Keith Goodrum

This is truly a fun & exciting way to waste a serious amount of your time. Really it’s not, but it is a serious time bandit.

If you let your domain expire you might loose it. No really, someone might buy it because they have an idea for a website.

Then all your hard work building up the domain is gone down the drain. Well it’s not really gone because the next person will benefit from your link building, and PR.

Unfortunately, not all people want your domain for their new website.

You see, there are people (and I use this term lightly) out there who make money off this situation. They’ll grab your domain & hold it hostage try to sell it back to you.

So for kicks, I decided to let a domain expire. Don’t ask my why… I’m just funny that way.

The Journey Begins

The first thing I did when I realized my domain expired was to see if I could get it back. It had expired at 10:30am, and it was now 5pm. It couldn’t be gone that fast. I mean it was only a few hours.

Nope it was already grabbed by someone.

So, I had to wait…

In a couple of days this person(again I use this term lightly) had slapped up a MFA site. MFA stands for Made For Adsense. Basically, it’s a sites with no content, and adsence links everywhere.

And this one was no different… links everywhere. They also put a link at the bottom telling the visitor this domain maybe for sale. Of course this link is mainly for the person who just lost the domain… Me!

So, I clicked on the link and went to a page which said:

We have your domain, and if you pay us ransom we will return it to you safe and sound.

Opps, did I say that out loud?

What they really said was:

This domain maybe be for sale & if you ever want to see those back links again… you’ll pay $XXXX.XX amount… or else!

NO WAIT! That’s not what it said…

Here’s what it really said:

This domain maybe available for sale. Please contact the…

RAT BASTARD WHO SNAKED IT OUT FROM UNDER YOU!

No, no sorry… sorry… that’s not what it said.

Anyhow, you get the picture. The ransom price was considerably more than a domain renewal.

There’s no way I’m I paying that much to get the domain back

At this point I didn’t know what to do and figured it was lost forever. But, then I remembered reading that sometimes these people would just reserve a domain for a few weeks and let it go if it didn’t sell. I decided to wait and see what would happen.

After some time passed, I went to see if it was released… No such luck. Apparently this person was waiting it out convinced I would cough-up the ransom asking price.

Not sure what to do next… I waited some more. Then I remembered Jeff Herring had a similar experience. And since I was a member of his AMTC membership I thought I’d ask what he did. It was a few weeks until the Q&A, so more waiting.

Stay with me here… all this waiting is important.

I asked my questions, and Jeff gave me some ideas. Then one of the other members Pat Shanks pointed me to an article on Ezine Articles. It said you could get a domain back by contacting your domain register within 30 days.

Guess what?

Yep, I had waited past the 30 days. Oh well, time to move on.

Fast forward to this past Friday

While on my domain register I decided to check for my lost domain name. Who knows maybe the person had given up and let it go. Hey, we can dream… can’t we?

I type in my domain name… and… and…

IT WAS FREE! I can’t believe it… it’s actually available! YES!

I quickly bought it. I was so excited… I got my domain back! I even Tweeted about it!

Now, all I had to do was wait for it to propagate and we are back online. Man I was jazzed…

You noticed I said jazzed… as in past tense. That’s because the next day when I typed the URL into the browser, it didn’t go to the landing page I had set up. It’s wasn’t working. And I didn’t know why…

Re-type the URL and bang… the same thing happens. It’s not going to my website. One more time… same results. What is going on here?

It turns out the I had misspelled the domain. I switched two letters… Two LETETRS! Not only did I not have my old domain, but now I had a misspelled version… just great.

At this point I threw in the towel, and gave up. That domain is gone.

So, what’s the moral of the story?

Don’t let your domains expire…

“Doh! How do you do that… Einstein?”

Simple:

1. Check to see if your domain register has email alerts, and sign up.

2. Actually pay attention to those emails. (I obviously didn’t)

3. See if your domain register will auto-magically renew your domains.

4. Put your domain expiration dates on your calender.

These are a few tips to help you remember when your domains expire. What about you? Do you have any tips you would like to share? Go ahead and leave them below.

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