New Domain .Co

The .co TLD will provide companies with a TLD that represents "company", which is a viable and possibly even superior alternative to .com. With the .com domain inventory nearly exhausted, .co gives businesses the opportunity to brand themselves online to the fullest extent possible.

The New TLD Release Process

Sunrise Period: This phase allows registered trademark holders to secure the exact-match domains for their trademarks secured prior to July 30, 2008. Trademark holders go through a process that includes submission of trademarks to registrars that are offering the new TLD, validation of the trademarks, auctioning if multiple trademark holders apply for the same domain, and awarding of domains.

Landrush: The Landrush phase is open to everyone and lets customers pay a premium to have a chance to secure high-commercial-value domains. Domains with more than one interested party will be awarded via auction. The domains that get attention during the Landrush phase are short and memorable non-trademarked terms. For example, something like pizza.co would have high value to a pizza company. That domain has the potential to rank well in search engines and would be a fantastic addition to a company's marketing and branding efforts.

General Availability: This is the final, broad-release period when all remaining domains are available for registration. Like other currently available TLDs, .co will be available on a first-come, first-served basis to be registered at a fixed yearly cost. Most domain names are still available at the beginning of this phase, with only trademarked domains and the most valuable generic domains being claimed during the Sunrise and Landrush periods.