Google Domains recently announced that they are shutting down their domain business and selling their assets to Squarespace. This came as a shock to many, as Google seemed to be making a profit from the small markup they placed on domains and the integration with Google Workspace, their business suite.
Many people are asking why Google would do this, and it turns out that this is not uncommon for the company. As of June 2023, Google has shut down more than 267 projects. Some of the most notable projects include Google+, Google Glass, and now Google Domains.
This is a bad deal for almost everyone involved, except for the parties directly involved in the sale. There are a few reasons why you may not want to have your domains registered with Squarespace. First, Squarespace is a website builder, not a domain registrar. This means that they do not have the same level of expertise in domain registration as a third-party registrar.
Granted, Google’s core service is not a domain registrar either, but they had the money to hire competent support and the resources to develop a user-friendly interface for managing domains. Second, Squarespace’s domain registration prices are not always the best. You may be able to find a better price by registering your domain with a third-party registrar. Third, Squarespace’s customer support for domain registration is not always the best. If you have a problem with your domain, you may have to wait a long time to get help.
Squarespace may also not be as secure as a third-party registrar. Squarespace has been hacked in the past, and there have been concerns about the security of their platform. If you are concerned about the security of your domain, you may want to register it with a third-party registrar that has a good reputation for security.
Let’s be real. Squarespace’s end goal is for you to build out a website using their website builder. That is obviously their most profitable and core service. Domains are just the carrot to get people to build websites with them. They can now email target you with special offers.
We believe that WordPress is the best choice for building out websites, big or small. We urge people to migrate their domains to CloudFlare or NameCheap. Our preferred setup at ClikIT is using CloudFlare as the DNS host, and NameCheap as the domain registrar.
