Like many people, I "own" a few personal domains for my blogs and a few old business ideas that never got off the ground. And, like many people, they have been parked at Yahoo Small Business, partially because I already had a Yahoo account when I registered them a few years ago, and partially because I was lured by the $1.99/year offers for new domains that they had running at the time. The rate increased to $9.95 after the first year, but I was OK with that. I was able to reserve the domains and set up redirects to my blogs, and have the option of building real sites if I ever get too frustrated with Google's Blogger service.
Now I find out in an email from Yahoo that the annual domain "renewal price" has increased by 30%, to $12.95 year.
Mind you, this isn't for new domains. It's only for existing ones, owned by loyal customers like me. If you look on the Yahoo Small Business site, there isn't any mention of the price being jacked up by 30%, and why should this be listed? That would only scare people away!
There was no explanation for the increase in the email I received or on the company website, so let's examine some possible reasons.
It's certainly not because it takes more work to renew the domains or send out the email notifications. Like eBay and other large Internet companies, Yahoo automates many of its services, and keeps customer service staff to a bare minimum
What are some other potential reasons? Consider the effective date of the price increase: March 11, 2008. As you may recall, this was when the company was in a tight spot. It was just one month after Yahoo announced a "lavish" employee retention and severance program in the wake of Microsoft's bid for the company, and about six weeks before it attempted to justify various salary increases and bonuses for senior executives, including President Sue Decker's $1.1 million bonus for 2007.
But I don't think these added costs are the direct reasons for the domain price increase. A primary source of Yahoo's profit is advertising, and while revenue increased in the first quarter, the company said it experienced weakness in sectors such as finance, travel and retail. If this weakness persists throughout the year -- a possible scenario, considering all of the negative economic news we've been hearing, and the rapid increase in online advertising inventory from social networks and other sites -- Yahoo will have to depend more on non-advertising income. I don't know if the new pricing scheme will really boost Yahoo's bottom line, but pissing off its domain customers is a small price to pay to help offset any dip in advertising.
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Comments
Oh, this is nothing just wait. I received an e-mail from Yahoo last night before leaving the office which informed me that the new renewal prices for 2008 will be $34.95 per year. I called to discuss this as this is the second price increase this year. I was told by a very friendly support staff (Brain) that an e-mail had just been sent to the floor notifying the staff of the price increase. It's nice that Yahoo has allowed "just" enough time for us to transfer our domains out before the new renewal pricing is billed.
Is this Yahoo's way of getting into the domain industry? By pushing around the smaller people and buying property at that time.
Any suggestions out there?
Sincerely,
Will
I'm just totally perplexed by it, and fail to understand how any sane company can justify increasing its prices from 12.95 to 34.95 -- Thats a 200% increase!!!
stupid, idiotic, short sighted, greedy, and (given many people are on auto renew and will not notice) just plain immoral is what it is.
I wrote to complain but the response I got from Billing shows they seem to have little idea of whats going on
I guess the only answer is to pull out. Transfers here I come
G.
I also just received notification that the increase will go up to $34.95, per year. I had a gazillion domains that was just sitting there. When the increase went to $12.95, I got rid of a lot of them. Now, that it has gone to $34.95/yr, I will get rid of the ones I really don't need, keep the ones that are up and running as websites (3) and transfer the rest. They have totally lost my business. I was a good customer. What I can't understand is, they are doing this to their existing customers, who they know are someone stuck, in that they already have websites that utilize these domains. I think they are counting on people just biting the bullet and paying the fees. I think it is such a low blow. I hope they DO go down the tubes.
I received the notice also. I'm moving all my 30+ domains from Yahoo as of this coming Monday. There is no way I'm paying $34.95 a year for my Yahoo domains. This is pure greed and bad business. Yahoo was really stupid to do this at this time in our economy. Everyone is taking advantage of the fact that people can't do anything about gas prices or anything else. So in other words, why not milk the cow some more. Transfer your domains to a cheaper register, there are several out there. Do your research and get away from Yahoo, fast!
Michael
Corporate Exec.
Its just gone from $12 to $34 - See Here
I'm really astounded by this, and I'm looking at starting a class action, but I really can't even begin to find the issues, as the pricing and terms are so intentionally confusing. It looks like they lull you in with very low prices (a couple of dollars), renew at $9.95, then $12.95 and then just hoist it up to $34.95. The problem is, you can't even turn off the autorenew without losing the domain from what I can see. Is this right?
Glyn
Yahoo! go to hell!
Me too. I had 7 domains with them. It is realy cazy!!! I transfer all my domain names out to http://www.luckyregister.com/
I think that many persons do not read this email will be charged with very high cost since the price in domain account still is the old prices!!!
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