.mobi Frequently Asked Questions

Q. Are the iPhone and other high end smartphones a threat to .mobi?
Q. Why do a lot of big brands have .mobi domains but not use them?
Q. Why don’t I just use m. and save myself the cost of registering another domain?
Q. Aren’t most mobile sites just “dumbed down,” text-based mini sites?
Q. Mobile phones can now render normal Web pages, so why don’t I just let customer go to my desktop site?
Q. dotMobi said that the mobile Web grew 700% last year, yet your zone file is flat. Are you losing market share to m. and other conventions?
Q. What are your predictions for the growth of the mobile Web and the .mobi domain?
Q. Why has the total number of names in your zone file declined over the past year?

Q. Are the iPhone and other high end smartphones a threat to .mobi?

A. A major misconception is that advanced mobile devices such as the iPhone render the mobile Web obsolete. This misconception is based on the ability of Safari Mobile, and similar browsers, to render PC-based Web sites. What is overlooked in this argument is that the mobile Web has never been -- and never will be – the desktop Web rendered on a mobile phone screen. Mobile phone screens are small; they don’t have a keyboard and mouse for navigation. These facts are not going to change. For a Web site to work well on a mobile device mandates that content is built specifically for the mobile context. The world’s largest brands have already acknowledged this by building mobile-specific sites. A more detailed discussion of this topic can be found here.

Q. Why do a lot of big brands have .mobi domains but not use them?

A. The majority of the world’s top brands own their .mobi domains. Some of these redirect an alternate naming convention; some are the primary mobile site address used. Having the .mobi site resolve to a different address serves to fulfill the purpose of the .mobi domain, which is to help consumers easily find content that works on mobile phones. As an example, amazon.mobi currently resolves to http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/h.html/002-3758616-3976054. From an end-user perspective, the redirect is invisible and makes it easy to consumers to type.

Some of the world’s largest brands, including BMW, Ford, Bank of America, Time, Hertz, Marriott Hotels, Volvo, CNN, ESPN, house their mobile content on their primary .mobi address and actively promote this all of their advertising.

Q. Why don’t I just use m. and save myself the cost of registering another domain?

As more companies start building mobile sites and realizing the benefits of the mobile Web, the uptake of the .mobi domain will continue to increase and the usage of m. and /mobile naming conventions will decline. The main reason for this is the emergence of .mobi as the de facto standard for identifying mobile content. There are two specific advantages to developing on a .mobi domain which are very important.

First, .mobi sites are white-listed by network level transcoders. This means that content developers can be sure that their .mobi sites will render on a phone exactly as intended and not be interfered with by an operator’s transcoders.

Second, the .mobi domain gets its own entry in the Internet zone files. That means a .mobi domain has an automatic advantage in search engine performance over other conventions. Additionally, search engines typically prioritize mobile sites when a search is performed on a mobile device. Because the content on .mobi sites is made for mobile, it tends to perform extremely well in such searches.

Q. Aren’t most mobile sites just “dumbed down,” text-based mini sites?

A. In the early days of the mobile Web, sites were limited, text-based sites. This was due to compatibility issues with handsets and their extremely limited capabilities for graphics and other advanced content. Today’s mobile sites have come a long way, so if you haven’t visited a mobile site lately, look at http://time.mobi on your mobile phone. This site performs device detection to recognize the specific handset you’re using and reformats the content dynamically to suit your device. But time.mobi is not an isolated case. Currently, 40% of the Interbrand Top 100 mobile sites use device detection and content adaptation and that percentage is sure to grow in the coming months. Entry-level handsets are becoming as capable as smartphones, and developers will to deliver high-quality mobile sites to all customers. Advanced features such as location-based services and GPS will make mobile sites not just device aware, but also location aware – something that PC-based sites can’t do.

Q. Mobile phones can now render normal Web pages, so why don’t I just let customer go to my desktop site?

A. The unique challenge of mobile is to understand the context of mobile usage and serve content that is appropriate. For example, a person in a foreign city looking for a coffee does not want to know the history of the coffee bean, how a share price is doing or if a company is currently recruiting. That person simply wants to know where the nearest store is and how much a double espresso costs in local currency. Just because a phone can render a full site does not mean that suits your customer’s needs … and in almost all cases, it won’t.

Another factor to consider is the time and cost of serving a desktop site to mobile customers. The vast majority of the world’s mobile users do not have flat-rate data packages; even those that do are usually subject to restrictions on the quantity of data they can download in a given month. For this reason alone, large desktop Web sites are highly undesirable for mobile customers. Lean, made-for-mobile pages, such as those found on .mobi sites, load quickly and will actively be sought out by a mobile audience. And remember: if you don’t offer great mobile experience, someone else will.

Q. dotMobi said that the mobile Web grew 700% last year, yet your zone file is flat. Are you losing market share to m. and other conventions?

A. In April 2009, dotMobi published a report, which showed that the number of mobile Web sites had grown sevenfold in the previous year. The growth was based on a similar crawl the previous year. At that time the total number of mobile sites was 150,000. And at this same time a year ago, the .mobi zone file already stood at more than 850,000  domains registered, meaning dotMobi was far ahead of the mobile Web in terms of our installed base (against the underlying size of the mobile Web.) Additionally, many of those 150,000 sites were of the older WAP variety, dating back to the better part of ten years.

The main finding of the report was that .mobi is quickly emerging as the de facto standard for mobile content on the Web, with a significantly higher share of sites using .mobi than any other naming convention. In fact there are more .mobis in use than m., mobile. and /mobile combined.

Q. What are your predictions for the growth of the mobile Web and the .mobi domain?

A. Given the level of growth we have seen in the past year, along with the predictions from various analysts, the consensus is that the mobile Web is growing faster than the desktop Web at the same point in its evolution. To put this in perspective, the desktop Web went from one million sites to four million sites over a two-year period, so even a conservative estimate for the mobile Web will see it more than double, year on year, for the next two years.

.mobi currently is the domain of choice for identifying content, with 23% market share; however, 22% of all mobile sites currently use the now-obsolete /wap. That means the .mobi share of sites with active content is just over 30%. In the short term, .mobi usage will be relatively stable but as the industry standardizes, usage of .mobi will increase. At this rate of growth, the .mobi zone file will comprise 1.8 million names in 2011.

Q. Why has the total number of names in your zone file declined over the past year?

A. dotMobi and its fourteen investors realized the potential for the mobile Web early on, and this in turn brought in a lot of people who invested in .mobi domains. Such was the early success that – despite the growth of the mobile Web – .mobi name base grew far ahead of market need. The .mobi domain is currently in a correctional period; the mobile Web is now rapidly catching up and justifying that initial expectation for growth in the domain. We believe that the next phase of growth in the mobile Web will be mirrored by growth in the zone file as .mobi and the mobile Web grow hand in hand.

Due to the current economic environment, some early purchasers of .mobi domains have not renewed their entire name base. This has resulted in a small dip in the base of domain holders. Such a dip is expected, though, and almost every new Top Level Domain sees this phenomenon when its initial “landrush” names are due for renewal. What is highly encouraging is that for .mobi this decline reached its highest percentage at 11.36% while, for example, .asia experienced a 13.64% decline. Historically, .info also suffered a 12.5% decline two years after launch, but rapidly returned to strong growth shortly thereafter. Given current economic conditions, this is a very strong performance and new investments in .mobi domains have shown a strong positive trend for the past 11 months, demonstrating the on-going confidence of the investment community in the long-term value of the .mobi domain.

For other articles about the .mobi domain click here.