Importance Of Geo Domains

A Geographically (Geo) Targeted Domain Name contains a keyword relating to a specific city, state, country, place or region.

Domains like LosAngeles.com, MiamiRealEstate.com, KirklandCondos.com, SeattleHomes.com, EvansvilleStorage.com, WyomingCoal.com, OHmovers.com, DenverAutoGlass.com, HoustonAttorneys.com, and CaribbeanVacations.com are all examples of Geo Targeted Domains.

One thing is for sure, the best Geo domains are long gone, registered 15-25+ years ago. That doesn’t mean they are out of reach. While many are in use, others may be for sale at the right price. When one expires as a result of the owner no longer requiring it, passing away, or a multitude of other possible reasons, it almost always ends up in an expired domain auction fetching a high price. Great Geos are definitely out there awaiting to be had. However, the price to get one will likely start in the thousands of dollars.

Geo domains are becoming an increasingly valuable asset class as the demand for them continues to grow. The main reason for this is that businesses want to be thought of as the local authority for their products and services.

When people want to buy or sell a home in their city they want people to think of them. When someone thinks about getting a plumber they want to be thought of as THE plumber for their city. Condo or apartment owners want to be thought of as the only relevant condos or apartments in their city. When someone wants a dentist, doctor or attorney… etc.

A Geo targeted domain is easier to rank in search engines for the exact term it contains which increases the likelihood of highly targeted visitors to your website.

A premium Geo domain can even be a uniquely brandable identity that you can build a business around. For instance, a friend of ours built a successful rental listing service called SeattleRentals.com. Over the course of a few years, SeattleRentals.com has become a great place to find an apartment, condo, home, or vacation property in the greater Seattle area. Owning the right domain name provided a great jump start towards that success.

Geo targeted domains are easy to remember and may result in a significant increase in direct navigation traffic.

It’s important to still register the domain name for your business (if it’s not already a Geo targeted domain like the example above). However, the likelihood of prior and future customers finding you increases dramatically when you also own the right Geo targeted domain. Consumers may already know exactly what they are looking for and simply type in a Geo targeted domain directly into the address bar and hit enter to end up at your site. If you haven’t named your business, a Geo domain can also double as a highly credible, looks like you’ve been around awhile and know what the hell your doing type of business name. Imagine a business called Seattle Homes, LLC operating at SeattleHomes.com and your team members are all using a kick ass ‘Name@SeattleHomes.com’ email address. Meanwhile anyone who sees your domain name is wondering how you got it and asking themselves if you picked it up during Bill Clinton’s first term as president.

Much like a traditional keyword domain, a Geo targeted domain can be used as your main site, a redirect to your main site, or an additional site that provides relevance, credibility and links to other site(s). Some Geo domains are purchased solely for a memorable email address with no intention of building a website. Even owning the domain without utilizing it in any way may still provide benefits as it’s not being used against you by your competitors.

Real Estate Domain Names

Did You Know? [City]RealEstate .com & [City]Homes .com domains rank #1 & #2 for total sales volume outranking every other Geo+Keyword domain category. This includes hotels, restaurants, insurance and 95 additional categories.

Real estate related Geo domains are in extremely high demand because a single lead can result in a sale which brings in thousands to tens of thousands of dollars in commission.

There are approximately 4,500 cities in the United States with a population of more than 5,000. It’s very uncommon for a real estate related Geo domain for any city in the United States ending in realestate.com or homes.com to become freely available to register as real estate .coms command top prices:

*The transactions above are for the domain name only & represent a small fraction of total sales as most are unreported. Notice a commonality in the sales above? The overwhelmingly most recognized and top selling domain extension year in and year out is .com (seriously, it isn’t even close), use all others at your own risk.

So, in the Geo real estate domain space, how do you compete with the Zillow, Trulia, Airbnb and giant home builders of the world? One of the best ways to stand out from the competition is through the ownership and development of a great .com domain which contains the exact match keywords those big guys are targeting for the city (or cities) you want to represent. This works great for other Geo categories as well. It simply helps to have an intuitive domain that represents what your focus is and the area you are targeting. It also helps if your domain doesn’t require tens to hundreds of thousands, or millions of dollars as is the case with the real estate companies listed above, to get people to understand what your business is about, let alone remember your web address.

Is a Geo domain a great fit for you? Do your own due diligence, check out some of our other articles starting with those listed below as well but ultimately you’ll need to draw your own conclusions as to what is the right domain for you and your business.

Oh, and I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention, *shameless plug*, Fat City Properties is the largest independent owner of ‘City’RealEstate & ‘City’Homes dot coms for US cities above 5,000 population. We have real estate domains available in every state covering approximately 1 out of every 6 US cities, most of which are available for purchase for under $7,500. *We also offer lease to own options for many of our Geo domains from 2-24 months. Quite a few of our domains are not listed on this site, please contact us for pricing and availability.

At an average US home sales price of $389,400 in 2020*, whether you buy, sell, or rent real estate for a living, it doesn’t take much to achieve a high rate of return on a premium real estate domain. A great geo domain put to the right use is an invaluable asset that can pay for itself many times over and can be resold if necessary.

Additional information on real estate domains as well as the most common ways to benefit from them, can be found HERE. 

Unfamiliar with the domain name aftermarket?  View this quick infographic first.

*Automatic monthly payments set up through Dan.com or the Escrow.com secure domain name holding service. Average 2020 home price from https://www.statista.com/statistics/240991/average-sales-prices-of-new-homes-sold-in-the-us/

**It’s important to not confuse geo targeted domains with geographically targeting a website to a different country which is commonly done through the use of ccTLD’s, language meta tags, through a Google Webmaster Tools account etc.