A very early look at the .uk behaviour of top UK sites...

[Edwin]

I looked at the top 20,000 UK sites (as tracked by Alexa).

There are 205 sites within the top 20,000 that are .co.uk based.

Of those, 58 have exercised their right to buy the corresponding .uk (all of them have the right, of course)

Here's what those 58 have done with their .uk (as of a few minutes ago)

I'm guessing that as companies gradually get clued in, the first % to drop will be the number of companies effectively pumping traffic to their registrars by sticking with the default domain registration setting (which leaves the domain pointing to an ad for the registrar itself)

 

[websaway]

Thanks

See on your twitter you met Frank Schilling.

Any feedback on .uk ?

 

[Edwin]

See on your twitter you met Frank Schilling.

Any feedback on .uk ?

No, not really. Had a nice chat but apart from mentioning that it's just launched we didn't discuss .uk specifically.

 

[WealdDomains]

Interesting, thanks. So, of the 205, nearly three-quarters haven't registered the .uk so far. Also, three-quarters of the quarter who have registered the .uk, have failed to follow through at even the most basic level.

David

 

[murph]

A rather slow start... Especially considering that's the top uk sites on the net. Is this in line with expectations amongst the AD community?

 

[WealdDomains]

I think there are two distinct topics :

- the slow take-off, which is possibly understandable given the long grace period and the lack of headline websites migrating

- the sloppy behaviour of those who have proactively chosen to register, where it seems surprisingly lazy not to even do something like basic forwarding

 

[anthony]

There will be a lot of companies with IT Heads who are paranoid about moving away from the established .co.uk names currently in service. It's a brave step to take when there is no indication from Google that it won't impact their sites.

 

[foz]

Thanks for the analysis Edwin.

My gut feeling is that .uk will remain a mino extension, when it comes to use. Companies will just register it as a defensive move.

e.g. google.jp just redirects to google.co.jp so even Google hasn't moved over yet in Japan. How long has this been so? or did .jp and .co.jp come out at the same time?

 

[Edwin]

e.g. google.jp just redirects to google.co.jp so even Google hasn't moved over yet in Japan. How long has this been so? or did .jp and .co.jp come out at the same time?

No, .jp came out in 2000. But currently there are twice as many .jp as .co.jp. The latter tends to be a "big company extension" since you have to have a exactly matching company name, and you're only allowed 1 .co.jp per company (no restrictions on .jp) so Google, Sony etc. use the .co.jp and smaller organisations use the .jp (as do larger companies that want a site around a specific brand/product but who have already used up their 1 .co.jp).

In other words, the Japanese situation is not a good analogue for the UK namespace because of the additional rules around .co.jp that have been there since the beginning.

More on this on p14 and p21 of this document, if you're interested.
http://www.mydomainnames.co.uk/ukpositionpaper.pdf

 

[Edwin]

- the sloppy behaviour of those who have proactively chosen to register, where it seems surprisingly lazy not to even do something like basic forwarding

This is more than likely down to the fact that the person who registered the domain isn't going to be the person with the POWER to decide what happens to it. The larger the company, the more that's going to be the case. It's going to take committee/management meetings, probably lots of them.

If you've ever worked in a larger organisation you're probably nodding along right about now

 

[foz]

In other words, the Japanese situation is not a good analogue for the UK namespace because of the additional rules around .co.jp that have been there since the beginning.

Thanks Edwin.

 

[Rob_F]

Thanks for the analysis Edwin.

My gut feeling is that .uk will remain a mino extension, when it comes to use. Companies will just register it as a defensive move.

e.g. google.jp just redirects to google.co.jp so even Google hasn't moved over yet in Japan. How long has this been so? or did .jp and .co.jp come out at the same time?

Same with .in/.co.in, G forward the former to the latter. I also tried to get a breakdown of .co.in vs .in registrations, but didn't succeeded.

I also looked at the top 50 Indian companies to see what they were using. Most were using .co.in, some .in and .com. I suspect most established pre .in release businesses have stuck with their .co.in, whilst startups, on the whole, have opted for .in.

Rob

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

 

[Stephen]

Thanks

Thanks Edwin for sharing your research, it is both interesting and useful.

Pity with all Nominet resources they could not provide update on how the .uk is being taken up and used.

On my .co.uk trading domains, I'm registering the .uk domains and redirecting to .co.uk equivalent. About 10 domains in all.

