You may have asked yourself this question at some point, "does the fact that I only register my domain names for a year hurt my search engine rankings?" Well, if a patent recently awarded to Google is any measure then: maybe. According to the patent:
"[0099] Certain signals may be used to distinguish between illegitimate and legitimate domains. For example, domains can be renewed up to a period of 10 years. Valuable (legitimate) domains are often paid for several years in advance, while doorway (illegitimate) domains rarely are used for more than a year. Therefore, the date when a domain expires in the future can be used as a factor in predicting the legitimacy of a domain and, thus, the documents associated therewith."
Seems reasonable. After all, anyone serious about developing a domain name shouldn't have a problem registering their name for 5 or even 10 years. Conversely, a spammer mostly likely won't register a name for more than a year.
Of course, extending the registration period of your names can get very expensive. I would personally have to open up a new line of credit if I wanted to extend the registration period of all the domain names I plan on developing in my portfolio. And then there's the next big question: is it really worth it? Extending the registration period of a name to 10 years may only give your domain a slight boost in the Google search engine results pages (SERP's.) And you can rest assured that Google will keep the details of it's patent secret, so I doubt anyone knows for sure how much better your rankings will be if you were to decide to invest in long term registrations.
There is one other advantage to extending the length of your domains' registration: you won't have to worry (as much) about losing your name to one of the many domain stalkers out there who you know are just waiting for your most valuable names to expire. Imagine: all the hard work you've put into getting your best domain names popular and profitable, only to loose them because you e.g. forgot to renew the registration while on Safari in Africa? Nightmare!
Of all the registrars out there, Network Solutions currently stands alone as the only place where you can register a domain name for a 100 year term, which would cost you just under $1,000. 100 years? Now that's some serious commitment! I wonder how many people/companies have actually registered a name for that long. Know of any? If you do, please post a comment!
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