I can talk myself into a $12 domain pretty easily. I like the name, I can think of a business that might use it, and the price is low enough that I don’t spend much time questioning it. Even if I’m wrong, it’s twelve bucks.
But I’m not necessarily spending twelve bucks. I’m adding another annual expense to my portfolio, and there’s a good chance I’ll be paying it more than once.
That’s the part I think we tend to leave out when we’re registering names. We look at what it costs to get the domain today. We don’t give nearly as much thought to how long we might own it or what we’ll spend while waiting for a buyer.
At $12 a year, a domain you keep for five years has cost you $60, assuming the price doesn’t increase. That’s still not a huge amount of money. But register 100 of them and you’ve committed $1,200 to the first year alone. Keep renewing the whole group for five years and you’ve spent $6,000. Now the names have to produce some sales just to cover what you’ve paid your registrar.
I’m not against hand registrations. I still look for them, and I still get interested when something decent is available. But finding an available name and finding a name worth carrying for several years are two different things. I can come up with a possible use for almost anything. That doesn’t mean somebody is going to pay me for it.
A name can make sense for a business without being a name a business would buy on the aftermarket. Maybe there are plenty of similar names available. Maybe the wording is a little awkward. Maybe I like it because I’ve spent twenty minutes convincing myself it’s good.
The $12 price makes it easy to overlook all of that. If the same domain were listed by another investor for $100, would I even consider it? Or would I immediately notice everything wrong with it?
Then the renewal notice shows up, and I go through the argument again. It only needs one buyer. I haven’t owned it that long. I’d hate to drop it and see somebody else sell it. Another twelve bucks buys me another year to find out.
None of those thoughts tells me much about whether the domain deserves to be renewed.
With NotRenewing, the whole idea is giving owners a chance to sell names they’ve decided they don’t want to renew. There are plenty of reasons for that decision. A name might be good but no longer fit the owner’s plans. Someone might need to reduce expenses or put money toward better inventory. Dropping a domain doesn’t automatically mean buying it was foolish.
But I do think we could save ourselves some money by making the renewal decision part of the purchase decision.
Before registering a name, ask yourself whether you’d be comfortable paying for three years upfront. You don’t actually have to register it for three years. Just consider whether you like it enough to spend $36 instead of $12. If that changes your answer, it’s worth figuring out why.
I’d also look at the renewals you already have coming. Ten new registrations might seem harmless until you remember the fifty names you’re still trying to decide what to do with. Buying more is usually more enjoyable than reviewing those.
You don’t need to know exactly when a domain will sell. Nobody does. But you should have some idea of how much you’re willing to spend waiting.
The next time I catch myself saying “it’s only twelve bucks,” I need to look at my portfolio and count how many times I’ve already said that. Those names will all be back on the bill next year unless I do something with them first.