DomainTools Blog

After a horrible launch last week of reserving all domain names on Network Solutions before a customer even ordered them, Network Solution started making improvements to the forward reservation service. I privately offered 4 unsolicited suggestions to a few Vice Presidents at Network Solutions.

1) Don’t register Name Servers with the domain (Avoid leaking the ideas).
2) Ask the consumer IF they intend on register a domain and IF they can guarantee payment.
3) Allow them to Opt in before searching.
4) Allow the consumer the ability to delete the domain being held in the AGP.

The first concept is the most important. When leaking customer intent or an idea of a potential registration, Network Solution was broadcasting information that was more hurtful then helpful to their own customers. In less then a week, commercial services specifically targeted the leaking data had popped up to mine Network Solutions customers. To steal the ideas of their customers and trade their ideas like fruit at the Sunday Market. I am glad to report all leaks have stopped, a domain is now registered with the status of Client-Hold meaning that Verisign doesn’t report the domain in the zone file and broadcast the idea to the world.

The second concept was straight forward, only register domains for people that want to buy the domains. If a person was performing a whois request and the domain was available that was not enough evidence to secure the domain and reserve it. Network Solution directly stopped registering all domains on their whois page. They only register domains of their customers in the shopping cart process now.

The third concept seems the most obvious, allow customers to choose ahead of time if Network Solutions would register and hold a domain as a reservation. Network Solution has not enabled this yet however a spokesperson for Network Solution said, “we are working on developing an option for the customer to choose whether to have the searched domain reserved”.

My final suggestion was to allow people to escape the process and go register the domain at a registrar of their choice. Two people can be on the phone call talking about domain names and if one person is checking ideas at Network Solutions that would lock the guy with the wallet from purchasing the domain at another registrar. The customer should have the right to delete the reservation. I was told this had changed since last week. Last week, Customer Support told me the domain would be available again in 4 days and there was nothing they could do to help me clear the domain off their system, I would just have to wait it out if I wanted to register it somewhere else. This week when I called in I was told the domain could be deleted in 6-8 hours but the issue had to escalated. Instant deletion is a big deal, there is nothing more overwhelming then the feeling of being held hostage. If Network Solutions can register the domain in 5 milliseconds, then why can’t the support team delete the domain in under 5 minutes.

Overall, Network Solutions accomplished 2 1/2 of the 4 suggestions I gave them. I am hopefully that all 4 will be accomplished in the next few weeks. This reservation service reminded me of how Site Finder was launched. A huge change with no advanced polling on how people would react to the service. I believe Site Finder could have been launched and stayed a service had Verisign launched it correctly. The Network Solutions forward reservation system is a good idea but not when it broadcasts customer ideas to the world, has no opt-out, and gobbles every idea on the whois page. Customers deserve to opt-in to such a service and be made aware of it before hand.

I applaud Network Solutions on acting quickly and making changes.

I am confirming that Network Solutions steals domain ideas when people check domain availability on the Network Solutions website. They seem to have started the practice of stealing domain ideas on December 16th 2007 according to our Domain History database but I was just made aware of this practice today. I am appalled at the concept of taking people’s domain ideas and registering it before the consumer has the ability to manually register the domain.

It is a deplorable action that Network Solution would announce potential domain names to the entire world. If a customer chooses not to register the domain name with Network Solution they are forced to wait 4 days for Network Solutions to delete the domain name in the Free Add Grace period. After the four day hostage period the consumer is free from the hostage situation and can register the domain somewhere else. However Network Solutions has now exposed those domains to Domain Tasters that will snipe those domain up milliseconds after Network Solutions deletes them. By registering the domain Network Solutions is exposing the domain in the DNS and every computer in the world now knows about the domain. These domains are now easy fodder for scammers and it is mind blowing that Network Solutions would expose their customers queries to the world in this manner.

Domain has never been registered before:

Network Solutions is now the best friend of Domain Snipers and Spys. I tested the system by going to Network Solutions and looking up the availability of Neiman Marcus Verizon.com. Sure enough the domain was available to be registered, however when I check the whois it now said it was taken by Network Solutions. I was not able to register the domain at GoDaddy.

Network Solutions says it is available:

Network Solutions sets up a website on the domain:

The domain is now registered to Network Solutions, LLC

Network Solutions really screwed up on this one. The exposer of their customers was put before corporate profit on this one. If you use Network Solutions to check if a domain is available they will literally register the domain without your knowledge and hold it hostage for 4 days with a price tag of $34.99.

This easily makes Network Solutions the worst Registrar in the world. I hope that they cease this activity immediately as this has given them the worst black eye and makes the entire industry look bad. They actually think they are doing customers favors with this little dirty trick. These guys are clueless!

UPDATE: Network Solution has made some improvements.

Want to place an ad inside your own whois record? Network Solutions has decided to offer this service to all their customers. Instead of just displaying contact information and your address you can now place whatever text you want inside the record. This, “Enhanced Business Listing” allows owners to place more descriptive text inside their whois record. When anyone looked up the whois record they would see your opening sales pitch before they even approach you about buying your domain. Sounds like a great idea to me. The listing costs $12 a year, which seems a bit expensive to me but I am sure people will buy it. Buy why would you buy this service if you also bought Whois Privacy? Read Network Solutions full press release about the service. If you are trying to protect your information then this is not the service for you. Whois Privacy and this service are completely opposite each other. For more information on the Enhanced Business Listing service check out their page on it.

