In the United States, at least 25,000 brick and mortar businesses will close in 2020 due to the Coronavirus (source: Coresight). I believe this will only be the tip of the iceberg. The businesses that fight to stay alive will become 100% dependent on the Internet to generate their revenue. No longer able to rely on foot traffic to their old brick and mortars, the popularity and brand-ability of their websites will solely dictate their ability to survive in the coming years.
Domain Names Take Center Stage
Since the beginning of the Internet, a domain name has been the online address of a business — nothing more, nothing less. Before the Coronavirus, most brick and mortar businesses kept a wary eye on their SEO, but search engines were only one slice of the pie of their revenue generation. Now, they will be totally at the mercy of Google and, to a lesser extent, Yahoo and Bing.
CentralNic Group Plc (LON:CNIC) provides registry services, distribution, and strategic consultancy for new TLDs, ccTLDs and SLDs.