Juniper jumps ship: There’s a reason why .JUNIPER is shutting down

Many corporations have spent the better part of a decade wondering if brand new gtlds truly offer any competitive advantages over generic keyword domains. Last week Juniper Networks , one of the largest networking hardware manufacturers in the world, provided a resounding answer when it announced that it was closing its .JUNIPER branded registry. Custom extensions were originally sold to the general public as the holy grail of internet real estate. Owning your own branded top level domain would create a walled garden around your company’s digital assets that was supposedly free from outside risk and confusion with generic search terms. 

Large multinational corporations spent millions of dollars investing in their own private web gardens believing that someday people would stop using “www”. While the closing of .JUNIPER will be felt hard by Juniper’s marketing department, for the industry as a whole it just means that companies are reallocating their budget into more useful investments.

+---------------------------------------------------------------+
| TODAY’S CUSTOM EXTENSIONS |
+---------------------------------------------------------------+
| OLD PUBLIC PERCEPTION | REALITY |
+---------------------------------------------------------------+
| Owning a branded extension protects | Owning a brand |
| your corporate brand. | extension does |
| | nothing to |
| | protect your |
| | brand. |
| | Owning a custom|
| | extension has |
| | the same risks |
| | as any other |
| | piece of |
| | digital realty |
+---------------------------------------------------------------+

Closing .JUNIPER is the next logical step for a company that has already migrated all of its public facing assets back to .COM. By moving Juniper Networks subsidiary domains back underneath .COM Juniper no longer has to pay exorbitant yearly fees to manage a private top level domain that no one uses. This is not a death sentence for custom extensions though, if anything it is a good thing. 

When big brands migrate their web traffic into a public garden they are opening up resources that can now be allocated to growing their business in the real world. I spoke with a California based data center engineer who told me that Juniper realized their private registry was creating a massive perimeter when compared to the relatively secure legacy web.

Lets start by looking at the timing of Juniper closing .JUNIPER. There are currently several dead gtlds on nTLDStats that have seen absolutely no use since they were released. Corporate legal departments are using these extensions solely for defensive registrations rather than actually using them to direct traffic. 

Closing .JUNIPER proves that digital real estate is only as valuable as the attention you give it. Digital respect is gained by creating quality content and delivering that content using a secure and robust network infrastructure. All the fancy words in the world will not make .TRULYAMAZING gTLD better than .COM.

Zero Downtime and Breaking Your Custom Extension

 
Breaking a custom extension is no easy task. When you buy a private top level domain you are responsible for every aspect of the maintenance and upkeep of that new gtld. You can not just turn off a custom extension’s nameservers the way you could with a regular domain name. According to ICANN regulations, you must first give global dns servers ninety days notice before your domain will no longer be supported. This is to ensure that there are no unexpected blackouts of service for any legacy partners who may be still using your custom extension.

+---------------------------------------------------------------+
| CUSTOM EXTENSION LIFE CYCLE |
+---------------+-----------------------------+----------------------+
| | OLD WAY | NEW CENTRALIZED WAY |
+---------------------------------------------------------------+
| Annual Price | $25,000+ Dollar Pegged Cost | Virtually Free |
| Technical Dep | Point RSP Necessary | No Infrastructure |
|endant? | | Dependency |
|---------------+-----------------------------+----------------------+
| Memorability? | No / Diluted Brand Presence | Yes / Instantly Ownt |
+---------------+-----------------------------+----------------------+

With this in mind Juniper will need to properly plan out a 301 permanent redirect strategy for every single domain registering on its new root zone. 301 redirects are essential to any domain migration because they allow you to shift web traffic seamlessly. Without 301s redirected web pages will most likely throw a Not Found error because their requested path does not exist on your new server. During Juniper’s transition they will need to ensure that every url paying .

By submitting their extension dropout letter Juniper is ensuring that .JUNIPER name strings will slowly fade from existence. Once the ninety day period is up ICANN will remove .JUNIPER from the root and Juniper’s private registry servers will go dark. Recently retired strings return to a pool of available domains that will be used to feed future gtld expansion. For speculators this proves that the domain name industry is self regulating. If someone buys a gtld that nobody uses they will be incentivized to unload that asset.

Where Does That Leave You and Your Domain Portfolio?

