Nominet Announces 10m .uk Registrations

The 10 millionth .uk domain was registered this week by the founder of SN Technologies, a Hampshire-based investment firm.

Steven John Northam launched the www.swarvemagazine.co.uk for a new venture his company is funding, domain registry Nominet revealed today.

A ‘prestigious address’

“All the businesses we’ve backed use .uk domains to establish a clear, trusted, British identity,” Northam said. “We expect our latest venture will follow the trend and we’re proud to hold the 10 millionth registration.”

There has been rapid growth of .uk domains, even though .com is still seen as the most prominent top-level domain (TLD). There have been two million .uk registrations in each of the past two years, with  renewal rates standing at around 70 percent. Indeed, .uk is the world’s second largest ccTLD (country code Top Level Domain).

“.uk is a prestigious address that people admire, respect and trust all over the world, and individuals and organisations of all shapes and sizes have recognised this,” said Lesley Cowley OBE, CEO of Nominet.

“The cumulative impact of the domains in the registry on the broader economy is huge, acting as the hub for most e-commerce activity in the UK. .uk is a great place to be and the registration of the 10 millionth domain is a fantastic achievement.”

Nominet said it was to make a major investment in marketing .uk. Advertisements will appear from May this year, homing in on the “trust, status and reliability” of the ccTLD.

“We are investing in the .uk brand to help grow the market in the UK and will be investing in operations to work with our channel to ensure that the small and medium businesses, the engine of the UK economy, understand the preference that consumers have for .uk,” Phil Kingsland, Nominet director of marketing and communications, told TechWeekEurope.

“The new marketing campaign will provide our sales channel with a range of online marketing materials to help drive growth and build on the solid foundations of trust and reliability already associated with .uk.”

Hugo Dalrymple-Smith, head of domain name marketplace Sedo, said .uk domains are recognised by consumers as sites they can trust.

“For SMEs in particular a .uk domain is attractive because it often gives them more choice to pick a company name that they feel will enable them to be competitive in their chosen industry. In the secondary market year on year we have seen an upward trend for demand in .uk websites, both for personal and business use, and we only see that continuing,” he added.

As for the controversial .xxx suffix, recent research found half of the UK’s largest companies have not registered a .xxx domain to protect their brands’ image.

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