Julianna
It’s no surprise that as a domain registrar, one of the things we are experts at is managing domains. So if I tell you that purchasing and transferring an aftermarket domain is easy, you might think it’s just because I work with Webnames.ca, but I recently had a chance to experience the process from a customer perspective, and it was a lot easier than you might imagine.
Purchasing an aftermarket domain from Sedo or Snapnames may seem confusing or too much of a hassle and the transfer process may make you nervous, but after doing both first hand for my own domain recently, I must say that both are easy to do, and you don’t have to be an expert user to do either.
With nearly every good one or two word .com taken, and .ca’s being such a hot commodity, it may seem like all the good domains are taken. When you find the perfect domain and someone else has it registered but it’s about to expire – what happens next? Using an aftermarket registrar like Sedo or Snapnames, you can bid for this domain right when it expires. All you need to do is create an account and find the domain you are interested in, then place your bid. If you are the only customer bidding for this particular domain, it will go directly to you for the agreed minimum fee (usually starting around $60 USD). If others are also interested, the domain enters into an auction, and you will have to bid for the domain.
How does the aftermarket domain auction work? You set your highest bid for the domain and if you are successful the domain is yours. A proxy bid system is used where everyone places their maximum bid and the service manages the bidding for you. You will be notified when the bidding starts, and if your maximum bid is exceeded, allowing you to make another higher bid if you are still interested. While I won my domain outright, a customer told me the auction is similar to bidding on eBay – you usually have your heart set on it and if you aren’t careful, you can go from paying a reasonable amount to way more than you wanted because you get excited about bidding. So keep in mind it’s best to set yourself a maximum price and stick to it.
In my case I was the only bidder, so I won my domain through Snapnames for the minimum bid straight out of the gate. Now came the hardest part for me, my domain was registered with a SnapNames registrar partner, and I didn’t want to keep my domain with them.
Because all of my other domains are registered with Webnames.ca, and I wanted to follow domain management best practices, I wanted all my domains with one registrar. When you register a domain for the first time and you want to transfer it, you must wait 60 days between the date you registered the domain and the date of transfer. While you could start to use the domain right away with your first registrar, I decided to I put a note in my calendar and wait 60 days until my domain was ready to go.
A month and a half later I logged into the account SnapNames had provided me with their registrar, checked to make sure my account was unlocked, wrote down my unique transfer ID and logged into my Webnames.ca account. I applied for a transfer, and within a few hours had received an email from Webnames.ca explaining next steps. All I had to do was respond to one more email and I was good to go. Within one week of initiating my transfer, my domain was in my Webnames.ca account, and ready for me to start using. The transfer process will take only 5-7 business days if you confirm the transfer (replying to the transfer confirmation email) on the same day it’s initiated.
From auction to transfer this was a completely painless process. I got the domain I wanted and transferred it to my preferred registrar in three easy steps..