Buying domains

[Bronze]

In regards to buying domains, I'm obviously going to buy the .com and .co.uk

I'm not fussed about the .net .org .info etc

But for example if your business name was redcar would you buy the following :

redcar.com redcar.co.uk
red-car.com red-car.co.uk
redcars.com redcars.co.uk
red-cars.com red-cars.co.uk

The reason I ask is because I've done a bit of homework on various web domains and you'll find that if a business has just a .com or a .co.uk of one type the others are bought by domain parkers and set up with adverts which are of the same nature of that business. (hope that makes sense)

I'm not sure how much impact domain parking has on a business with domains parked similar to yours. To be honest I'm much more interested in making sure that all customers get to my site if they assume it's a different combination for example with a hyphen or plural.

Having said that I would've thought most people google search for a website so parked domains are of minimal worry.

Just wondering what peoples general views are on this.
There is one example where a company has a .com and when I checked the same name with a hyphen, it was a chinese company selling in the same market!

The domain name I was after is in the singular version (redcar) so I'm thinking of buying this as .com .co.uk and with the hyphen versions but just wondering if I should buy the plural versions also?

Thanks

 

[MASSEY]

If you have you biz trademarked then there is nothing they could do except park them anyway. Or use them in a non commercial sense.

I personally just buy the .co.uk and .com for things. I think it's a waste of money to buy the others.

I wouldn't even buy the hyphens to be honest.

You will have a live site and rank for your business name with ease, you will have business named in pointing links.

_____________________

On the other hand if you have a niche exact match then buying the hyphens is a good idea. Even buying extensions such as .info .net and .org is a good idea if it is a keyword domain and you don't want other people getting the phrase seo bonus in competion with you.

 

[5wire]

If you have you biz trademarked then there is nothing they could do except park them anyway. Or use them in a non commercial sense.

I personally just buy the .co.uk and .com for things. I think it's a waste of money to buy the others.

I wouldn't even buy the hyphens to be honest.

You will have a live site and rank for your business name with ease, you will have business named in pointing links.

_____________________

On the other hand if you have a niche exact match then buying the hyphens is a good idea. Even buying extensions such as .info .net and .org is a good idea if it is a keyword domain and you don't want other people getting the phrase seo bonus in competion with you.

Yeh I agree, although if you think somebody could try compete with you, using the hyphen then you could potentially purchase them.

 

[thebiznizdotcom]

Usually you can pick these up cheap enough anyway. I agree with others that say there might not be any threat but for the money you might as well have your bases covered. Just a thought.

 

[KateCB]

Cover the bases - prime example.
When I started karate-kid.co.uk in 1999 that is the URL I bought - the karatekid.co.uk wasn't available, and frankly I was so busy getting the business up and running I never thought about it again, until 6 years later when a regular customer emailed me to tell me that if I went to karatekid.co.uk then it would take me to a different site, selling exactly the same type of martial arts goods - I checked and found that someone had purchased the domain, then re-directed it to THEIR martial arts supplies website, therefore diverting my customers who omitted the hyphen.....

I ask the domain owner if I could buy it from him and basically he was extremely rude and vulgar. I then talked to a solicitor, who said that I COULD sue for 'passing off' and would need to show what traffic I had lost due to this, however with regular customers reporting it, I would have a strong case for 'cease, desist and sell to me' against the domain owner. Cost of this - about 8k - lot of money in 2005 for a small company.

I decided to ignore it, as I couldn't afford that at that time; the company using the url went bust in 2007, and we didn't see a notable decline in sales, only an increase in people emailing to tell us about this other site, which they knew wasn't ours as in their words ' it wasn't as nice' as ours

If I bought a new URL NOW, I would cover my bases!

 

[WebSensei]

When buying/thinking of a domain name for business use, I alway's use the radio test. Imagine a customer hearing the words '...visit red car dot co dot uk'. When that customer is next sat at their computer and they recall your ad, what will they type? most likely redcar.co.uk.

But if your ad said '...visit red, forward slash, car dot co dot uk' some will type 'redcar.co.uk' who could be a competitor.

