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Joel Disini responds to dot.PH Pricing discussion

Joel Disini, President & CEO of dot.PH, responds to our earlier discussion here last October entitled “Why dotPH is still expensive?“.

In his comment, left yesterday evening, he said:

Hi,

I just recently discovered this thread, and I thought I’d directly respond to the group. Hopefully, people are still willing to discuss this topic.

My understanding is that most of the readers here are Adsense/SEO people? If so, I’ll try to address my thoughts appropriately.

First of all, DotPH pricing at $35/year is the retail price. The wholesale price is a lot cheaper, and goes as low as $15/year, depending on your volume of registrations. This has been the case as far back as 2000, when very few ccTLDs were selling below the $35 level. The Registrar prices are located here:
http://www.domains.ph/PartnerApply.asp

As you can see, the discounts begin once you have at least 12 domains to register.

So it might make sense for some of you to join forces, and buy in bulk – so you can enjoy larger discounts – or work with one of our existing Registrars. We have over 150 Registrars – practically every ISP in the Philippines and Webhosting company is a Registrar. (Now whether they wish to pass on the discounts to you – that is entirely another matter).

If your need is to get lots of domains so that you can point them to your main website (so as to increase its Google rank), then perhaps we can discuss creating some price that favors the SEO community. If some of you recall, we actually gave a way 18+ character domains several years ago – for free. This way you can get domains with your desired keywords, then direct people to your main money site. Or you can monetize them with SEDO, DomainSponsor, or some similar domain monetizing company. We’ve also toyed with the option of lowering price for net.ph & org.ph – but we’d like to get more feedback first.

But if you are domainers and want to buy domains, hold, and sell them later, you might want to look at mail-only domains. These only cost $5/year and can be later updated to full functionality (once you pay $35/year). So this means you can speculate (if you wish) and grab all the domains that you think will be of value in the future. They you can sell them later at a profit.

I am currently at the ICANN conference in Portugal, and Tim Schumacher of SEDO tells me that the average resale price these days for domains is about 20k. That’s a pretty impressive amount. Naturally, ccTLD domains don’t sell that high – but once more and more Philippine businesses get online, you should find the aftermarket price for PH domains going up.

If you have ideas, please feel free to post comments on my blog at jed.i.ph (it is unmoderated). Or if you prefer, you can call/email us directly. (The contact details are here:

http://www.domains.ph/ContactUs.asp
.
This way, we can respond more quickly to your concerns.

He also wrote about it in his personal blog here .

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Avatar for Abe Olandres

Abe is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of YugaTech with over 20 years of experience in the technology industry. He is one of the pioneers of blogging in the country and considered by many as the Father of Tech Blogging in the Philippines. He is also a technology consultant, a tech columnist with several national publications, resource speaker and mentor/advisor to several start-up companies.

35 Responses

  1. Avatar for PH Domains PH Domains says:

    Hi,

    Our company is selling PH Domain Registrations at $25 or PHP1075 per domain. We are setting up new website but for now you may contact PHDOM****@****.*** for information on how to get your PH domains from us.

  2. Avatar for Web.com.ph Web.com.ph says:

    DotPH domain registration at Web.com.ph cost P1,100 per year. Please go to www.web.com.ph/domain.php for details. We accept bank deposit, cash payment in the office and Paypal. Thank you for reading.

  3. Avatar for Robert P. Robert P. says:

    I’ve registered a domain name with them (dot.ph) after I have registered mostly CON domains with other hosts and registrars.

    They (dot.ph), hands down, are the slowest I have experienced. In all respects –

    (1) The dot.ph is slooowwwww. Yes, everything-about-it slow.
    (2) The reply to query is sloooowwwww, which is a token actually because it’s, in truth, non-existent.

    If they (dot.ph) can’t fix their own websites (try visiting them all to see real meaning of slooowww), I can’t and will in fact not wait to see their webshosting performance.

