It’s been years since I’ve blogged about my chase lists, so I hope to do it more often. The problem is that if I post semi-good domains, others will chase them too. I’ll figure out a way to split my lists in the future so I can blog about dropping domains that I won’t be chasing and are up for grabs, then blog in the future about domains I chased and captured on the drop & didn’t blog about.

For tomorrow, I really like these domains:

spincoater.com – tld’s, wayback, product price, cpc
careerfashion.com – longer domains fit criteria, cpc
discountmower.com – longer domains fit criteria, cpc
jonga.com – tld’s wayback, popular
cyberperks.com – wayback
yulemarble.com – wayback

I have godaddy & bluerazor backorders added. I will also try with dynadot’s API – but I know that the quality of these drops will probably have snapnames & namejet backorders. Yulemarble & discountmower are iffy about having a hit put out (Backorder), but the rest probably will. If not, they will be fetched by other registrars for sure.

I will blog more lists in the future & try to break off the lists into what I think snap will chase, medium grade lists that are iffy & lists that I feel the api drop catchers can compete against.

Here’s a quick reference to the notes above:

cpc – the domain shows some kind of +1 value for an advertiser cost to advertise on the domain.

wayback – the domain shows some kind of wayback value for age or number of stored wayback pages.

product price – the domain specifically matches a product of significant value.

longer domains fit criteria – other domains exist that are longer & include this domain inside the longer domain.

popular – the domain shows up as a result of nested search engine keyword combination results.

I’ll try to keep the lists rolling in daily. Your feedback is appreciated as always.

Fabulous Drop Catcher

I have been working with a few beta testers who have been testing drop catching software for the Fabulous.com API. The Fab API is XML based & easy to use. The software I wrote is available at DropKing.com for purchase & immediate download.

The software works on any windows based computer from windows 95 – Windows 7 (32Bit & 64Bit). The software allows you to enter a list of domain names you’d like to register. You save the list of domains to chase into a text file – one expiring domain name per line. Next, you enter your Fab account username & password. When you are ready, simply set the pause you’d like and click start. I usually recommend using the software with a 1 second pause between each domain registration try.

Fabulous API Domain Catcher

If a domain is available to register and you have enough prefunded money, the domain is registered right into your Fab account. You only pay registration fee which is nice. This becomes a huge money saver compared to backordering domains at high prices. Why backorder when you can drop catch the same quality of domains?

The feedback I am getting from the testers is great. One of the testers claims he can beat godaddy and some of namejet’s backorders. I have witnessed losing a handful of times to Fabulous’ API where I backordered the same domains at godaddy & Fab’s API won. I’ve heard that every once in a great while fab will beat a snapnames backorder on domains of much lesser quality that probably only received one backorder.

I think the Fabulous API is an untapped resource at this time. I believe the API is extremly useful because:

1.) Not a lot of people who know about or use Fab’s API. This leaves the highway open for the API users who are getting away with murder. Imagine having the strength of a registrar with realtime connections to the registry for your own drop catching without much competition.

2.) The API is one of the faster API’s I’ve used. You can tweak the pause to “0″ which really gets the API hits hammering to register a domain for you. From the TOS & what I’ve read & talked to Fab, it’s ok to use the API tool at this speed without any fear of a penalty.

3.) Since Fabulous has strict rules to join, not many people are accepted or meet the requirements. Therefore the members who have access to the API own portfolios or hundreds of domains and are more serious about drop catching.

4.) Fabulous specializes in the TLD’s: .com, .net, .org, .info & .co. This avoids amature domainers who are clogging up the API system chasing less desirable ccTld’s (like: .in, .co.in, .mobi, .me etc) around the clock.

Overall I am happy with the product I made. It is yet another tool that can be used to catch expired domain names at registration price. The feedback has been great & I don’t see other software being offered for Fab’s API.

For more information about the fabulous.com API drop catching software, please contact me or visit: www.DropKing.com.

