by Chris Connor

In the third part of a multi-part series, DomainRadar.com looks at the top domain extension intended for non-profit organizations, .org.

Although .com continues to dominate the domain landscape, .org has carved out itself a nice little niche. .Org has been able to establish this niche because it has a significantly better/cleaner image than .com due to its non-profit origins. These non-profit origins have translated into a great deal of TV time for this extension. I don’t know how many times that I have been watching TV and saw a commercial or program saying something.org. It has actually gotten to the point where I don’t know whether .org or .com gets more TV time these days.

What does that mean for domainers?  It means that domainers have a viable substitute for .com in certain areas. These areas do not have to be completely void of making a profit, but some industries simply DO NOT work well .org at all. These non-.org industries include:

• sex - remember that .org has a fairly clean image

• hosting - stick with .com or .net

• gambling - unless for addicts or along those lines

• money-related - anything overtly related to commerce or money

Besides just non-profit organizations, a few areas that DO work with .org include:

• free games

• reviews

• directories

• news or blogs

• general info about a particular subject

Now the question that you are probably asking yourself is how can you make money off .org if this extension is supposed to be non-profit. Like .com was originally intended just for commerce (where the ‘com’ comes from), .org is not used strictly for non-profit purposes anymore. There are no restrictions on what a .org can be used for and I have seen many .org sites selling products or making money from advertising. Keep in mind that .org being strictly non-profit is more image than anything else.

Furthermore, .org is one of the most sold extensions on domain forums. Speaking from personal experience as well, I have sold at least 5 times the number of .org domains that I have sold .net. In fact, I will usually pick a .org before a pick a .net if they are both available. As mentioned in the .net article, .net does not have a real identity. On the other hand, .org definitely does and domainers need to be aware of that.