will rake in the moolah with .co …I think I should go in for a few obvious ones that will sell…
Nice comments folks.
i see many people compare .me with .co
.me in my view,always placed after .com, .net, .org, .info etc.
it looks like the cointernet should be able to bring .co perhaps after the .com very soon. It looks like .co will work lot better than .me, .mobi and .tv imho….
I can see already we can register .CO for $29 and $299. Public release is 17th July. Then waht is landrush all about?
There IS a little extra value from .co but not much. It’s an out of the box typo for every .com site out there. I think this is one you have to pick up because there may also be some web “bugs” that choke on shoemoney.com vs shoemoney.co from a pure code perspective. Otherwise it’s of little value since they didn’t require proof of being a company in order to get one.
While a few people might make a couple bucks flipping names early on, I suspect this extension will be dead in a few years. Spend your time elsewhere!
More importantly you need to consider what makes your land investment so potentially profitable. Are you simply buying a cheap piece of land and hoping it will increase in value or have you done your homework? If you are investing in an area that has reason to increase in value fast then this is the true investment that brings big returns.
Nice Shoe. I wonder how will it rank though.But thanks for observations you post and now I am thinking of checking it out myself too.
fantastic,,, l will learn.
It’s good to get a .co domain that is the same with your .com. If it’s a generic .com domain name that you have then there’s a potential that the .co domain may increase your traffic because of typos. just be sure to redirect it properly.
I still think .tel is going to make a big hit soon. The first year has been hard as this domain is radical, but I do feel when people see the scope for back linking and jacking up in search “teljacking” then things will move up. This is afterall the only domain with no host cost with all data held in the DNS.
See, you can not do this another way!
Ya know, I’ve read way too many of these comment sections where “hurt” people (no one made you register .mobi) vent their past frustrations and simply imply that no other extension other than .com has merit.
.co can be taken exactly as it is: a nice looking extension that is a cctld and will probably do well in terms of sitting just behind .de and .co.uk for country extension popularity and usability.
THERE IS NO COMPETITION WITH .COM! Why not then compare .ca or .in with .com? No chance. It’s like comparing a mansion with a condo…a totally different league. But that doesn’t mean the condo isn’t nice or has some value or that the minor leagues in baseball don’t have a right to exist …of course they do. Of course everything in the beginning is a lot of hype because that’s what most advertising is! If you approach the .co soberly you’ll see it is just a nice extension that is nice to pronounce and people will want it in moderate quantities in terms of nice keywords, brands and so forth. Plus you really can’t compare this launch with .mobi or .tel because .co is a cctld and will have great relevance in Colombia given it’s shortness. There are 50 million people in Colombia with ever increasing Internet users there and that fact alone already makes .co a success. It won’t be going anywhere because it’s a cctld for Colombia with pre-popularity (nothing like .cm which had too many structural problems). The cointernet.co team has done a very professional job in organizing the dissemination of this extension and they deserve kudos for their acumen.
It is said in German business circles that the beginning days of a project are the most important over all the others in order to get it off the ground properly. I find this to be true and I laud cointernet.co for doing this launch with class.
PS Negative speculation is so uncreative…sorry again about .mobi. That baby was pure speculation and really had no roots to build from.
I have already spent some money on .co domains just to realize it could be a big failure. God, save me. I got http://earlybird.co and some 3-lettered domains. If I could just recover my investment, I would be very happy.
Great information for me, because i need this post. Thanks
Unquestionably believe that which you stated. Your favorite reason seemed to be on the web the easiest thing to be aware of. I say to you, I certainly get annoyed while people consider worries that they just do not know about. You managed to hit the nail upon the top and also defined out the whole thing without having side effect , people could take a signal. Will likely be back to get more. Thanks
Fantastic article.Much thanks again. Keep writing.