First off, the meaning of drop catching, drop catcher is a term to label the art of catching an expired domain down to the millisecond. It really is milliseconds for the valuable drops. I’ll assume that you already know how to calculate when a domain will drop & become available for purchase at any registrar. If you need a source for lists, I recommend estibot or dnmeter.com.

This guide covers my methods & how I perceive the entire system works. It’s how I understand it & what it does for me. I may stand corrected on some topics, but overall this guide should get the point across.

This guide will not work for the best drops. When a domain like a LLL.COM drops, there will generally be hundreds of watchers / bidders via backorder auctions. Snapnames, Pool & Namejet are notorious for promoting good drops to gather more backorders. This guide will work for domains of medium to lesser quality. For example, many two word domains & other variants go under the radar as dropped & get picked up by drop catchers that have good scanning tools. I have flipped many of these for good money. I have also caught hundreds of LLLL.com & the like. Sometimes you just get lucky too. Math & stats play a role & after you do something and follow a routine for a while, you will get some percent of success.

Let’s get started – So you’ve found a good domain in the drop lists. Great! Now what?

You’ll probably be at stage 1. At this stage, you’re learning the drop times, learning how to weed out the good drops & etc. You may have a domain registrar that you enjoy purchasing domains from. Well here’s my notes on the registrars I consider my favorite:

GoDaddy doesn’t allow drop catching to my knowledge. Their bulk checkout has a captcha that makes it slow to checkout. Their intentions are for you to backorder a domain through their service.
Moniker – Has an API system & the manual checkout pages seem to catch some drops.
Dynadot - Has an API system & the manual checkout pages seem to catch some drops.
Onlinenic – Has an API system & the manual checkout pages DO NOT catch some drops for drop catchers. It’s too slow. The API is faster
Directi – As per their TOS, drop catching is not allowed
Name.com - Is working on an API & the checkout pages catch some drops.
ENOM – Is selfish & has recently blocked API access for drop catching .com & net during drop time.

That’s just to name a small handful registrars. I tend to use ALL of the above and more at the same time. You don’t have to. I have excessive funds at some registrars that haven’t caught anything for a while. It depends how serious you are & the resources you choose to utilize.

Stage 2

You’ll find some success trying to hand reg domains – but will get beaten because others are a wee bit faster than you. You’ll also find yourself spending a good amount of time researching & trying to drop catch, but maybe at the wrong time.

Stage 3

After burning myself out manually refreshing checkout pages at various registry’s using laptops & desktop computers, I decided to macro my drop catching. A macro is a script. Every computer has macros pre built into the operating system & products like microsoft office have help tutorials. You can see my tutorial on making drop catching software here.

You’ll find that automation will soon become your best friend. While you’re doing other things, you can have robot scripts doing the drop catching work for you.

Stage 4

You’ll notice that the way domains drop – they drop in a certain order. This is where you start to target your drop catching since you have an upper advantage. You learn that a single domain stands a better chance than 50 in a bulk checkout.

Stage 5

Since there’s a scanning solution in place, a drop order & catching automation – you’re basically at the furthest point you can get without becoming your own Registrar which costs over $20,000 USD per year & requires you to have serious cash $xxx,xxx+ in a “trust bank fund” in case something happens since you’re liable & a registrar.

To rephrase Phase 2 requires a lot of checkout page refreshes & whois checks – It will be common to have 2 browser windows or computers side by side because one will be trying to purchase domains while the other checks the whois status of your drops.

In a nutshell, that’s the stages I went through. I’d like to also address things I’ve found to be true out of personal experience.

1.) Domains that have the most backorders require backorder services to put more emphasis on that domain. That’s why LLL.com’s that drop always get picked up by the backorder services. They will literally exhaust all their server connections on one domain. If a good name drops & there’s 0 backorders, it will remain available for minutes. I have seen this.

2.) There is a registrar drop pool. From my understanding, this pool works in batches & it gives registrars a chance to make special calls to verisign. No API can touch this pool & usually the backorder services will compete for the premium drops. This pool supposedly runs seconds – 1 minute ahead of the drop list. I don’t really believe this is in place. During a comparison of a LLL.NET drop, I examined it to drop just like any other domain drop in order – as per dnmeter.com.

