Our TLD Saturation (SAT) Metric Helps You Find Domains in High Demand

Fifun Delight Johnson

Writing reviews and buying advice on tech products, software, cloud & internet services | Simplifying technology with user documentation, FAQs & Knowledgebase content

Nearly every high-value domain that’s easy to pronounce and catchy has been registered. Good luck trying to find a one-word domain made from an actual word. Expired domains are the next big thing to look at whether you are looking for a name for your brand or you are a domain reseller.

But how can you tell the value of a domain? Yes, you can check backlinks, the domain’s history, domain authority, and other metrics but is there some way to tell that the market also considers a domain valuable and that people will buy it when you are ready to sell?

Our TLD saturation metric (SAT) was designed to help you do just that with real data that shows exactly how much other buyers on the market want that domain. In the rest of this piece, we’ll discuss the importance of TLDs, the different types, why TLDs are important, and how our TLD saturation metric helps you choose the most valuable and in-demand expired domains on the market!

What is a top-level domain (TLD)?

A top-level domain (TLD) also known as a domain extension is the suffix in a domain name that comes after the dot(.). For example, in ‘Amazon.com’, ‘.com’ is the TLD or domain extension.

However, TLDs are not restricted to .com or .net domains alone. There are different types of TLDs and many more examples under each category. TLDs play an important role in helping visitors understand what your website or business is about.

What are the different types of TLDs?

So what are the different types of TLDs and what are some good examples?

Generic Top-Level Domains (gTLDs)

Generic top-level domains (gTLD) are the most familiar TLDs today and they can be registered by anyone and are called generic because they were created in the early development of the domain name system. Some popular gTLDs include:

.com — for commercial websites

.org — for unspecified organizations

.net — for network infrastructures

.edu — for educational institutions

Although they were initially created for specific industries, all gTLDs are now unrestricted and can be registered by anyone. Many variations of gTLDs have and in particular, big companies are allowed to register their own generic top-level domain names. Now you have websites with TLDs like .google, .apple, and .amazon.

Sponsored Top-Level Domains (sTLDs)

A sponsored top-level domain is an exclusive TLD toed to a specific community or group that shares a common interest (like government or businesses). It mostly comprises private agencies or organizations that establish and enforce the criteria required to use the TLD. Some popular examples are:

.gov

.edu

.travel

sTLDs provide information about websites in a related industry, when you come across a website with a .travel TLD, that immediately informs you that it is related to the travel industry.

sTLDs also help users locate reliable and accurate official information quickly. For example, .edu and .gov are reserved for websites of U.S accredited schools and the U.S. government respectively.

Country-Code Top-Level Domains (ccTLDs)

Country-code top-level domains are TLDs specifically created for countries and geographical regions. They can be easily identified with a two-letter string and are not constrained to local businesses and individuals alone, but are also used by big organizations operating in particular regions.

ccTLDs also help Google geotarget websites, so when a user searches from a particular region or country, more relevant results pop up. However, ccTLDs only work for countries and territories, not languages. So if you’re looking to make your website multilingual, you will require a lot more.

Some of the most popular ccTLDs today include:

.us — for the United States

.uk — for the United Kingdom

.in — for India

.it — for Italy

.fr — for France

.es — for Spain

.ca — for Canada

.io — for British Indian Ocean Territory

Test Top-Level Domains (tTLDs)

Test top-level domains are TLDs reserved for local testing and development purposes. Because they are not available for general registration, you can use these tTLDs to freely test software changes without worrying about conflicts with other domain names.

According to the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) —the body that defines standard operating internet protocols, tTLDs were specifically reserved to reduce the chances of confusion and clashes while carrying out software tests.

The four popular tTLDs are:

.example — used for place holding

.test — used for testing purposes

.invalid — used for invalid domain names

.localhost — used for usage in local networks

Infrastructure Top-Level Domain

Infrastructure top-level domains belong to a peculiar category that contains only one TLD— the address and routing parameter area (ARPA). ARPA was the first top-level domain ever to exist and is managed by the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) for IETF.

Why are TLDs important?

