Protect Your 3 Character Domain Names — How to
Own a three character domain? You need to play defense.
Three letter domain names are valuable. But owning them carries risk: since so many firms have three character acronyms, they often feel they are entitled to your domain.
The number of pending and recently settled claims on three character domains is staggering. Here are just a handful I found today:
Ace.com
Ace.us
Dsn.com
Rcu.net (claim denied)
Own.tv
Ucp.com (transferred, domain may have been stolen)
Pao.com
Kpn.info
Tcn.com
Cbq.com
Cbq.net
Cbq.org
All.com
It’s the .com challenges that are most troubling since of the value of the domain names. If you own a three character domain, here are some tips to avoid losing them in arbitration:
1. Don’t park them. It’s possible that a firm with the same acronym will point to ads on the parked page as infringing their trademark. You need to control the content, and parked pages frequently optimize with ads that can be used against you.
2. Create a site. Even a modest site is fine. Your goal here is to make sure no one can claim you have no legitimate use and rights for the domain name. I recently talked with a domainer who owns a number of three letter domains. He creates an affiliate site for each one.
3. File for a trademark once #2 is done.
Of course, doing this doesn’t prevent you from receiving a UDRP letter. Consider the case of Ace.com and Ace.us. The best I can tell, this domain has been used for a legitimate business for many years. The owner of the sites, WebMagic Ventures, even has a trademark for the term “Ace”.
So who’s challenging the owner of Ace.com and Ace.us? There are a number of firms holding trademarks for the term “Ace”, and I can’t see a reason why any of them ought to be entitled to this domain. This could be a clear cut case of reverse domain name hijacking, but we’ll have to wait to see. I’m anxiously awaiting a decision.
