The changing face of .com domain drops – 2004 to 2010

The statistics for dropped domains in .com from 2004 to 2010 are quite strange. A dropped domain is a domain that has been deleted and has not been reregistered. A reregistration is a domain that is subsequently reregistered. The averages for each of the years are below. The 2010 average is to November 2010.

Year - Average Drop % - Average Rereg %
2004 | 33.42% | 66.58%
2005 | 38.43% | 61.57%
2006 | 43.17% | 56.83%
2007 | 59.81% | 40.19%
2008 | 70.92% | 29.08%
2009 | 73.90% | 26.10%
2010 | 82.99% | 17.01%

The figures look strange but they are the evolution of .com domains. Domain tasting had not really started on a large scale in 2004 but by 2005 it was beginning to have an impact. The peak of Domain Tasting, when it really started to go out of control was in 2007. The problem with measuring the effect of Domain Tasting is that the domains that are retained in the process will only be dropped a year or so later as they fail to generate the necessary PPC revenue to justify renewals. This is what may be happening from 2007 to 2010. The average percentage of dropped domains is far larger than the average percentage of domains that are renewed. Somewhere in all this, there are domains that will be dropped as a result of natural attrition such as distinct company or business names where the registrants have gone out of business. The full statistics for .com and other TLDS will be published later this week on HosterStats.com.