    Utterly disappointing.

    Anyone experienced the speed at which they issue refunds? Slooowwww, perhaps? If they (Dot.ph) wants to charge a lot, which in fact they do, why can’t they show some performance?

    Anyhow, I have seen people go around his “ph” problem by attaching something before and after their “ph” “-ph” before or after their domains. So for example, if your preferred domain name is “dotphsuckslow,” instead of “dotphsuckslow.ph”, people opt for either:

    (1) “dotphsuckslow-ph.com”
    (2) “dotphsuckslowsph.com”
    (3) “phdotphsuckslow.com”

    It does not look pretty above because dotph sucks, but imagine this:

    (1) “love-ph.com”
    (2) “loveph.com”
    (3) “phlove.com”

    Even lovelier than love.com.ph or love.ph, isn’t it. And way cheaper. And way faster – I’d give the first person a free Manchester United jersey if he/she can find in the next 12 hours a website in the same line of business slower than dot.ph. And its a dot.com – its like the (02) in Metro Manila landlines which means all the positive brands recalls you can have except the fact that pldt at the height of its monopoly why slooooww like dot.ph sloooowww.

    This is aging tech-kuno company, stagnant and stinky, with no noteworthy innovation it seems whatsoever in the last ____ years. How many people believed believed their i.ph project? What was that? Look at their website. Even their CEO’s blog seems designed from crap.

    I believe people should do this than pay well for a lousy service. What are dot.ph servers like, circa and pre-1999? And where exactly are they?

    Goodness, what shameless tech providers.

  4. Avatar for o3to7wxpei o3to7wxpei says:

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  5. Avatar for o3to7wxpei o3to7wxpei says:

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  6. Avatar for fcuk disini fcuk disini says:

    Too bad I only got to see these posts now.

    Tarantado yan si Joel Disini. Don’t ever trust that scumbag.

    For posterity, follow the thread here http://www.grabeh.com/forum/showthread.php?t=8193

    Domains are $6-$10 already. WTF is .ph domain? made of gold?

    We’ve been battling to break up the Disini monopoly for more than 10 years. Of course, the idiot will start lowering the price when competition happens. But since he thinks he is untouchable and act like PLDT. Oh well.

    All you, kind folks, can do is just boycott the damn Disini corporation. It will make the world a better place.

    Well, at least, until we break up the Disini monopoly. Think pldt.com.

  7. Avatar for JC John SESE Cuneta JC John SESE Cuneta says:

    @joel

    quoted
    On a side note, I’m intrigued that there are domainers already anticipating DotAsia domains to come out. (It won’t be availalble to the public till early 2008). DotPH is one of the founding members of DotAsia, together with a few other ccTLDs. I think it’ll be bigger than dotEU and the betting in Portugal (ICANN Lisbon) is that it’ll probably hit 2M within a year of the landrush period. I think that’s pretty optimistic, but we shall see.

    end-of-quote

    Now that you mentioned it, I remember now that DotPH is one of the founders of DotAsia, how could I have forgotten that.

    I agree, .ASIA will be bigger than .EU, and while we’re at it, maybe you can offer us bloggers something like the ‘sunrise’ registration for businesses with TM and R ?? I really like to get my domain names secured, but it seems TM/R will take longer than expected :/

    And I don’t even know how to get advantage of the sunrise registration hehehe.. :p

    Personally, I’m really into .ASIA instead of ccTLDs ;)

  8. Avatar for joel disini joel disini says:

    Great to see all these comments. I’ve tried to respond to most of the issues raised here:

    http://jed.i.ph/blogs/jed/2007/04/08/dotph-prices-revisited/

    On a side note, I’m intrigued that there are domainers already anticipating DotAsia domains to come out. (It won’t be availalble to the public till early 2008). DotPH is one of the founding members of DotAsia, together with a few other ccTLDs. I think it’ll be bigger than dotEU and the betting in Portugal (ICANN Lisbon) is that it’ll probably hit 2M within a year of the landrush period. I think that’s pretty optimistic, but we shall see.