For domains which contain 'normal words', its worth paying a few extra quid for a plural. For brandable 'non-words' its less of an issue. As mentioned before, these can be trademarked for some extra protection.

 

[astutiumRob]

If you are intending to *use* the domain variant with the hyphens for branding/readability reasons, then yes, you should always get the alternatives without the hyphens.
Otherwise you'll lose traffic (and clients which is more important) when people mistype, dont recall the exact spelling or simply dont expect the hyphenated version.

 

[coolfogdaisyliu]

My company's domain ends with net. because the com sold out .

 

[Bronze]

Thanks for the input.

Next question, where's the best place to buy them from?

Google brings up a whole load of companies and I'm tempted to go with the cheapest but I read somewhere that some domain companies don't register the domain in your name? Does that matter?

 

[MASSEY]

123 reg is the best for domain purchase. Very easy.

Don't use them for hosting though (they are bad)

 

[ecenica]

Google brings up a whole load of companies and I'm tempted to go with the cheapest but I read somewhere that some domain companies don't register the domain in your name? Does that matter?

Yes. As you may suspect it certainly does matter. Make sure the domain is registered in your name and/or business name.

You might have also seen something called domain name privacy, or WHOIS privacy. This service still registers the domain name to your name, but uses a special proxy address to hide your personal information from the public WHOIS database. This is useful to prevent spammers and scammers getting your details. The key thing here is again, the domain name is still registered in your name and your property for as long as you keep renewing your domain name.

As to domain name companies to register your domain name with. It's really a case of you get what you pay for. And of course, there are plenty of UK web hosting and domain name companies on this forum.

 

[WebSensei]

For .co.uk domains, use 123reg - cheap and pretty straight forward process.

For .com/.org/.net use GoDaddy - they normally work out slightly cheaper because of the dollar conversion, but best of all, they always have deals like 30% off .com's etc. Just search for 'GoDaddy Coupon Codes'.

But remember NOT to sign up to any of their hosting/email packages.

There are much better UK based hosts. All you will need to do is to change your DNS records at 123reg/GoDaddy to host with someone else. Again, this is relatively straight forward as most hosts have a video tutorial which shows you the exact steps in both 123reg/GoDaddy.

 

[Bronze]

Thanks everyone for the help.

 

[ecenica]

Anyone thinking of registering a domain name with US firm Godaddy might first want to Google "godaddy elephant"...

Still dumbfounded as to what Bob and GoDaddy were thinking when they posted that video...

 

[Bronze]

Anyone thinking of registering a domain name with

Still dumbfounded as to what Bob and GoDaddy were thinking when they posted that video...

According to the articles (wether you believe it or not), the elephant was killed and used for meat by the local villagers.

I'm not sure what the difference is between this and a country like ours which mass slaughters animals on a daily basis for the high street supermarkets. It's all part of the foodchain.

I could only see people finding issue if the elephant was killed purely for it's ivory.

 

[ecenica]

I'm not sure what the difference is between this and a country like ours which mass slaughters animals on a daily basis for the high street supermarkets. It's all part of the food-chain.

I gather he paid something like $10k to kill the elephant. He also says himself that it was his second hunting trip in so many years.

Right or wrongly. Ignoring the moral basis of whether to shoot an elephant of not. What interests me is what would make a company think there was any PR benefit of showing their CEO strutting around with a gun whilst a dead elephant lies at his feet?

I think it says more about the corporate culture of Godaddy then anything else. Will we ever see Steve Jobs, Gates or the likes of Richard Branson strutting around with a 12-bore shotgun?

Sorry to go so off topic!

 

[Bronze]

I gather he paid something like $10k to kill the elephant. He also says himself that it was his second hunting trip in so many years.

Right or wrongly. Ignoring the moral basis of whether to shoot an elephant of not. What interests me is what would make a company think there was any PR benefit of showing their CEO strutting around with a gun whilst a dead elephant lies at his feet?

I think it says more about the corporate culture of Godaddy then anything else. Will we ever see Steve Jobs, Gates or the likes of Richard Branson strutting around with a 12-bore shotgun?

