I just received an email from sales@zipacquisitions.com that insinuated that they acquired a domain name much like my own and that they are willing to sell it to me for only $49.00 USD. They go on to point out it’s a one-time fee which many may read as a one-time only offer.
The email was addressed to my proxy email (used to hide my real email address) which is only available by doing a whois on my domain name (and illegal).
Here is how zipdomains is making money spamming people with this offer, which is also a big scam in my books!
Say that you own the domain name: how-zipdomains-makes-money.com. What zipdomains.com does is look up the contact information for your domain, then find at all the other extensions of your domain name that are available, such as: how-zipdomains-makes-money.org or how-zipdomains-makes-money.info and they pick one, say the .info
Understand that if you were to visit one of the big registers, like godaddy.com, name.com, namecheap, etc. You would find that you can purchase the EXACT same domain for as little at $1.99!
What zipdomains.com is doing is making you think that they have acquired a similar domain name as demonstrated in the first sentence of their email spam:
Our company specializes in acquiring expired domain names to help individuals and businesses protect their brand online.
They are counting on you not looking up the domain yourself and just jumping at the chance to prevent someone else from buying the domain and competing with you.
Here is an image of the website page I was sent to:
Test Zipdomains Yourself!
Notice the close up of the website address in the image below? Replace how-zipdomains-makes-money.com with a domain name that you know is available and then hit enter, you’ll see the same message I received but with your domain instead.
It’s a tricky way of getting you to pay $49 for something that should cost you $1.99 – that’s a profit of $47 on each domain sold!
Yet another example of spam designed to take advantage of you!
Hi Doug,
I’m simply posting information to make people aware and prevent them from experiencing what you have experienced. I have no affiliation with this company.
Good luck – and let us know what happens and I’ll post the results on the site!
Jim
I purchased a domain name from you on 2/28/10 called superioradvantages dot com
I’ve recently discovered that someone else owns it. I would like to know how this happened and how to get it back.
receipt ID:0765-5088-4003-3903
Please call me at [snip] or email me
Thank you
Doug Fischhaber
Thank you! They said they had my expired domain names and wanted $30 for them each. Turns out they didn’t, I was able to buy them back without them..
They tried it on me as well. Looked up through godaddy & got it for $7.49. I did send zipdomains a thank you letter for alerting me to the fact that the domain was available. I also told them I got it for a great price @Godaddy, and good luck trying to scam someone else.
Last time I checked (a few months ago) the domain was owned by someone else, so they did me a favor by alerting me to the fact that it was available. Scammers suck, but it’s great when people can turn the tables on them.
You are dead on. Same happened to me. They wanted $30.00 to lock a domain down ASAP. I looked it up thru Go Daddy and got it for $9.99. Buyer Beware!!!
This just happened to me today. If it wasn’t for your article, I would have been out 99.00!
Following your advice, I looked up the name through my perspective domain, and it WAS available! I purchased it for 6.99. My domain registration is private, so I am unclear as to how they knew my email address.
Not only is this a scam, but the owners really should do some hard JAIL TIME. I’m tempted to try and put efforts into putting them on a bigger “blast.” I should call a news channel, because I’m not for people loosing money I know they don’t have, especially in that way.
Thanks for the information!