In late September 2015, a Google employee discovered that the Google domain was available for sale. He purchased the domain to see if it really was possible to buy that domain. Although he remained the owner for all of 5 minutes, this story goes to show the importance of renewing your domain on time.
At Rhys Welsh Web Design Cardiff, we highly recommend that you set your domain names to auto-renew. Here are 5 good reasons to do so.
In late September 2015, a Google employee discovered that the Google domain was available for sale. He purchased the domain to see if it really was possible to buy that domain. Although he remained the owner for all of 5 minutes, this story goes to show the importance of renewing your domain on time.
At Rhys Welsh Web Design Cardiff, we highly recommend that you set your domain names to auto-renew. Here are 5 good reasons to do so.
Ensure your website is never down
Sure, you get a grace period to renew your website after it expires. However, in many instances, the expired domain’s nameservers are changed to “parking pages”.
The result?
All connected services to your domain such as your email and of course your website will stop functioning.
Even if this is a temporary setback, imagine the kind of impression it would create on your customers! They might begin to question your credibility and in fact, may choose to never do business with you.
Now, that’s definitely not worth risking, is it?
You keep your existing domain
By not setting your domain on auto-renewal, you are exposing yourself to the most obvious and the biggest risk. Once your domain expires completely, it is available for anyone to take.
In case you forget to renew, you still have a 30-day grace period. However, if you forget to renew even during this period, your website will be put back on the market.
Consider the immediate effects of losing your domain name. You will have to make changes to your business cards and stationery. If your domain has a good ranking, you lose all that traffic juice and the hard work.
Don’t let your hard work in your competitors’ lap
In the case of Google, the one who registered the domain was an employee who did it out of curiosity. What if your domain is being followed by a competitor who is just waiting for exactly this kind of opportunity?
So unless you want your competition to reap dividends from your hard work, consider auto-renewing your domain name.
Stay away from malware scare or extortion
What if the third party registering your domain has an ulterior motive?
Perhaps they may want to lure your visitors with a view to injective malware. Or they might demand a ransom or an insane amount to resell the domain back to you.
Well, that’s what happened to Dell in June 2017. Dell forgot renewing its domain name for a site they use for storing system recovery backups of their customers. A German company that specialises in typosquatting traffic claimed the domain, and Dell lost that domain forever.
In conclusion
Auto-renewal is the easiest and the most obvious way to keep your domain with you. Need help setting up auto-renewal? Get in touch with Rhys Welsh Web Design Cardiff today for assistance.