A good domain not only makes people want to visit a website, but it can also increase your ranking in search engine results. This is because search engines index websites based on keywords found both in its content and domain. Yet, how does a webmaster know if their domain name is going to be profitable? Most webmasters won’t know until they have put it into practice. Hence, there is the practice of domain name tasting.
What is domain name tasting? Domain name tasting is the process of purchasing a domain to see how much traffic it brings to a website during the domain’s grace period. If the domain results in a lot of traffic, the webmaster will keep the domain. If the site results in minimal traffic, they will cancel their registration and get their money back.
Does this sound of interest to you? Before you decide to do domain name tasting for your site, first consider the ethics of the practice. Domain name companies lose a lot of money every year due to domain name tasting. While some may not feel sympathy for them, domain registrars may be forced to increase their fees if domain name tasting continues. This would also hurt customers who intended on buying the domain in good faith.
Another ethical dilemma involved with domain name tasting is the issue of good domain names not being available for genuine customers. Some may feel that in capitalist system, domain name testers have the right to access whatever domains they like. However, if they have no intention of purchasing the domain name for the long term, why shouldn’t these domains be available to individuals who would like them even more? Many would argue it is better to sell a domain name to a company that is serious about using it as their domain than selling it to a person intending to use it to get quick traffic.
It is also important to keep in mind that a good domain is not a sole indicator of whether or not a site is going to be successful. Domain name tasters are fooling themselves if they think their practice of domain tasting is what has made them successful with website traffic. Granted, an expired domain name might have a little bit of traffic associated with it, but to get one that is of value, a webmaster would have to pay hundreds of dollars. Many domain name tasters wouldn’t have the money for such a domain, so they may instead deal with cheaper ones. And most of these cheaper ones probably do not have any traffic.
The type of website that gets a lot of traffic is one that has a decent domain name, keyword-enriched content and appropriate inbound links. Even if a person doesn’t see anything ethically wrong with domain name tasting, doing it may not accurately reflect whether or not a domain name is valid. In fact, if a person does domain name tasting and their website does not have the other elements that make for proper traffic-building, they could potentially be throwing away a domain that could be a gold mine in the future.