  9. Avatar for JC John SESE Cuneta JC John SESE Cuneta says:

    Hey guys… quoted:

    Jeffrey Wong says:
    April 7th, 2007 at 5:58 pm

    I’d rather buy a .ASIA than .PH as well.

    When .EU came out, several ccTLDs in Europe dropped their prices, some (.BE) even gave it away for free.

    end-of-quote

    Source: https://www.yugatech.com/blog/?p=1809

    ———–

    So.. will .PH drop down its prices once .ASIA is available to the masses?

  10. Avatar for JC John SESE Cuneta JC John SESE Cuneta says:

    Why invest in something that is “of the past” (protectionism and individualism) like .ph, .sg, .my to name a few, when you can invest in the future? I’d rather buy .ASIA when it comes out (very soon) than buy a .ph.

    We’re already in the “ONE COMMUNITY” era, protectionism and individualism is OVER. ccTLDs are the past, regional TLDs are the future.

    .ASIA is where I will invest my money.

  11. Avatar for Bryanboy Bryanboy says:

    I agree with the sentiments above. I’m not paying $35 bucks for a .ph domain. I’ve got over 700 .com/.net domains and i’m personally happy with godaddy.

    $35 is just plain ol’ ridiculous. robbery at its finest.

  12. Avatar for Jeffrey Wong Jeffrey Wong says:

    I read a post of JED years ago regarding the .dotPH marketed a .dotPhone. He said the price could have been lowered if local community did not protest about the plans.

    In my opinion, i dont think he would lower the price. It was just an alibi.

    My idea is make dotPh open to all, sell it without restriction to all nationalities. Please sell it around 8$ to 12$.

    .CO.UK, .US, .IN are curretly sold below 10$. .CO.UK is sold without restrictions.

  13. Avatar for Chino Yray Chino Yray says:

    in the end, it’s one reason to get a .com instead of a .ph

  14. Avatar for gibo gibo says:

    the question is, why can’t we get rid of him cctld administrator with that hilarious pricing scheme?

  15. Avatar for juantanamera juantanamera says:

    What??? a crappy comment!!!.

    He didn’t even answered why it costs $35/year. He’s just marketing his products

    NOT EVERYONE IS AN ADSENSE/SEO PEOPLE

    NOT EVERYONE IS A DOMAINER

    NOT EVERYONE WANTS TO BUY WHOLESALE (too expensive… again…)

    Did this guy really cares about his country at all?

  16. Avatar for jash jash says:

    he’s promoting the wholesale price. wag daw tinge-tinge :D

  17. Avatar for Leandro Leandro says:

    so why is it expensive? I was lost with your flowery nincompoops sir, sorry.

  18. Avatar for JC John SESE Cuneta JC John SESE Cuneta says:

    I agree, he did not answer the question.

    For us non-business people, or for Small businesses, the $35/year is VERY EXPENSIVE (emphasizing). As much as we want to get a ccTLD like .ph (and variations), we decided not to. We sacrificed getting more attention on google.ph results (to name one) just to avoid that expensive price.

    Though we can say ‘thank you’ for making it expensive, coz if it wasn’t and we bought our domain of choice using .ph, we wouldn’t have learned how to get our desired results – we will be relying on ccTLD like .ph.

    Well, I guess for everyone, forget about .ph, get .ASIA which will be opening publicly this year. After all, today is the generation of a ONE ASIAN COMMUNITY – social and business aspects.

  19. Avatar for bingo bingo says:

    his answer is lawyer-speak for “you’ve got not choice”

    that’s what happens when you have monopoly power and are gouging your market

  20. Avatar for Chino Yray Chino Yray says:

    so why is it expensive again?

    The post didn’t seem to answer that question.

