Your Guide to .COM Domain Names

Domains ending in .com are the oldest, largest and most valuable group of domains in the world. Introduced way back  in 1985, and originally being a short for for “commercial”, the first .com names were held mostly by computer hardware manufacturers. The very first name registered was symbolics.com in March 1985 belonging to a now long-defunct manufacturer. IBM followed them in 1986 and then Apple registered Apple.com in 1987. But Microsoft waited four more years, until 1991 to get theirs!

Now in 2011 there are almost 99 million .com domain names active. That number dwarfs all the other extensions such as .net, .org and the 250 country extensions like .co.uk. Having a good .com name gives instant credibility and says you are open for “serious” business, literally opening up the world, unlike a local country name extension. A good .com name creates a global brand for a business. It’s a must-have marketing tool for most businesses.

So it’s easy to see why sometimes it’s so hard to find a good .com domain, with so many names spoken for. Also why some have sold for such high prices – into the multi-million dollar range. A few recent examples are social.com for $2.6 million in 2011 and toys.com for $5.1 million in 2009. The average price for a .com name is over $5,700 today and will likely increase in the future.

Our mission here is to help new and existing businesses find and maximize the value of these valuable assets – your company’s new .com name.

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