Issue link: https://read.dmtmag.com/i/217512
sit dy e+ gin hip na age aluld mte) uld nd he ses ps. od- an ldan ow ltion or en ith t es so sirds ers hip ds, est will reale ose tos on nd er. her erge, lly. onve to akge, to ng nce nd de ain he he to E-commerce FOCUS PSB m www.PowersportsBusiness.com Powersports Business • December 2, 2013 • 15 Looking to the future, Dominion makes a buy New domain extension .motorcycles offered to industry BY DAVE McMAHON EDITOR IN CHIEF Dominion Powersports Solutions announced last month that it had submitted the winning bid for the new domain extension ".motorcycles." Until now, website addresses have largely ended with familiar "top level domains" such as .com, .org or .edu. But a recent expansion allowed hundreds of new generic top level domains, like .shop, .free or .smile. With the acquisition of .motorcycles by Dominion Powersports Solutions, the powersports industry will have access to the extension, which will be operated exclusively by Dominion Powersports Solutions. The nonprofit organization that oversees the domain extensions, called The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), is in the process of approving up to 1,400 domain extensions, up from the current 22. How important was the recent expansion of domain extensions? Google applied for more than 100 generic names, including .car and .store. Winning bids provide those companies with exclusive rights to the domain suffixes. For example, Dominion will have exclusive rights over .motorcycles. Domain registrars like GoDaddy.com will need to contract with Dominion and observe Dominion's rules and regulations in order to offer URLs with the .motorcycles domain. There were no other powersports-related trade-specific or generic names submitted during the process, and it is unlikely there will be another round of applications for several years. "Dominion Powersports has taken a critical leap ahead on behalf of our customers. As Google continues to personalize the search experience for consumers, top-level domains like .motorcycles will elevate our dealer customers in the search results," said Jeff Littlejohn, president of Dominion Powersports Solutions. "While some have downplayed this worldwide initiative, the proactive response of technology leaders demonstrates the impact the new top-level domains will have on the visibility of businesses on the Internet." Powersports Business reached out to Littlejohn to provide further background on the acquisition of .motorcycles. had 101 applications for the newest extensions. We feel like it was very important to secure this valuable top-level domain on behalf of our powersports dealers. We anticipate the generic top-level domain .motorcycles is going to become a strategic component to our dealers' online visibility. That's going to become increasingly important as we continue to see a migration of consumer search behavior moving from desktop to mobile. PSB: Looking at organic search, especially as it moves to mobile, how will dealers or other businesses in the industry benefit from the .motorcycles domain? JL: There's a limited amount of real estate on the first page of a search result on mobile device, whether it's a tablet or mobile phone. It's going to become increasing difficult for powersports dealers to show up on the first page of those organic search results. Having an industry-specific, product-specific generic top-level domain, like .motorcycles, is going to deliver the most value for powersports dealers and could be the difference maker. PSB: How does the acquisition meld into the other technology that Dominion is in the process of rolling out? JL: As the search behavior continues to migrate to mobile — and we're witnessing that as we speak with our own websites — our strategy is to be able to provide dealers an end-to-end solution. We're in the process of introducing our new technology platform, DX1, into the marketplace. We find that the .motorcycles toplevel domain is a piece of that strategy, and we See Dominion, Page 16 PSB: How did you decide that .motorcycles would be an asset for Dominion Powersports Solutions? JL: We noticed from our own research that .motorcycles would be the most impactful for businesses in the powersports industry. Consumers are searching more based on productspecific searching, and as search becomes more personalized and descriptive, the .motorcycles extension would bring the most value and have the most impact for powersports dealers. PSB: It's hard not to overlook the fact that Google was obviously interested in purchasing a healthy share of newly available top-level domains. JL: Yes, it's important to know we're not the only innovators in the technology space who are investing in the top-level domains. Google P13x20-PSB15-Focus.indd 15 11/25/13 11:33 AM