  21. Avatar for Dusty Dusty says:

    Tsk Tsk … Ditto!

  22. Avatar for Jon Jon says:

    Did i missed it?

    I cant see the his answer to the title question “Why dotPH is still expensive?”

  23. Avatar for AhmedF AhmedF says:

    WOW did he mis-quote the Sedo fellow.

    Here is the ACTUAL quote:

    “”The number of sales is growing really fast. So we are seeing a lot of the secondary market going into the long tail, a lot of small sales happening. So at SEDO, for example, to give you an example, we have an average price of about $2,000. And we have a median price of about $600. That means more than half of the names sell for less than 600. So there are just a couple of high-ticket sales, like vodka.com, which we sold a couple of months ago for 3 million. And those, of course, take the average price up.”

    Average $2k, but median is $600.

  24. Avatar for Jonas Jonas says:

    So, I guess this means that the prices are still going to remain the same. :(

  25. Avatar for Eugene Eugene says:

    There’s still no reason why it’s expensive! Is DotPH paying fees to ICANN? Is running a ccTLD server system much more expensive than running a web hosting business? Domain names are practically an unlimited virtual real estate business with minimal maintenance costs that volume (because of affordable prices) ought to be enough to pay for the expenses.

    Aside from pure corporate greed, I just don’t get the economics of selling .ph domains at $35/year.

  26. Avatar for jedi jedi says:

    For someone to be able to get the $15 tag price, an initial investment of $18,000 is needed, thats for 1200 ph domains.

    I guess i have to look for 1199 interested persons to join me to be able to get a discounted price :(

    Dotph should be the first one to encourage local entreps to use ph domains but with the $35 price tag? nakupo ,,, buhay nga naman

  27. Avatar for Rickey Rickey says:

    What an asshat.

  28. Avatar for deuts deuts says:

    A discount is not synonymous to cheap!

    I’m just wondering how many sales did they already lose because of their expensive domain names. I for one would have also availed of a .ph domain if they sell at most the same as .com domain names.

  29. Avatar for Andrew Andrew says:

    Still doesn’t explain why they’re so friggin’ expensive. It’s funny how he says that “getting lots of websites” and “pointing them to your main website” will increase “Google Rank”. Mr. Disini, not everyone is interested in buying domain by the bulk nor able to pool enough people to by in bulk. You have to address the real issue. Your domains are too expensive. Why are they so? If you think about that maybe this discussion can get somewhere.

  30. Avatar for Ian Ian says:

    [quote]This has been the case as far back as 2000, when very few ccTLDs were selling below the $35 level.[/quote]

    But this is 2007. Hello…

    [quote](T)he discounts begin once you have at least 12 domains to register.[/quote]

    Seconding Christian DeVera: how about for those who just want a single (or less than 12 domains)? Not very consumer-friendly, that discount, unless DotPH really targets the domainers/speculators out there. Very ripe for abuse, too. I can almost see spammers buying DotPH domains by the bulk, boosting the Philippines’ status as one of the top spam sources. (Then again, lowering the bar would also do that, but still, a cheap domain is a cheap domain is a cheap domain.)

    I, for one, would want to have a ccTLD domain — it would be a source of pride — but I’m a cheapskate, so…

  31. Avatar for Shari Shari says:

    Well, thankyouverymuch for addressing the…issue — in Adsense/SEO people’s issue.

    Thank you, Mr. Christian DeVera, for pointing out what’s wrong in his statement.

    How about us people who also live in the Philippines and want hilariously expensive .ph domains but don’t care about those SEO, Adsense, money-making thingamajigs? *sighs*

  32. Avatar for Christian DeVera Christian DeVera says:

    Cheaper if you buy in bulk? What about the newbie kid who only wants 1 domain for his personal blog?

  33. Avatar for Kiven Kiven says:

    Me eat up ph domains. me look for money. w00t. (oh, wait…..someone else already did that =) )

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