18.1 Mission and Purpose of .BOATS
DERBoats, LLC (hereafter “DERBoats”), a wholly owned subsidiary of Dominion Enterprises (“Dominion”), has filed this application for a .BOATS gTLD with the intention of bringing to market a trusted, hierarchical, and intuitive namespace for consumers that will contain listings of boats for sale, as well as a repository of goods and services related to boats.
18.1.1 Dominion Enterprises
Dominion is a leading marketing services company serving the wide-ranging needs of many industries including real estate, apartments, specialty vehicles, employment, automotive, and travel, with over 3,000 employees located in 145 offices in 33 states and four countries. Its websites receive more than 17 million average monthly visitors and 279 million average monthly page views. For more information, see http:⁄⁄www.dominionenterprises.com⁄main⁄do⁄Fact_Sheet.
Dominion Marine Media (DMM), a division of Dominion Enterprises, is a leader in marketing services and publishing in the marine space with a comprehensive suite of technology-based marketing solutions including Internet advertising, lead generation, CRM (customer relationship management), website design and hosting, and data management services. DMM employs 150 people in offices in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, and Italy; serves customers in 106 countries; and advertises boats for sale in 193 countries. In 2011, over 49 million unique visitors spent time researching products on DMM web and mobile sites, apps, and social media outlets. DMM’s global reach includes 22 localized web portals, which are translated into 13 languages. Collectively, DMM’s market-leading websites – Boat Trader®, YachtWorld® and Boats.com® – generate 4.1 million visitors, 8.3 million searches and 167,000 leads per month.
YachtWorld.com® (http:⁄⁄www.yachtworld.com⁄): YachtWorld.com® is an industry leader in delivering a full suite of cost-effective broker solutions globally, including portal advertising, inventory management, web services, lead management, and MLS (Multiple Listing Service). YachtWorld.com contains the Internet’s largest database of new and used boats for sale through brokerage houses. It boasts more than 1.7 million global visitors per month and 51 million page views, as well as 2,300 brokers globally.
BoatTrader.com® (http:⁄⁄www.boattrader.com⁄): BoatTrader.com® is the preeminent U.S. website for boat buyers to connect with sellers. It averages 1.6 million visitors and more than 27 million page views each month. and advertises boats and services for more than 2,500 dealers nationwide.
Boats.com® (http:⁄⁄www.boats.com⁄): In North America, Boats.com® is the boat owner’s homepage, a resource-driven site focused both on buying boats and maintaining them. It offers more than 150,000 listings and 10,000+ professionally written boat reviews, blogs, and articles. The site averages 13 million monthly page views and 650,000 visitors per month.
European Boats.com (including domains uk.boats.com, es.boats.com, de.boats.com, fr.boats.com, it.boats.com, nl.boats.com, au.boats.com): The European version of Boats.com is the largest website of its kind with over 460,000 boats for sale in 171 countries, representing a total value of over €135 billion.
Marine Web Services (http:⁄⁄www.marinewebservices.com⁄): Marine Web Services is one of the largest website service providers for marine dealers in the U.S., offering lead management, e-commerce, and parts fiche, currently serving 4,300 customers across the nation.
PWCTrader.com™ (http:⁄⁄www.pwctrader.com⁄): PWCTrader.com is a leading website in the U.S. for buyers and sellers of personal watercraft.
BoatShow.com (http:⁄⁄www.boatshow.com): BoatShow.com is a website featuring a comprehensive listing of boat shows, highlighting current boat shows and inventory that will be available at the shows. This site partners with show management companies and feeds inventory from current DMM customers to maximize their inventory exposure.
YachtWorldCharters.com (http:⁄⁄www.yachtworldcharters.com): YachtWorldCharters.com is a leading charter listing site that connects charter companies with consumers interested in chartering a boat. The site receives 30,000 visitors per month and approximately 3500 listings of yachts for charter.
18.1.2 Potential Business Models
DERBoats is still analyzing potential use case options regarding the type of domain names that will be permitted for registration and by whom. In undertaking this research, DERBoats is leveraging Dominion’s experience in bringing critical business services to its customers in a safe and trusted online environment.
The business model for the .BOATS gTLD is currently broken into two stages, one has been confirmed and the second is under evaluation and will be implemented after DERBoats has assessed the first stage. The two stages are as follows:
1. Allocated Strings and Client Strings
At the current stage of analysis, the business model for .BOATS is one in which generic strings (“motor yacht,” “sailing yacht,” “super yacht,” etc.) and geographic (city⁄state) domain names would initially be reserved and⁄or allocated to one or more Dominion online marine properties. These domain names would provide a model for a hierarchical and intuitive framework and naming system for consumers to more easily navigate the .BOATS namespace. This initial allocation would also provide Dominion’s and its affiliates’ IT and security personnel the time to run a number of tests to ensure seamless and secure access using the .BOATS gTLD domain names, and interoperability with various software and Web-based applications.
Following initial allocation, Dominion’s existing clients across the different marine property groups would be initially permitted to register domain names. This initial rollout guarantees that the identity and contact information of each .BOATS domain name registrant will be known based upon a pre-existing business relationship. This allocation mechanism also minimizes DERBoats’ startup and operational costs.
2. Registration by Non-Clients
DERBoats is currently evaluating a validation process to allow non-Dominion clients and other domain name registrants to register domain names in the .BOATS gTLD. However, the exact timing of this proposed expanded universe of potential .BOATS registrants has not been determined, and will not be finalized until appropriate verification mechanisms can be put in place.
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