A Few Rules for Deciding Whether to Drop Your 5L dot coms

I love 5L dot coms but I hate most of them.  99% of five letter dot coms are completely worthless and will $8 you to death.   Here are ten things to ask yourself before you decide to spend the money and renew it.

1.  Is it pronounceable?  If you say your domain out loud to a stranger and ask them to spell it,  will they get it right without asking?  If they get it wrong or have to think about it, congratulations you have a “brandable” domain aka you need to spend more money on the content to make up for the average domain.

2.  Would it make a good company name?   I bought Weeba the other day.  I certainly can see a internet based company with this name, or perhaps a toy.  Trurs.com on the other hand, not so good.  Cut the cord.

3. Is the dot net taken.  This doesn’t necessarily mean it’s a solid name but if the dot net is taken it’s often a good sign that it’s a solid name (unless the dot com owner bought both)

4.  Does it end the vowels “o” or “a”  ?  gabba gabbo happa jonlo  type names seem to do well.  These double consonant followed by an o or a do well.  Two “k”s and two “j”s .  Punt

5. Does it have three consonants in a row?   9 time out of ten if it does, dump it

6.  There are very few 5 letter acronyms.  Don’t even try it. Adios

7. How many sites does a Google search bring up.  If the domain name has no meaning but yet you still find people using it for usernames, slang, or as a fun name, then it has a better chance of selling.  If nothing. Bye bye

8.  How many whois searches did you get.  1 last month. Drop it

Hey, if you really like a name keep it.  There is always room for a few names like that in your portfolio but if you have too many you are wasting money.  That was fine when you were selling names at a good rate but if you don’t have the cash flow to support your straggler domains, you need to start dropping.