So, you lost your domain. Maybe due to credit card fail during renewal, maybe the mail address of domain got hacked. Or maybe you lost a case on domain to competition. Happened to our rivals once.
After lots of screaming and slapping yourself the question comes what to do next. So, a quick check list:
- Fix the reason you lost the domain. Update your credit card details, change the email for all of the domains to the one you actually read.
- Evaluate and start using what remains from domain. Launch the site under new name or decide what you want to do with all the content. If you feel better, make an excuse that this was a strategy all along and the former name sucks no longer reflect what you are or do.
- In case that the domain still points to your server, make 301 redirect to new website. The best way is to use .htacces and point old content to new content directly and not just to the new domain. This is a very likely scenario in case of court order. Also, it helps with double content problem later on.
- Do the link search for your old domain. In some cases you might be able to update address to the new one. In some cases it is not possible. But you have to try.
- Check ALL your sites for the links to the old site and update it to new one. Doublecheck the site again. Many people forget this issue and they might give a backlink or two to the people who stole their precious name.
- If the competition lauches a site on the lost domain, check with your legal departament. In some cases it is illegal to do so, in some dont. This was a case when poker site bodog lost their domain due to a court order in brand name case. Make life for competition as difficult as possible.
- Promote, promote, promote.
You will not regain popularity easily. But there is a hope for comeback.
Any other ideas what to do?
This post was inspired by very careless actions of some of our competitors.
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