This lesson should not scare you into thinking that every custom extension is going to close. The primary reason why large global brands are shutting down their custom gtlds is because they are expensive to run. When you own a custom extension you are responsible for paying an annual $25,000 dollar minimum to ICANN to keep the domain registered on the root. On top of thatJuniper realized that running their own registry created a larger security surface area than was necessary.

+---------------------------------------------------------------+
| BIG BRANDS DOMAIN COSTS |
+-----------------------------+-----------------------------+
| | NEW MODEL |
+---------------------------------------------------------------+
| $25,000 Annual Maint Cost to| No More Doughnut Holes$ |
| ICANN Just To Play | Only Pay For Generic |
|------------------------------+Domains That You Redeem |
| Backend RSP Required? | No Lock In’ Backend Services|
+-----------------------------+-----------------------------+

Maintaining a private top level domain also requires you to hire a backend RSP to manage all of the hosting duties your brand new registry requires. Chances are your backend RSP is going to charge you a nice monthly retainer to provide standard registration services, database escrow, and abuse monitoring. Similar to website hosting your registry rental fees will depend on the amount of namespaces you would like to protect. When looking at backend cost potential and diminutive visitor statistics brand managers quickly see that there is no reason to operate a private registry.

What this means is that going forward your company should only selectively pursue private top level domains. Custom extensions should only be used if they serve a strategic part of your overall brand protection strategy.

Preparing Yourself For the Next Round of Applications

Recently closing .JUNIPER is a perfect case study to use when finalizing your plans for the next round of applications. Many brand consultants are in the process of writing their GTLD applications right now without first knowing how they will actually maintain their new extensions. By examining the failures of legacy brands we can begin to understand why certain corporations chose to give up their private extensions. When planning for your next application remember these three things.

+---------------------------------------------------------------+
| PRIVATE BRANDS VS KEYWORD DOMAINS |
+-----------------------------+-----------------------------+
| | GENERIC Wins! |
+---------------------------------------------------------------+
| Initial Cost to Apply | Clearly defined $44,000 fee |
| for Custom Extensions is | that everyone is required |
| Sky High | to pay. No guessing games. |
|------------------------------+-----------------------------
| Are You Locked Into A Backend|Rents are decreasing across |
| Hosting Provider? | the board because |
| | registrations are shared. |
+-----------------------------+--------------> Wins Mainstream |
| Brand Recognition? | Search Traffic Instead of |
| Limited to your own brand. | Being LIMITED to your own |
| | BRAND. |
+---------------------------------------------------------------+

Do Your Company Truly Need a Custom Extension?

Make sure that you truly need a custom extension before you buy one. If your companies only goal is to prevent cybersquatters from registering domains similar to your brand then simply register them on a public top level domain. By using advanced registrar locking and DNSSEC you can fully protect your domain name without the overhead of running a private extension. This will allow you to spend your technology budget on creating a better product for your customers.

The reason why the domain name industry will always thrive is because registry operators are continually improving their backend services. New RSPs are emerging that provide shared infrastructure hosting for gtlds. This means that in the future you will be able to create your own custom extensions without overspending on infrastructure. The domain name industry prides itself on keeping transaction costs low for everyone.

How To Safely Transition Your Portfolio Into a Security Mindset

Managing your domain portfolio through transitions like these requires you to take certain precautions. The first thing you should do is download yourself a spreadsheet that details out the renewal prices and actual traffic statistics for each of your domains. Any domains that show nominal traffic should be flagged for review. This is step one in making sure you are not spending money on digital real estate that is not performing.

+---------------------------------------------------------------+
| PORTFOLIO TRANSITION STEPS |
+---------------------------------------------------------------+
| STEP 1: Download spreadsheet that details out traffic |
| and renewal fees for all of your domains. |
| STEP 2: Create a list of 301 redirects for all of your urls. |
| STEP 3: Move main business domains to a protected .COM. |
| STEP 4: Configure your brand monitor on nTLDStats. |
+---------------------------------------------------------------+

Step two in this process is creating a spreadsheet that documents all of the urls you will need to 301 redirect. Once you have compiled a list of urls you will need to verify that every SSL certificate is active on your new hosting platform before initiating the redirects. As per ICANN rules disruptions in data continuity can harm your brands organic search rankings. Double check your urls so that you do not inadvertently disrupt your business.