Cruise.co.uk pays record £500,000 for extra URL letter

Cruise.co.uk has smashed the existing UK record for the price paid for a domain name by buying the plural version, Cruises.co.uk, for £560,000. The cruise community site bought the URL from German travel firm Nees Reisen. The previous UK record stood at £150,000 for Recycle.co.uk, paid by ASAP Ventures in October 2007. The purchase of…

Cruise.co.uk has smashed the existing UK record for the price paid for a domain name by buying the plural version, Cruises.co.uk, for £560,000.

The cruise community site bought the URL from German travel firm Nees Reisen. The previous UK record stood at £150,000 for Recycle.co.uk, paid by ASAP Ventures in October 2007.

The purchase of Cruises.co.uk comes as the company hopes to double the amount of user generated content it has on the site during 2008.

In January the company launched a major promotion with Berlitz guide publishers to bring in new users to the site. The initiative is believed to have attracted around 2,000 new reviews in just four weeks.

Seamus Conlon, managing director of Cruise.co.uk, said: “‘Cruises’ is consistently ranked first on Google, with ‘cruise’ just behind.

“We wanted the top positions so that when internet users are searching for cruise deals, reviews or news we are the first port of call.”