3 reasons for registering .uk before the end of the 5 years, for me, on those revenue generating domains;

1. A very small part of the Google search algorithm looks at the age of the domains. Sadly Nominet / Google did not provide assurance that the age of the .co.uk would be used if moved to .uk. The small difference might mean we loose a few places on top page, which would equate to a lot of sales, so not worth taking the risk.
2. Ownership rights are easier to protect when you own it, rather than a right which my be modified at some later date by some unforeseen event.
3. Type in traffic and missed emails to wrong address, in case .uk ever gets any traction.

On my domain portfolio, I have not registered any .uk were I have the right to do so.
As I judge no financial return on the extra cost and so don't want a higher carrying cost and have yet to see a demand for .uk.

On new UK domains I have registered since 10th June, 21 in all;

3 have registered both .uk and .co.uk

12 have registered .uk on dropped .co.uk strings

2 had .co.uk registered first but did not register .uk
4 the .co.uk have not been registered yet
6 the .co.uk was available to register at the time, I did not but somebody else has since registered the .co.uk​

1 new unused string not as .co.uk before, registered as .uk only

1 new unused string not as .co.uk before, registered both .uk and .co.uk​

 

[websaway]

.uk is one of the best country tld 's in the world

The UK is already branded as such.

It takes no guesswork. Most others are two letters from their country name some the first two letters like india in, and france fr , others random like mexico mx.

Ours is a brand and is known as such throughout the industrial world.

The future is .UK , absolutely no doubt, but it will take time.

 

[DaveP]

I agree, .uk will not fail, I'm 100% sure on that I'd put my mortgage on it.

 

[Edwin]

[*]A very small part of the Google search algorithm looks at the age of the domains. Sadly Nominet / Google did not provide assurance that the age of the .co.uk would be used if moved to .uk. The small difference might mean we loose a few places on top page, which would equate to a lot of sales, so not worth taking the risk.[/INDENT]

It won't be. Why should Google adjust their algorithm just because the .uk was launched? There are over 500 domain extensions now, many more coming soon - they're not going to code in an exception that says "because the poor .co.uk owners could only buy the .uk last week, we'll pretend they hopped into a time machine and treat the .uk domains as pre-aged".

Nominet has nothing to do with this in any case. Google's not going to reveal the "special sauce" of their search algorithm to Nominet any more than they would to you or I.

I understand that there are aspects of the .uk launch (and the .uk concept) that are less than ideal, but we have to maintain the distinction between what is reasonable to expect and what is impossible. Expecting Nominet to explain Google's algorithmic treatment of .uk falls squarely into the latter category. As such, there's no "sadly" about it - they were never going to provide the type of information you mention because Google was never going to give it to them in the first place!

 

[Murray]

]A very small part of the Google search algorithm looks at the age of the domains. Sadly Nominet / Google did not provide assurance that the age of the .co.uk would be used if moved to .uk. The small difference might mean we loose a few places on top page, which would equate to a lot of sales, so not worth taking the risk.

You're confusing two different things

The age of a site and its built up trust and authority will play a role, but the age of a blank domain means nothing.

I can tell you for a fact the age of a domain by itself means zippity zip zero.

 

[Edwin]

There have been a few more registrations, and we're now exactly at the 1/3 mark i.e. 1 in 3 of the Alexa Top 20,000 websites have secured their matching .uk.

 

[Stephen]

Risk

You're confusing two different things

The age of a site and its built up trust and authority will play a role, but the age of a blank domain means nothing.

I can tell you for a fact the age of a domain by itself means zippity zip zero.

As Google don't provide the formula, it is guess work by all.

I Googled "seo age of domains Google" and top link was ;

http://www.ecreativeim.com/blog/2011/02/is-domain-age-important-for-google-rankings/

I don't know if Google will track a website or the domain?

What I was trying to say I have several commercial websites that generate a lot of sales that currently use .uk.

If those established websites that have been using .co.uk for over 10 years should I move to .uk (ago = 0 years),
I believe the domain age will have a minor adverse effect on my ranking,
therefore I will not be taking the risk on moving them over to .uk for that reason.

If that reason is shown not to be true and there is more upside to .uk then I will move websites over.

 

[Murray]

As Google don't provide the formula, it is guess work by all.

Nope, currently I can guarantee that google doesn't look at the age on the whois in their algorithm

The domains usage yes, the domains age itself no.