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All The Best Names HAD Gone ...
Now They're Back Again!
By Lee Hodgson
A year ago the terms "expiring domains" and "on hold domains" were only known to industry insiders. Nowadays, if you don't know your "soon to drop" from your "just expired" you're
considered way behind the domain times. So what do all these arcane phrases mean, and more importantly, why should you care?
You should care because expiring domains are now THE PLACE to look for the best domain
names. We all know that trying to register a new dot com name is a tortuous and often fruitless process. You start off with grand visions of registering 'BestName.com' but after spending a frustrating hour being told
the names you want are already registered, you either end up registering 'eBestName4U.com' or nothing at all. But there is a better way...
Around 80% to 90% of domain names are inactive. Many are or were being
held by domain speculators who thought they would get rich registering hundreds of names - and haven't been able to get rid of them. Some were being held by site developers for future development. Others by big business
who often can't even remember having registered them in the first place. The good news is that for these very reasons, a huge number of these names, currently averaging more than 20,000 every day, are being returned to
the available name pool. Why so? Simply because the original registrant hasn't paid to renew them. When this happens, most names are put on hold for approximately 45 days, after which they are available to be registered
again by anyone.
So based on the absence of good available dot coms, and the massive number of names expiring, the industry is booming. But the question is: how do you take advantage of this situation and
register these expiring domains? And how do you possibly know when names you might like are about to expire? To answer the second question first, you need to subscribe to an expiring domains service. Domainsbot - http://www.domainsbot.com
- are currently the market leaders, and have been featured in the NY Times and USA Today. For a monthly subscription fee, they allow you to search through millions of domain names that are on hold, soon to expire, or expired. They also e-mail you new names twice a day. What this means is you are getting up-to-the-minute information on the registration status of all the dot coms, dot nets, and dot orgs in existence. And if you have a web site, they even have a new service called Live Expiring Domains(TM) which lets you display the latest and greatest expiring domains free of charge. You can sign up here:
http://www.domainsbot.com/led/agreement.asp
The second part of the puzzle is the actual registration of any names you might want. Bear in mind that whilst some of these names might be only useful to you, most of the decent names will be sought by several parties.
To give yourself the best chance of grabbing the names you want you need to use a 'name-grabbing' service. The only real player at the moment is SnapNames ( http://www.snapnames.com/index.jsp?affiliateID=26)
who provide an excellent service called SnapBack(TM). You can put a SnapBack on any name/s you choose, and when that name becomes available for registration, SnapNames will attempt to register it for you. They cannot
guarantee a successful registration, but they have excellent technology, and if they do happen to fail, you can transfer the SnapBack to any other name free of charge. So you are guaranteed of getting a name with every
Snap-Back order you place. What's more, they are currently putting in place technologies and partnerships that should radically increase the efficacy of any SnapBack subscription. It should be interesting to watch.
Glossary of Terms(A great graphic explaining the typical life cycle of a domain name can be found at http://www.snapnames.com/expiredlistPartners.html)
Expired domain
- A domain that has been released for re-registration because the original registrant did not pay to renew it.Expiring (on hold) domain
- A domain name that has passed its original expiry date without the renewal fee being paid by the current registrant. There is normally a grace period of around 40 days before the name becomes 'soon to drop' (see below).
Soon to drop (soon to expire) domain - A domain name that is known to be dropping in the next five to six days. Dropping domain - A domain name that is just about to expire. Name grabbing
- Competing with other parties to registering a dropping domain. ### If you are interested in registering international domains, please visit our new service at: http://international.domainguidebook.com
For quality domain appraisals by domain professionals for just $14.95 visit: http://appraisals.domainguidebook.com
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