Top-level domains have evolved from merely a way to tell users what your business is about into a full-blown measure of a website’s credibility. Web users have become biased toward some particular TLDs and as a smart webmaster, you should only go for TLDs that increase your user trust.

The most popular and most credible TLD by far is the .com TLD. Other trusted TLDs include the .net, .gov, .org, and .io TLDs. By default, when someone hears about your brand, if they want to visit your website, they’d type in your domain name with one of these TLDs.

There are some TLDs that just look spammy and shady that you should avoid totally. Some examples include - .gdn, .jetzt, .xin, .ren, .country, etc. In fact, you should steer clear of any TLD that has too many consonants as this ruins your domain’s chance of passing the radio test .

TLDs also increase your domain’s overall marketability. If you have an educational website, using a .edu TLD makes a lot of sense and users will immediately feel drawn and safe to click your website.

Introducing the TLD Saturation Metric (SAT)

It can be challenging to know exactly how exactly the market perceives a domain you are considering. And if you are a domain reseller, you don’t want to be stuck with an inventory of domains nobody wants to buy.

That’s why we introduced the TLD saturation metric to help you choose. Our TLD saturation (SAT) score is the first-of-its-kind metric that measures the value of a domain based on the demand for the domain. How many people are registering different TLD variations of the said domain? What’s the value of each of these TLD variations? The TLD saturation metric puts it all together into a single comprehensible score.

How the SAT score helps you find the most high-demand domains

The SAT score is calculated with a magic formula to give you a measure of an expired domain’s popularity among other buyers. It’s one thing to believe a particular domain is high value but that is not enough. By gauging how other buyers rate the domain, you can have a good idea of the domain’s value in the market and price it accordingly.

The SAT score is built on a logarithmic scale from 1-10 with 10 being the most TLD saturated and hence, the most valuable. The more TLDs are registered for that domain, the higher the SAT score. The SAT doesn’t only measure the number of TLD registrations, but the value of each individual registration, as well as the overall domain’s popularity.

A domain that is registered in so many TLD variations will be incredibly valuable - especially its .com, .net, and .org variations. This shows that many buyers are looking to snag a piece of the domain in hopes of reselling it.

If you can get the .com and .net variations then you can be sure you have a good domain and rest assured that the the other variations would be getting little or no visits at all. So in a way, the TLD saturation metric (SAT) explores and exploits the interest placed on a domain to help you choose the best ones.

At Expired Domains, we feature a huge list that’s updated daily with hundreds of expiring and expired domains so you can find the best ones for your business. Now you don’t need to manually check whether each TLD variation is registered for a domain.

And even in our domains list, you don’t need to scroll through several pages to see the most TLD-saturated domains. Simply click on the ‘ SAT ’ icon and you’ll have all the domains arranged starting with the most valuable ones:

Alongside the SAT, you also get a link to the auction site where the domain is being sold, their prices, current bid prices, Estimated Auction Price, WHOIS birth year, Archive Birth Year, MOZ domain authority, MOZ page authority, Archive count, the search volume, the cost-per-click, Facebook shares, Trust flow, and finally, the auction expiry date.

The SAT Metric - a powerful tool for domain resellers

Domain resellers stand to gain the most from the SAT metric as the market demand for your domain matters. If you were just buying the domain for your own brand, you may just see the score to get an overview of the domain’s value.

However, if you are looking to resell, then the SAT metric can help you know the kind of demand to expect. You should then target the TLD variations of the domain that are most popular and credible.

Rounding Up

TLDs matter for a domain name and can make or break your credibility in the eyes of website visitors. There are different kinds of TLDs and many many more examples under each kind.

While the TLD on a domain can point to its value, an elusive but even more accurate measure of a domain’s value is how popular it is among other domain buyers. The more the number of TLD variations registered for that domain, the more valuable it is on the market and you can be sure you will get a good sell.

The SAT metric is just one of the exclusive domain value scores you’d find only on ExpiredDomains. We also have an exclusive estimated auction price (EAP) and BrandRank (BRR) scores to help you choose the best expired domains each time and every time.

So head to Expired Domains today and get you some prime internet real estate!