Check your website domain expiry date and contacts
Recently I was asked to look at a website which had suddenly stopped working. The website owner, a small organisation, had tried contacting the website designer but there was no reply.
After several weeks they believed the website was down for good and were looking at options to replace it.
The website had been online for several years and ranked well in search engines. It had inbound links and the website address was printed on marketing material. The organisation had public email addresses on the domain, so anyone contacting them by email would find their email bounced or they wouldn’t get a reply.
My first step was to look at the website domain and to see if it could be retained. Visiting the website loaded a page of external links with some text pointing the owner to contact their domain provider. Looking up the domain’s details showed that it had expired several weeks earlier.
The registration details also showed the contact information for the web design company and not the organisation. Next I looked for details of where the domain was registered, but unfortunately it was the same company which already wasn’t responding.
Finally I recommended they contact the top level domain registry (the layer above this reseller). They provide an option on their contact form for situations when the reseller is unresponsive.
If they are unable to have the domain renewed the organisation will need to wait for it to expire and become available for registration again.
Alternatively a brand new domain can be registered by the organisation. This would enable them to start building their online presence again, but with the loss of those inbound links and boxes of marketing materials with incorrect details.
Avoid losing access to important domain names
The registration and ownership of domains names is not particularly difficult and doesn’t require technical skills. Any business owner or organisation member can buy and manage renewals for domain names in the same way as other business subscriptions and memberships.
Website domain logins and renewal dates should be kept with other essential documents, such as insurance policies and formation certificates. Some domain providers allow multiple contacts on an account - so a director, finance manager and the company secretary could be set to receive notifications of expiring domains.
Contact details for the domain should be kept up-to-date with the company where the domain was bought. Domain registrars communicate by email and are unlikely to call if a domain is due to expire. I’ve never seen a domain registrar send a renewal reminder or invoice by post. Many domains are lost because the contact email address was wrong, or reminders and invoices were filtered as spam and never seen.
Domains can be renewed several weeks and months before they are due to expire. It’s worth putting the date in a calendar and ensuring it’s taken care of well in advance to avoid any issues.
We would always recommend:
- Buy a domain name separately of a web design company and use a reputable registrar.
- Add the date of the domain expiry to a calendar and set your own reminder a few weeks before then.
- Know how to access and renew the domain. If a staff member who normally renews the domain leaves it’s important to update the contact details with the registrar so that you receive any notices and can login to the account.