The Great Dot UK Scam

For years our domain name choices were limited but easy. Local business? .co.uk Global business (or just want to look it)? .com

Claim Your Land!

Of course, with a limited number of TLDs (Top Level Domains) there can only be one whitstablewidgetmaker.co.uk and new options like .gb.com and .uk.com soon popped up. Which did nothing but show that you were there second.

Over time more TLDs have come along, some clever (.london has been popular) but some downright confusing – many a .co owner has been asked “did you miss the “m” or the “.uk” off the end? Unless they really were based in Colombia.

I’ve written about how having a brand can be more important than “exact domain matching” before, and Google has tried to reduce the effectiveness of domain names in ranking too.

So what about .uk?

Back in June 2014, Nominet launched the .uk domain. Ostensibly with the aim to open up far more availability of names. So, the second widget maker in Whitstable can now register whitstablewidgetmaker.uk

But it’s not that simple, is it? That’s really annoying for the owner of whitstablewidgetmaker.co.uk – they don’t want their competition grabbing a domain almost identical to their own. So Nominet thought of that, and reserved .uk equivalents for anyone who has the .co.uk (or .org.uk etc) until 10th June 2019.

So the benefit to us website owners is pretty much zero. We can either claim our .uk (more money) or let the fastest competitor or domain squatter have it next June.

Meanwhile, the registrars’ tills are ringing

Ultimately, the only people benefiting are Nominet and the registrars, because for every .co.uk they have sold, there’s a good chance the same person is going to buy .uk just to protect it. A nice way to double your income.

And then some have gone one further and got really sneaky. Like 123-Reg.

123-Reg have been emailing their users the fantastic news that they have reserved the .uk for them for free. Hurrah! Except…

1. You already had the rights reserved for you for free until June 2019
2. You may have wanted to exercise your rights with a cheaper registrar (123-Reg charge £9.99+vat to renew, my favourite Namecheap £6.98 with no vat)
3. Who knows what happens to unclaimed domains come June 2019? 123-Reg own that domain from then on.

So, should I register my .uk domain?

I really want to say “don’t bother”. Having two domain names will not improve your search ranking. Your existing website should outrank a new site and if you have a trademark on the name it cannot be used anyway. Any competitor could just be taken to court for “passing off” as you.

But who really has time for that?

Am I going to register fairlymarvellous.uk? Damn right I am.

But I’m going to wait until June 2019 – until then, the money can stay in my pocket, thank you.

You can find out if you have the rights to your .uk domain by clicking here.