Catching Dot Com

[BeachLife]

Hi all, I'm rather out of touch with drop catching these days. Is it still practical to catch a .com these days through any public catching services? It's a two word hyphenated domain, not particularly attractive in the words themselves, but may have a small but ok backlink profile having been in use for a small ecommerce shop for a few years. It looks as if it may not be renewed in December.

Thanks for any advice offered.

 

[RobM]

Well you can backorder it at places like snapnames if you think other people will be after it as well. That'll cost you $79 if they catch and no other backorders. I run droppingdomains.info for domains that nobody is likely to pay a catcher high amounts for but don't want to take the risk of a hand registration after it drops. There is also pool and namejet.

 

[getmein]

Also Pheenix and dropcatch.com

 

[RobM]

Oh yeah I forgot dropcatch. I believe they have control over something like 500 registrars (unlike nominet people don't have to pretend they only have one). Don't miss them out

 

[getmein]

control over something like 500 registrars

Is it still $200k or so to setup a .com registrar? If so, that's a lotta dosh.

 

[RobM]

Yeah it's a big industry.

 

[BeachLife]

Thanks all, I'll book it at the suggestions. It is currently registered at 123-Reg, who appear to offer a backorder service, but when I search for the domain it only offers me a facility to transfer it, not back order it. Does anyone have any experience using 123-Reg back ordering? I assume as they are the registrar they can keep control after it expires and not let it drop?