Digishire™ - Domain Extension .org vs .com

As we currently operate quite a large number of .org domain name extension based websites, we get a lot of questions and inquiries regarding their user benefits vs. the .com extension. I thought I would write up a brief article about them, detailing some of the pros and cons that we have experienced. For those of you not familiar with .org, it is a top level domain or TLD, which has been used on the internet since 1985. Sometimes you will also hear the domain referred to as a gTLD, or generic top level domain. The .org extension was one of the original top level domains introduced. It was initially setup to be used by nonprofit organizations, however the acronym has taken on many new meanings over the years. I would say that the most commonly accepted meaning that the .org TLD has taken, is simply the broadest most watered down definition of organization, which could mean anything, both commercial or non profit related.

The first benefit to using the .org extension over .com, is obviously the acquisition price. In most cases generic .org domains will trade at a much lower price than a .com will, however there are some exceptions to that rule. As many of you have probably noticed already, domains in the .com extension can be extremely expensive to acquire on the domain name aftermarket. It wouldn't be uncommon to find a generic .com domain priced in the four to six figures price range, while it's .org counterpart is either available for immediate registration, or is owned but for sale at a three figure price range. So that in a nutshell is the first benefit to owning a .org domain over a .com, and it's one of the main reasons why the domain is so popular. As of March 2010, there are currently 8,134,299 .org domains owned or in use today, placing them slightly under the registration total for the .net domain extension, and well under the .com total.

Another really large driving force behind why the .org domain extension is so popular, has to do with internet based trust. The domain extension is heavily regulated and monitored by a group called the Public Interest Registry, who make sure that the domain extension is used in accordance with internet laws. Hosting malicious or illegal content on your .org domain can be reason enough to have the registration contract revoked, and the domain confiscated. The extension is also regularly monitored by trademark holders, who are usually quick to take action against individuals that register .org domains with the intention of cybersquatting on existing trademarks. Due to the heavy regulation that presides over .org, it has garnered a lot of internet based trust, and is generally considered to be a very solid and secure address for public web users to browse through and visit. This trust parallels what .com enjoys, or possibly even exceeds it.

The final element that I wish to explore regarding .org domains, and another reason why they are so popular, ties into the trust issue I mentioned above. Due to the fact that .org is so widely trusted by institutions and the general public, search engines have also taken a liking towards websites hosted on the .org extension. As many of you can probably imagine, Google, Yahoo, and Bing all have to work extremely hard in weeding out malicious web entities from their search results, such as websites that host trojans, spyware, illegal content, or engage in blatant copyright infringement. As the search providers know that the .org extension is heavily regulated by it's governing body, they tend to favor .org as a trusted address, as they would a .com, .net, or country code top level domain. Some new domain extensions such as .me, .travel, .co, .asia, .mobi, and many others, don't have the search engine awarded trust.