I am currently going through two extreme pains with registrars on domains so I did some research and came up wit the following information.

What happens after a domain name “expires”For 40 days, the domain is in a grace period where all services are shut off, but the domain owner may still renew the domain for the standard renewal fee. After 40 days are up, the domain goes into a “redemption period”. During this phase, it will cost the owner additional fees to re-activate and re-register the domain. The average fee is around $150, depending on your registrar.  If a domain name enters the redemption period it is unlikely that it will be renewed. After the redemption period the domain goes into the true deletion phase. This phase is 5 days long, and on the last day between 11am and 2pm Pacific time, the name will officially drop from the ICANN database and will be available for registration/The entire process ends exactly 75 days after the listed expiration date.

Getting your domain

We know that domains are available to the general public 75 days after the expiration date, and there is the unpredictable three hour period of time in which the domain is deleted from VeriSign’s database and released back into the registry pool. There are three major services which specialize in hammering away on VeriSign’s servers during the drop period. The three companies are — Snapnames.com, Enom.com, and Pool.com — the all work in a similar manner. They use a network of registrars to hit the Verisign servers at frequent intervals and grab as many requested names as possible. If you don’t get your name, you don’t pay.

Snapnames.com

Snapnames.com (the exclusive partner of Network Solutions) charges you $60 for your domain unless there are multiple interested parties, at which point there is an open bid auction between all parties. Seems fair enough. Snapnames is a bit of a newcomer to the game, but with their Network Solutions affiliation, they are said to be improving their success rates.Snapnames has an exclusive partnership with Network Solutions which allows them first shot at any and all expiring domains that are currently held by Network Solutions. The domain I got was not held by Network Solutions but a great many are. If yours is, Snapnames is your best bet. You’ll still have to bid against any others who may be after the same domain, but the auction process at Snapnames is pretty fair and straightforward. If you are the only bidder, it will cost you a flat fee of $60. Not bad.

Enom.com

For over 6 years, ClubDrop has been eNom’s exclusive destination for aftermarket domain names, including Pending Delete and Pre-Release names. On October 5, 2007, eNom made these names available for auction at NameJet™, a new aftermarket auction venue which consolidates an exclusive inventory of deleted and expired domain names from top registrars including eNom, Bulk Register and Network Solutions.

Pool.com

Pool has a cool feature called Catch and Release. Catch and Release (C&R) is a fast and easy way to acquire available domains and assess their value prior to making a final purchase decision. 

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 15th, 2008 at 8:45 pm and is filed under Web Design. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.