3.) Partner registrars will attempt to catch domains for the backorder systems. To my understanding, when the domain drops, it’s available to anyone – including you! Don’t let this term scare you. They usually bump heads & if you are after a domain, you can occasionally beat out the partner registrars.

4.) Dog eat dog – I have seen trickery going on. From whois changes to the registrar renew a valuable drop while in pending delete. You may notice a drop quickly change hands often. Pretty much anything goes.

5.) Yes, it is possible to beat godaddy, snapnames, pool & namejet at drop catching. The problem is that not enough of us do it to actually put them out of business.

A myth that is floating around:

Myth – You can never compete with snapnames, pool or namejet. They use thousands of connections. While this is true, the central registry can only accept x connections per registry & everyone still holds a chance. I believe they serialize the connections which then determines who got the domain.

Last time I checked, Snapnames employed between 400 – 600 registrars that they owned. That number is said to have grown to about 900

Advice – If you plan to drop catch, it would not be wise to backorder the domains you target. Unless if very valuable & you have the cash to spend, If you backorder domains, it will draw attention to your picks & you will add on more competition.

Advice – Stealth mode & common sense play a huge role in this game.

Advice – Instead of trying to catch 25 or 50 domains at once daily, learn the pending delete drop order. Go after only one domain at a time. After it drops, switch flow to the next drop.

Here’s a real customer reply I recieved from one of my drop catching titles:

Hi Dan,

I’m happy with the results. I beat oversee domain management today.

Peter

Common sense helps a lot too. I’ve seen drop catchers catch dirt & flip domains while others silently grab the pot of gold. It will take a good understanding of which domains are valuable. Then attempt to compare who grabbed the domains you wanted & learn on how they grabbed the names to make your system better.

Here’s a break down of drop times collection I have:

.com 1pm cst 1-2 hours drop window
.net 1pm cst 1-2 hours drop window
.us 1pm cst 10 – 20 mins drop window
.org 9am cst 30 mins drop window
.info 3am cst – haven’t verified in over 1 year
.in 2pm cst 1-2 min drop window
.co.in 2pm cst 1-2 min drop window
.ws 9:30am cst – haven’t verified in over 1 year
.mobi 9:30pm cst – drop lasts 2 mins

Good luck drop catching!

Domain Name: PGR.NET
Registrar: ONLINENIC, INC.
Whois Server: whois.onlinenic.com
Referral URL: http://www.OnlineNIC.com
Name Server: NS2.ONLINENIC.NET
Name Server: NS3.ONLINENIC.NET
Status: pendingDelete
Updated Date: 28-jan-2010
Creation Date: 19-nov-2001
Expiration Date: 19-nov-2009

According to DNMeter.com, the domain will drop around (+-5mins): 2:09 PM CST on Wednesday.

I have been working on a new tool & monitoring the spikes of views on the drop lists. Sure enough – as far as I can tell, this domain will be dropping on Tuesday December 29 2009. It will be funny to see what happens.

Note, this is a typo of flickr.com – but people have issues spelling it.

Here’s a snapshot of the whois:

Registrant Details

Domain Name: FLIKR.NET
Registrar: ONLINENIC, INC.
Whois Server: whois.onlinenic.com
Referral URL: http://www.OnlineNIC.com
Name Server: NS1.PARKED.COM
Name Server: NS2.PARKED.COM
Status: pendingDelete
Updated Date: 23-dec-2009
Creation Date: 10-aug-2005
Expiration Date: 10-aug-2010

Interesting Details:

Words: flikr
Appraisal: $27,000
Search Results: 2,810,000
Search Ads: 0
PageRank: 0
Overture: 2339
Alexa Traffic Rank: 12,340,774
Alexa Trend: 10,974,303
Dmoz Listed: No
Avg. CPC: 4.22
Avg. Search Volume: 90,280

Another one that caught my eye was: GeoCitys.net:

Registrant Details

Domain Name: GEOCITYS.NET
Registrar: ONLINENIC, INC.
Whois Server: whois.onlinenic.com
Referral URL: http://www.OnlineNIC.com
Name Server: NS1.PARKED.COM
Name Server: NS2.PARKED.COM
Status: pendingDelete
Updated Date: 23-dec-2009
Creation Date: 20-jul-2004
Expiration Date: 20-jul-2010

I remember the old geocities.com, but not sure I would spell it like that. Maybe something else was in their train of thought since the names are aged.

