Wow, it’s been an exciting 2 days of down time here at WingnutSEO. It all started when I received an email saying “Per your request your domain registration of WingnutSEO has been canceled.” Of course this never happened and oh man did I freak! I instantly called up my domain registrar Godaddy and they gave me the bad news my credit card failed billing (I had switched banks and called Godaddy 2 times in between the failed billing in October and when they finally canceled my registration 2 days ago - I was assured all was OK when calling them) - and to make matters worse these assholes had my site on back order so as soon as Godaddy dropped the ball they snatched it up and parked the page.
I had a meltdown. All my work - all my writing - and worst of all ALL MY LINKS! gone.
That first day I spent about 4 hours on the phone with Godaddy customer support with no help what so ever. They told me I was SOL and better luck next time. Needless to say I was furious. I started the process of unlocking my domains and moving them to a different registrar. As that process is the most tedious thing in the world - if you are trying to move 100+ domains - I got even more and more worked up and then some more worked up.
That’s when my friend @MattMeeks, a LA PR guru, told me to search around on Google for a “Communications manager” who works at Godaddy, call them up and tell them about the situation. I called and chatted for about half an hour with this PR rep - he assured me he would elevate the situation and I would be contacted by someone in the office of the president. Of course I wasn’t hopeful at all.
I recieved 2 emails about WingnutSEO today - The first early this morning about the above assholes saying they would sell me the domain back for $388 ($388 how insulting! First of all this site is worth much more than that - I have made much more than that with this site - but second of all FU for emailing me and trying to get money for something that was jacked (even if if was a fair and square jacking)) and the second email around 2:00 PM from Godaddy saying ownership of WingnutSEO had been moved back to my account and that they were sorry about the inconvenience. Faith fully regained in Godaddy - and even though their prices are higher than others, and their site is pretty slow - at least the sites I still have with them will stay there - and to first time people buying a domain name or two I would recommend they use Godaddys service - My faith has been restored and I know they do actually care about their costomers.
Responses to “How I lost and then regained faith in my domain registrar”
November 19th, 2008 at 1:06 pm
I use GoDaddy as well and have never had any problems with them so far.What registrar would you recommend if there is a need to change at some point?
November 19th, 2008 at 4:43 pm
@Tom - I really like BlueHost right now as a registrar - they also offer free transferal of domain names.
December 3rd, 2008 at 2:17 pm
Hi Dave. I saw your domain for sale, probably about 1 month ago and wanted to buy it because I was loking for a domains with good links and SEO in the domain name. However, wingnutseo.com ended up going for about $150, so I didn’t bother. You are lucky to have got this domain back because you lost it fair and square.

November 19th, 2008 at 12:04 pm
Wow, that’s awesome. I thought you were screwed too. I’m glad that GoDaddy helped you out, because I use GoDaddy and I always hear about all of these horror stories, yet I’ve never had a problem myself. It’s good to know that your blog will still be around