As you expand your domain portfolio and see your yearly costs accumulating, you may find yourself tempted to more reasonably quell your addiction by purchasing a .info domain name. For the love of god, don’t do it. Let me explain why.

They’re Long and Ugly

How many 4-letter extensions are there? Granted, this is a minor reason, but man they’re bulky.

Nobody Uses Them

The public transport system in Montreal blew my mind when they located their site on stm.info. The 3-letterness of it all does make it more palatable, but still. Blech. Name 3 well-known .info sites. How about 2? I imagine most people stop at 1, if that.

Not used means not trusted, especially when most are just trying to leverage a keyword-domain in the hopes of easy rankings. You likely won’t succeed anyway, and you’ll just seem sketchy.

Why won’t you succeed? Because while Google can be dumb, they’re not stupid. How far do you think you can leverage one on domain name alone? The only way to have a shot is by investing in a design, content, marketing, and the rest, and let’s be honest: are you really going to end up putting that much into a .info?

You Look Cheap

How much success are you going to have when you’re going out of your way to save 6 bucks on something as important on your domain name? Wasting 3 bucks isn’t better than investing 10, and one .com is better than three .infos.

Do you really want to be a domain name slumlord?

Extension Undercut

Every .net purchase has to stand in at least some fear of its .com brother. The .com may be parked, but for how long? With .infos, you have just about every other extension on earth ahead of you in the credibility line, except maybe .biz, the used car salesman of the domain name world.

Did YOU Ever, Hypocrite?

Yes, and I regretted it instantly. It was a decent keyword-domain that was suitable for an information-related search, so in a moment of late night weakness, I bought it. Then I realized everything you’ve just read and let it die.

Have a .info success story? I’d love to hear it.