OnlineDomain.com Domain Name News & Opinions
.Shop is sitting firmly among the top new gTLD Sunrise phases, and with seven days still remaining (from the day of the last count), over 850 domain names have been applied putting .shop ahead of .london that was the most successful (non-adult) new gTLD Sunrise in the program so far (source: https://newgtlds.icann.org/en/reviews/cct/rpm).
.London had 799 sunrise applications while .nyc had less than 500. .Porn and .adult had both more than 2,000 applications each. (The report referenced only has data up until May 2015)
The GMO Registry said “We are very happy to see that so many of the world’s top brands have chosen to align themselves with the .shop brand and can’t wait to start seeing these names in the wild. Stay tuned for news of the first .shop pioneers as early as this week!”
.Shop started with 300 names in the first 7 days of sunrise back in the first days of July.
So let’s take a look at who is registering .shop names. There is demand from right around the world with applications from more than 25 countries. Us and Germany lead the way. European brands are definitely showing an affinity with .shop accounting for 64% of all applications. As far as industry verticals is concerned the strongest demand is in fashion, luxury and sports.
The .shop Sunrise phase ends on August 29, 2016. Priority access to .shop domain name registration will be available from September 1 – September 26, and General Availability opens September 26, at UTC 15:00.
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I do not think they will be doing so well one month after general availability.
Just look at .Store poor performance now. (Extension which is not far from .shop)
What I find most interesting about that pie chart is the over-representation of some countries relative to the USA.
True, roughly a quarter of Sunrise registrations are credited to companies in the United States (23%). But another quarter are due to Germany (21%). Italy, Japan, France, and Switzerland account for another 31% between them.
So more than half of all these Sunrise registrations for .SHOP are due to countries where English is a foreign language and “Shop” itself only a loan word. What’s more surprising still: They’re not just keeping pace with the USA; rather, they’re outpacing American interest in .SHOP. The USA is a much bigger market, yet it’s relatively under-represented.
Notice 12% is due to the UK – half as much as Germany or the USA. But the UK domain market – especially outside .UK and especially for nTLDs – is nowhere near half as big as the American domain market. Population alone is about 1/6.
I think what this shows is a linguistic difference. In the USA we “go to the store”, we go “shopping”; but the word “shop” has a quaint European air to it, almost like “boutique”. We definitely use it – often for imported bitts of culture like the “coffee shop”. But I daresay it’s more prevalent in the UK. And apparently even on the Continent. The level of interest from Japan I find especially puzzling, given Japanese disinterest in the domain market generally. Maybe someone who’s lived in Japan can tell me if “Shop” has much currency.