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In mid 2004 I went through a process of registering some sample domain names, based upon popular search terms, to try and calculate how many people ‘guess’ domain names in their browser address bar. This led me to make several conclusions about the best format for a domain name… and in the process I became convicted as an official cybersquatter thanks to AXA and the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO). Two years later my accusers havent even bothered to renew the domain they challenged me for and its now held by somebody else with a page full of ads and pop-ups! Whats that all about?

The Yahoo! / Overture search term suggestion tool is great for discovering which search terms are being most commonly searched by your target audience. Typically this information is used for planning pay per click or search optimization campaigns. This data also provides some fantastic information on website naming / navigation conventions, since it indicates what people find to be most easily memorable on a given subject. Some people are likely to guess a domain name when they want to visit it. It’s well worth owning relevant domains for your company and saving on costly pay per click adverts and potential lost custom. A few example formats that should be registered by companies in addition to their usual domain are:

[brand]insurance.com
[brand]carinsurance.com
[brand]hotels.com
[brand]cruises.com
[brand]magazine.com
[brand]shoes.com
[brand]cars.com

I can guarantee that any variation of these examples (including .co.uk) combined with a leading brand name will receive relevant web traffic should you register it. However, if you do register such a domain you could be in for a rude awakening. Many Internet savvy companies track newly registered domains which contain their brand name. Rather than bother to get there first as part of a marketing plan, they pay legal teams to track down the registrants of such domain names and take them through a WIPO domain name dispute process.

In mid 2004 I received a courier package from Paris which contained approximately 500 pages of documentation detailing how I had infringed the trademarks of the AXA insurance group through my registration of axacarinsurance.com. The domain actually didn’t receive more than 7 guesses per month (very low), however, because I was counting the impressions using a parking service I was judged to have purchased the domain with bad intent (there was a buy this domain option which was set to a minimal 250 to cover my administrative expenses should it need transferring). I was initially very shocked, more so when I received another similar bundle from WIPO with a date of a hearing for my ‘domain trial’ in Switzerland (no you dont have to be present).

My efforts to give the domain away to AXA for free were to no avail. Nobody had ever contacted me to threaten use of a WIPO dispute process in advance; it just came right out of the blue. Had AXA asked for the domain I would have let them have it free of charge - I had no use for it anyway. I raised this issue with WIPO and they did ask AXA’s lawyers in Paris if they wanted to continue with a costly dispute process, when I was offering to hand it over for free in advance. AXAs lawyers never replied. Instead AXA paid in the region of $1500 to force my domain registrar to hand over the domain. I could never understand why they didn’t contact me first to obtain it free, or at worst consider paying 250 for the domain.

Even in WIPOs decision summary for AXA,they concluded ‘The fact that the Respondent later indicated to the Complainant that he was willing to transfer the domain name at issue free of charge is not relevant from the point of view of the Panel, as the said offer was made after the Respondent knew of the filing of the Complaint. However, one may wonder why the Complainant has not accepted the said offer in order to avoid the present proceedings.’ So arguably even they found it odd.

Then here we are two years later, I discover that AXA no longer own the domain, it’s owned by Owen Webster of Beirut. For me this makes a mockery of the whole domain dispute process, why would AXA’s lawyers not renew domains that they win through WIPO? Surely this might mean they have a non-stop supply of AXA domain retrieval work that renews itself every two years? Why would anybody want a stream of non-stop work to do for their client?… I dare say AXA’s lawyers have decided against physically going to Beirut to get the domain again, perhaps instead another small tree has been felled and is making its way to Owen’s post box even as I write.

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