Elaine asks:
When I obtained my Domain Name of domainname.com.au from Melbourne IT when I first started back in 2014, I was ‘advised’ to secure domainname.net and domainname.com too, to prevent ‘others’ from setting up a similar website.
The .com.au is the one I use for my website and my email is [email protected]
I think now I’ve been paying quite a lot to keep two other domain names for no real good reason.
Would really appreciate advice (if possible) as to whether it would be ok to ‘ditch’ the other two, to save $s or whether the original advice about securing them is sound.
In case it’s not obvious, I’ve edited Elaine’s actual domain names for this article.
The quick answer: You don’t need more than one domain name, drop the others.
The long answer: Maybe you need them?
Here’s five reasons you might want to hold onto old, other, or extra domain names:
Legacy brands
I used to brand my business “Married By Josh”, until everyone did the same gag, so I moved to just plain old Josh Withers. But That old brand still hangs around, websites linked to me, people had my old email address “[email protected]” and clients knew me as that name. So I’ll hang on to marriedbyjosh.com for the longest time.
Search engine optimisation
A celebrant retired last year and they let a strong domain name expire, so I grabbed it and redirected it to my website. In search engine optimisation world – SEO – you buy old domain names and hold on to them for backlink powers. This answer also sits with the first, because if you have a legacy brand it’s probably been linked to.
Secure your brand name
Years ago my wife Britt and I started a business called “The Pop-Up Wedding Co.” and built a nice little business. Loads of other people thought it was a cool idea too so they bought other domain names around that brand and started their own. When we pivoted to The Elopement Collective, before I told a soul outside of my intimate friends group I bought every domain name under the sun that was linked to that name, plus we registered it as a trademark because securing that brand was important to us.
People mistype domain names
There is some wisdom in buying a .com because you also have the .com.au because honestly, sometimes people mistype things. Or they even just say the wrong thing. It’s like that news website that people always quote by saying “I saw it on news dot com”. I know for a fact you did not see anything on news.com because that’s owned by ZDNet and isn’t a functioning website. You saw the news on news.com.au but you say news.com … if that was my business and brand I’d be stressed.
Bad actors impersonate people and businesses online
People do bad things, so sometimes securing the .com of a .com.au means you reduce the number of ways people can impersonate you. I, for example have joshwithers.com.au but I don’t own the NZ version, joshwithers.co.nz, so someone could try and impersonate me by registering that domain name and some people might be tricked.
In the end you can spend your life’s savings trying to protect against these measures, but you could also not worry about any of them and live a good life a few dollars better off a year.
Thanks Josh! Lots of good info which has helped my decision making 🙂
I’m so new to this game I hadn’t even thought about having more than one Domain name or people impersonating you. You make so many great points in this article Josh. The search engine optimisation and securing your brand name make perfect sense. I’m almost finished my Cert IV… so watch out Domain names, here I come!
Hi Josh, I Hope you have some time to answer my question on where to register my .com business to just au .
I believe we have until the 22nd August 2022 to do this change so your business name can not be bought and changed to the au.
I got my Domain via your suggestion through Hover Domain in Toronto which I hope is still the best as you did advise your members to join with them.
Okay. josh if you could please advise me on where to go and register this I’d appreciate it as time is ticking.
Cheers Jude
Hi Judith, I registered my .au domain names with VentraIP 🙂
Hi Josh, I Hope you have some time to answer my question on where to register my .com business to just au .
I believe we have until the 22nd August 2022 to do this change so your business name can not be bought and changed to the au.
I got my Domain via your suggestion through Hover Domain in Toronto which I hope is still the best as you did advise your members to join with them.
Okay. josh if you could please advise me on where to go and register this I’d appreciate it as time is ticking.
Cheers Jude