Domain name availability is dwindling small and medium enterprises (SMEs) have been warned by one industry expert.

According to Discount Domains one of the benefits of obtaining a domain name is that it gives SMEs "an online presence" but the company says that "many of the domain names have gone already".

Managing director of Discount Domains, Adrian Lawrence, said: "It gives [SMEs] an online presence associated with whatever name they choose – you can have the brand connected to the name."

He added that one of the reasons that domain names are being snapped up so quickly is that the whole of the English speaking world can buy them.

"In this case, it's more about what names are available depending on what your business identity is," explained Adrian.

However, Discount Domains did note that the price of domain names has fallen "a lot", with a new domain name costing in the region of between £10 and £20, compared to £90 seven or eight years ago.

Domaininformer.com reported last month that DotAsia, the organisation responsible for administrating the new domain suffix ".asia", has received a total of 266,663 applications within the first 24 hours of sales opening.

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