The 9rules blogging network site was offline yesterday for a while. The cause – their domain name had expired and they had forgot to renew it.
Is that careless of the 9rules team? Yes. If my domain name expired, probably a few people might notice. But the bigger, more popular and high traffic site, particulary a blogging network fails to renew their domain name, people notice it well enough… and tell them about it.
What does 9rules say? The official reason is was that the contact email used to register the domain over 3 years ago is no longer used. So they failed to recieve the notices for an expiring domain, and requests for renewal.
What lessons do we learn?
You register a new domain name from your favourite domain name registrar for a few years and forget about it. But your contact detail changes, your email address changes over the years… Remember to update your contact details and email address as it changes. Your domain name is a prized possession which you nurture and develop with care over the years. The registrar sends notices affecting your domain name status to your contact address, including renewal notices and domain expiry warnings.
Remember there are people waiting to snatch your domain name, many might have already backordered your domain and Domain Name Brokers are already on lookout to buy domains you always wanted.
Would you not update your bank contact details if your postal address changed? Then why not update your domain name details… it brings you an identity, traffic, a virtual life and of course advertising revenue too!
I remember when the Official Google Blogger Blog got deleted by mistake!