According to post on Boston.com, the domain names/sites Boston.com, BostonGlobe.com and Globe.com may soon be available for sale.
The domain names are owned by the Boston Globe newspaper which is for sale and has a June 27th deadline for submitting bids. Today Robert Kraft the owner of the Patriots dropped out of the bidding.
“Even without daily traffic Boston.com gets, the URL alone would almost certainly be valued in the six or seven figures for a patient seller. ”
“With their current traffic, Boston.com and BostonGlobe.com would be worth quite a bit more says Ken Doctor, who often writes on the media industry, told the Herald Boston.com could be worth as much as $50 million if spun off separately, which the New York Times has indicated it is not considering doing.”
Globe.com currently just redirects to BostonGlobe.com.
One other domain item the story didn’t cover is the new gTLD application for .Boston which was also applied for by the Boston Globe. The new gTLD .Boston which had the backing of the city may or may not be of interest to the buyer of the Boston Globe publication.
So what you do you think Boston.com is worth?
That’s only if the new buyers change the name of the paper.. When The ‘New York Daily News’ was sold to Mort Zuckerman of US News and World Report, he wasn’t about the change the name of the paper which is a New York institution.. Changing the name is one way to quickly lose readership/circulation and along with it, advertising dollars $$$..
The buyer doesn’t have to change the name of the paper they could keep bostonglobe and bostonglobe.com and sell boston.com, globe.com and the new gTLD application for .Boston
From here on the Cape I find myself visiting the site multiple times a day. If it weren’t for the content provided by the news staff, updated and breaking news, I would not have alot of reason to visit the url at all. Or at least nearly as often. I think the vast majority of repeat visitors would likely agree. Sox, Pats, Bruins, Pats, etc..
Their majority of their traffic MUST be local, repeat visitors.. those that used to read the paper. If you don’t provide news content, the traffic will drop immediately.
That said, and as I mentioned on their blogs last time they were for sale, almost offering to GIVE the paper away (threatening to close if unions did not make concessions), the URL at that point was worth more than their overall business.
For a news org to come into the area, it could be priceless. It obviously is a great name that guarantees anyone X amount of traffic. But If built as just another local portal, and the news org element is not involved, perhaps $2 – $3 million. Of course, that kind of money can be considered huge to some, and a small investment to others. Boston has 650k residents – the New England Region has 15 million. So if you come in and just do “Boston” – the rest of us outside of Boston won’t be so impressed.
*Disclosure, I own the url NewEnglandNews.com, so I am biased about how the “news” factor fits into the region. Thanks.
Denver.com at $7MM was a special deal with prior owners – but with BOD’s likely reading and believing the new non.com (gTLDs) horseshit offered up by the Washington Post:
http://www.thedomains.com/2013/06/20/washington-post-on-new-gtlds-brings-the-value-of-any-one-domain-down-to-almost-nothing/
Boston.com could be a real deal – save your pennies and nickels 🙂
Are Your Domain Names Worth More than Your Business ? Great Buys For An Entrepreneur
UPDATE
According to TermSheet
“”The New York Times Co. (NYSE: NYT) reportedly has received has received multiple bids for The Boston Globe and Worcester Telegram newspapers, albeit for only between $100 million and $200 million. NYT paid $1.1 billion for the papers around 20 years ago. http://www.boston.com/globe“”