Unfortunate however, the domains will lose their age upon drop on Tuesday at 1pm CST & it will be a mystery who picks them up if anyone, or if they are returned – until it happens.

wedlin.com
gazeboes.net
permissions.us

That’s all I was chasing for today & managed to grab 100%. Wedlin.com doesn’t look promising at all. My hope is to sell it to an end user. Perhaps someone with the surname Wedlin may become attracted to the domain or was waiting for it to drop. Maybe not.

Gazeboes are popular & the domain should at least double reg fee in a year minimum based on sponsored advertiers / ad spots – weather parked or developed. Permissions I picked solely based on the Estibot appraisal which was over $500.

I really thought about two other domains expiring: grades.net & rangers.net. However, last minute I pulled these out. Looks like at least one was backordered & secured. Both were instantly taken nonetheless.

berrettas.com
pewits.com
sarsens.com
gleets.com

Probably not the best selection, but for reg fee @ Dynadot.com, I’ll keep them & see what happens. The quality in the drops just seems to get better by the day

Have fun drop catching!

mixeurs.com
minuscula.com
vittoni.com
transferred.us

Nothing special & I’m not particular about: transferred.us as the US extension has been stinking in my opinion lately. Also Mixeurs.com, the chance of making it big would require a lot of non-usa traffic & the small traffic from the US, probably won’t help someone with a “mixer” of some sort.

Just sharing my list, I won’t get mad if you manage to hand reg some, but at least give me some credit. I always go into drop catching thinking I ain’t gonna get Jack. A lot of the time, I do catch stuff, store it & then a buyer comes along.

It’s a beautiful feeling to connect with the right end user & supply what their online business thrives – which is usually the right domain. For what they’re trying to do & you helped them out.

jacket.com
stubby.us

Stubby.us doesn’t concern me, but Jacket.com is nice. I am sure many have backordered this domain, but since the drop is public & anyone can grab it, I’m going to try. I’m sure I won’t grab it. But if I do, it would be awesome.

This is one of those “weird” domains that every drop catcher complains about. The whois is fuzzy & so is the origin of the domain. The current registrar is Tucows which will be releasing the name real soon. The major forums would tell you to backorder at NameJet, Snap & Pool.

However, note this.. Here is a copy of the whois:

Domain Name: JACKET.COM
Registrar: TUCOWS INC.
Whois Server: whois.tucows.com
Referral URL: http://domainhelp.opensrs.net
Name Server: DNS1.IN2NET.COM
Name Server: DNS2.IN2NET.COM
Status: clientTransferProhibited
Status: clientUpdateProhibited
Updated Date: 13-oct-2009
Creation Date: 31-jul-1997
Expiration Date: 30-jul-2011

Ok, so according to dnmeter.com, Jacket.com will drop around 1:51PM CST.

Tucows has a status of: clientTransferProhibited which should be pending delete.

I’ll make sure to keep an eye on it, but the domain will probably drop. It has to since Verisign has it on it’s drop list for tomorrow.

I took down the site originally because the info had leaked out & it was spreading like wildfire. There was a paying memeber that quickly spread the lists as I published them.

Now, I invite you to a free 1 month trial. Yes it is a paid site, but you can enjoy the lists for free until Halloween (Oct 31st 2009).

To checkout the daily list, visit: www.dnmeter.com/member.php

Username = afterlife
Password = afterlife

Your feedback is welcome on the accuracy of the drop order & times. From top to bottom you’ll notice my drop order lists are dead on. The time a domain actually drops based on my time predictions may vary by seconds – 5 mins.

So go check it out & have fun! The list is updated daily at 11PM CST / Midnight PST.