Preparing for a new internet age

In an internet economy, developing an effective online presence is at the heart of commercial success. Since the first .com domain was registered by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the worldwide web has expanded at an exponential rate and is expected to be used by half of the world’s population within the next two years.

One factor fuelling the growth of the online world is the launch of gTLDs, such as .luxury, .technology and .photo which signifies one of the biggest changes to the internet addressing system since its inception.

Over the next three years, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) will release more than 1,000 customised domain endings and kick-start the beginning of a new digital landscape.

The fragmentation of the internet

gTLDs are set to change the internet in the same way that the emergence of digital channels changed the TV industry. In the past, analogue channels were one of the only ways to reach a commercial audience. However, the availability and success of new channels such as Discovery TV, Sky One, MTV and Bloomberg meant that consumers were more willing to receive content that was specific to their interests and pay a premium for it. As a result, the advent of digital TV changed the TV landscape forever.

Similarly, the .com suffix has been the BBC of the internet to date and one of the primary channels to reach a scalable audience online. However, the availability of new domain endings such as .restaurant or .hotel will start to fragment the internet in a meaningful way over the next five to ten years so that marketers can create a web presence designed to more effectively target specific segments and audiences.

For example, companies such as Sony and Microsoft may want to improve the online gaming space using the .game domain. By being able to develop that specific part of the registry system, brands can introduce superfast servers at the root of the internet which ensures that the web can operate effectively and meet the needs of online gamers, improving the user experience and boosting engagement amongst this community of consumers.

Preparing for a new digital age

Creating the ability for brands to own their own internet suffixes creates various new online opportunities for marketers. In a recent survey, 96 per cent of marketers labelled their domain names as an important factor in their online presence. As a result organisations need to think about which gTLDs will be most relevant to their brand.

The gTLD programme offers marketers the opportunity to strengthen a brand’s online presence by securing sector-specific registrations that will attract consumers and help gain priority treatment in natural search in the future. New domains, such as ‘fashion.shop’, ‘film.reviews’, ‘music.download’ and ‘car.insurance’ could be used to help attract and capture valuable online traffic by verifying the authority of a website for consumers.

Several brands have already publicised their intention to use the new gTLDs. Most recently, UK-based professional services firm, KPMG, outlined how it hopes to eventually migrate the existing kpmg.com website to a .kpmg domain as part of its gTLD application. Using the .kpmg domain will allow the brand to operate its own registry system and act as a clear signpost to web browsers so the company can get a better control of internet traffic and focus on enhancing online security for users.

A gateway to new markets

In addition, the introduction of Internationalised Domain Names (IDNs) as part of the new gTLD programme signals the opening up of the web to new markets and a big opportunity for businesses operating, or looking to operate, on a global scale. The vast range of new addresses available, including geographical TLDs such as .london, .nyc, and international suffixes using Chinese, Russian and Arabic characters, will allow businesses to tailor their online presence and marketing campaigns to reach new markets and audiences.

We are already starting to see the emergence of registry sites in Cyrillic script with http://nic.онлайн/, http://nic.сайт/ and a full Arabic script domain from dotShabaka ://نقطة-شبكة.امارات/ going live. There are currently 1.7 billion combined Chinese, Russian and Arabic speakers and the launch of the new IDNs effectively opens up the web to a vast new portion of the world’s population. Moving forwards, organisations will be able to register web addresses in various international scripts, allowing businesses to fully engage with targets in those markets and providing a gateway to new regions.

As gTLDs are officially launched online over the next year, marketers will need to start reassessing their current online presence and developing a digital strategy that reflects the launch of new domain endings. Preparation will be fundamental to ensuring that companies are able to shape their online footprint as the internet continues to develop. As a result, organisations need to start thinking about those new domain endings that will be most relevant to their business and customer engagement strategies so they can register web addresses that add the greatest value to their business.