Sorry to go so off topic!

I fully agree, everything you've said is spot on.

That's the beauty of forums, talk of domains to elephant hunting in the same thread and no one will batt an eyelid.

 

[ecenica]

That's the beauty of forums, talk of domains to elephant hunting in the same thread and no one will batt an eyelid.

LOL that did make me chuckle!

All the best,

Rich.

 

[KateCB]

I use uk2.net or my webhost........ if I use uk2.net there is charge to move them to my webhost, which wipes out any savings on their good pricing - talk to your webhost, they offer them usually as part of their service, they don't make much as there is little in it.

 

[blue0510]

namecheap.com are much easier to deal with than godaddy , there are loads of rumours on the web of godaddy stealing domains whilst you check out they really are just not worth it

the checkout process takes about 15 minutes whilst they try and trick you into buying every add on they can think of.

so my 2p says no go daddy

 

[E Shop Hosts]

there are loads of rumours on the web of godaddy stealing domains whilst you check out they really are just not worth it

Lots of domain sellers/hosts do this, if you check the availability of a ##.co.uk and it appears to be a good domain and the .com version is available then they will register the .com domain for themselves.

The cheapest domain sellers aren't always the best for this reason.

 

[ecenica]

Lots of domain sellers/hosts do this, if you check the availability of a ##.co.uk and it appears to be a good domain and the .com version is available then they will register the .com domain for themselves..

This is very interesting. Can you cite any examples of this?

 

[Bronze]

Anyone had any experience with buying domains from dreamhost?
Seem to be the best price for .com at present with all the extras included.
Godaddy are cheaper but that's counteracted by the extra 8.99 for whois privacy.

 

[Miley Tipton]

hi,
I am little conscious in buying domain because it should be easily memorable. like .com

 

[E Shop Hosts]

This is very interesting. Can you cite any examples of this?

Hi ecenica,

Have stumbled accross quite a few reports of this over the years, unfortunately I can't post links to examples due to not having 15 posts yet.

Try a Google search of 'hijacking user domain searches' and you will see a few examples.

 

[astutiumRob]

Still dumbfounded as to what Bob and ...

At the very least it got you to mention them 3 times in a single forum post ...

 

[MASSEY]

Hi ecenica,

Have stumbled accross quite a few reports of this over the years, unfortunately I can't post links to examples due to not having 15 posts yet.

Try a Google search of 'hijacking user domain searches' and you will see a few examples.

I would not of thought godaddy would do that.

It's funny because i was thinking a few months ago that they probably do log your domain searches and get tempted to reg the really valuable ones. If there is any left that is.

 

[cambridgegadgetguru]

afternic.com is a good site to find out about domains and try to sell some but its hard work very few sell for a profit, protect your brand by buying all endings you can afford even mispellings or squatters get them and may put porn on them which is bad for your brand. i have some domains for sale on my blog beingahuman

 

[Bronze]

Just out of interest why can you only register .co.uk domains for 2 years at a time?

 

[TotalWebSolutions]

Just out of interest why can you only register .co.uk domains for 2 years at a time?

This is the standard registration period imposed by Nominet who are the governing body for all .uk domains. Top Level domains such as .com, net, .org etc will allow you to register for 1-10 years but Nominet is always 2 years at a time.

 

[ecenica]

At the very least it got you to mention them 3 times in a single forum post ...

Hmmm. Very good point.

Working for Ecenica Hosting not GD, I guess the least I should do now is mention Ecenica Hosting three times in a single forum post so as to address the balance back to Ecenica Hosting.

Oh. Regarding the question of why Nominet limit the registration to two years. We asked our Nominet rep, and she forwarded us to this paragraph on their website;

Renewing registrations on a regular basis helps to maintain the quality of data in our database. Having renewal dates also prompts registrants to release domain names that are no longer wanted. These domain names then become available for registration by others.
​

Rich.

 

[123dotvc]

FYI,

RedCars.com is up for auction at Flippa a very low reserve:

bit.ly/redcars