The weird part about this service is that you are advertising on your own whois record, why should it cost money to advertise on your own record?

What would be a more valuable service would be if they verified information about your company and put that in the whois. Such as, Registered Doctor in New York City. If the registrar could authenticate claims I can guarantee Search Engines would use those authenticated claims and boost the sites in their index based on those claims. Now that would be an enhanced whois service! I pitched that exact service to Network Solutions about 3 years ago.

Network Solution and eNom domain names that expire or delete will be landing in a new auction house this afternoon. The brand new NameJet appears to be a joint venture between eNom and Network Solutions. It appears eNom owns the NameJet.com domain name or at least controls it and Network Solutions owns the NameJet Trademark. The company NameJet, LLC was registered in Delaware on Oct 3rd. Traditionally domain names from those two domain companies have gone through Snapnames prior to deleting. Network Solutions started the process a few years ago when Snapnames struck a deal to be the primary auction place for all expiring domain names that Network Solutions was letting delete. Then earlier this year eNom’s deleting domain names started appearing at Snapnames.

NameJet is launching this afternoon, you can be assured that they are actively talking to other registrars to join the program. Snapnames was the first and biggest Pending Delete auction marketplace, I think it will be a matter of time before NameJet takes that title. The company that controls the Network Solution deleting domains controls the market. NameJet seems to have come out of no where and is moving fast. The caliber of Network Solutions domains is awesome because most of the generic domain names where registered at Network Solutions back before the multiple registrar system was invented.

Taryn Naidu was the past president of Pool.com joined eNom last year around November. It would be likely that Taryn is the project leader for NameJet. Paul Stahura was quoted last year saying, “Taryn is a true domain name player whose expertise coupled with his solid reputation is very valuable. We have our sights set on growing the aftermarket business, and with Taryn’s experience, we can implement our new aftermarket strategy.”

I will keep everyone posted as more details of NameJet come out.

UPDATE: It appears the NameJet is live. ClubDrop has moved its auctions to NameJet.com. ClubDrop is dead, long live NameJet.

This is not good news for Oversee.net. Oversee.net just purchased Snapnames for $35 Million and it looks like their investment is going to go south very quickly. Network Solutions has filed for a trademark on NameJet, a service that will feature that same services Network Solutions current partner Snapnames is providing. For the guys that cashed out of Snapnames they had perfect timing or perhaps they awoke the sleeping whale by not offering the company to them. Network Solutions may have been angry they were not consulted or offered the Snapnames sale. Since most of the value of Snapnames is locked up around Network Solutions expiring domains it will be interesting to see this play out.

The domain name NameJet.com was purchased off of Afternic a while ago and it stands to reason that purchase was by the first registrar, the almighty Network Solutions. While the domain is currently at eNom the chance that eNom is involved in the new service seems remote. I talked with a high level source at eNom and they had no idea what NameJet was. I would expect Network Solutions to make an announcement soon that all expiring domains inside Network Solutions will no longer Transfer-Fulfill through Snapnames.

Snapnames has a patent pending on what they do with Network Solutions, so I wonder if that will stop Network Solutions or if Network Solutions will fight the patent before it is finalized.

This was first spotted by trademark watcher TradeMork.

I had to post this, Candice Michelle (”The GoDaddy Girl”) was at Traffic this week. She was signing autographs and was posing for pictures with GoDaddy fans. Hey Bob, thanks for sending Candice. Customers like it when the company they do business sends their superbowl superstars to take pictures with them. It makes them feel in touch.

It made me chuckle a little that the other registrars are being out marketed by GoDaddy. GoDaddy has been the leader in new registrations for several years in a row. We have reported year after year that GoDaddy is the clear leader, there are no registrars that even come close to the amount of registrations GoDaddy does on a daily bases.

Let me explain why GoDaddy is winning.

A while back I had the pleasure to dine with Jim Sinegal the CEO of Costco. Costco has a Market Cap of over $25 Billion. Jim explained that they have a 3% profit margin and that they mark up their prices by 10%. That 7% goes to paying employees, covering real estate, and paying other operational costs. I asked the devil’s advocate question, “why doesn’t Costco mark up by one extra percent and make a 4% profit. This would increase Costco’s profit by 33%”! This would make Costco worth an extra 7 Billion. Jim remarked it would be easy to do and most likely customers would not notice or care that much either. It seems like a win-win for everyone, but wait then he explained the finer points and the reason he doesn’t do it. Jim said an extra percent is like Crack Cocaine and that the shareholders would get addicted and demand it. An extra percent here, an extra percent there, and several years later they would be in a bad spot. The company would be so addicted they would not be able to go back to 3%. This leaves the door wide open for competition. Someone else would start a competitor and before you know it they would be eating Costco’s lunch. If a company can stay with low margins and still offer excellent customer service then no one would enter the market against that company.

Network Solutions had the chance to keep everyone out. They could have lowered prices back in 1999 from $35 to $10. Network Solutions had 100% market share in 1999, not many companies can say that or even dream that, but now it has 7.6% of the market. Had they lowered prices to one dollar over costs they would surely be at 85% market share right now and several of the registrars in the market would not exist or even have been formed. Network Solutions let over 90% of the market escape because they were addicted to the $26 profit per domain.

GoDaddy is the closest business model of all the registrars to Costco. But then again Costco does not have Candice Michelle.

UPDATE: We have added a LOT more detail to our last post about the last live domain auction. We did not have time to write a thorough review yesterday but we wanted to post the prices as they happened so I encourage you to read it again.