Domain Expiry Monitoring for Agencies

Stop Explaining Why a Client's Website Went Dark

It's 9 AM. Your phone rings. Your client's website is showing a parking page with ads for discount pharmaceuticals. Their email is bouncing. They're panicking.

Their domain expired.

You didn't have access to their registrar. You didn't get notified. And now you're spending your morning explaining what happened and walking them through renewal while they wonder why you didn't catch this.

Sound familiar?

The Agency Domain Problem

You manage websites for clients. But you often don't manage their domains. They're registered under:

• The client's personal GoDaddy account from 2015
• Their "IT person" (who left the company two years ago)
• A previous agency that never transferred credentials
• Some random registrar you've never heard of

You don't have access. You probably don't even know the login email. And when the domain expires, you're still the first call because you're "the web people."

What Domain Expiration Costs Your Agency

Direct costs:

• Hours spent in crisis mode
• Unplanned, unbillable work
• Calls and emails with panicked clients
• Walking clients through registrar interfaces

Indirect costs:

• Damaged trust: Client wonders what else you're not monitoring
• Reputation risk: Their site was down, you're associated with it
• Scope creep: "Shouldn't you have caught this?"
• Stress: Emergency mode is exhausting

The worst case:

The domain enters redemption (expensive) or gets released (potentially catastrophic). Now you're explaining $200 recovery fees or—worse—that someone else owns their domain and wants $5,000 for it.

The Solution: Monitor What You Don't Control

You don't need registrar access to monitor domain expiration. WHOIS data is public. Anyone can look up when a domain expires.

Domain Expiry Watcher checks WHOIS data on a smart schedule—monthly for domains with time remaining, weekly as expiry approaches, and daily in the final week—so you always know exactly when each client domain expires.

How Agencies Use Domain Expiry Watcher

During client onboarding

When you take on a new client:

This becomes part of your onboarding checklist. Every new client, every time.

When you get an expiry alert

60-90 days out: Send a friendly reminder email to your client. Something like:

"Hi [Client], just a heads up—your domain [domain.com] expires on [date]. Make sure you renew it before then. Let me know if you need help."

30 days out: More urgent follow-up:

"Hi [Client], your domain expires in 30 days. If it lapses, your website and email will go down. Please confirm renewal is handled."

7 days out: Phone call time. This is getting critical.

Documenting the relationship

The key benefit: you warned them. In writing. With dates.

If the domain expires anyway because they ignored your warnings, that's documented. You're not liable—you did your job.

Setting Up Client Domain Monitoring

Step 1: Inventory all client domains

You probably manage more domains than you realize. Check:

• Active client websites
• Client email domains (if different)
• Redirects and legacy domains you maintain
• Staging/development domains on real TLDs

Step 2: Bulk import

Add all domains at once. Copy-paste a list, one domain per line. We fetch expiry dates automatically.

Step 3: Organize by client (optional)

Use tags or notes to group domains by client for easy reference.

Step 4: Configure alerts

Most agencies want:

• 60-day alert: time to notify client casually
• 30-day alert: time for urgent follow-up
• 7-day alert: time to escalate

Step 5: Build into your process

Add domain monitoring to your:

• New client checklist
• Monthly/quarterly client reviews
• Offboarding checklist (remove domains when client leaves)

Pricing for Agencies

Free tier: 3 domains (enough to test it out)

Pro tier: $9/month for unlimited domains

Most agencies manage 20-100 client domains. At $9/month flat, that's less than a coffee per client per year for peace of mind.

Billing clients for domain monitoring

Some agencies include this in their retainer. Others charge it as a line item:

| Approach | Example | |----------|---------| | Bundled | "Domain monitoring included in maintenance plan" | | Line item | "$3/month per domain for expiry monitoring" | | Annual | "$25/year domain security monitoring fee" |

At $9/month for unlimited, you can cover your entire client base and still make margin.

What We Don't Do (And Why That's Good)

Domain Expiry Watcher focuses on one thing: telling you when domains expire.

We don't:

• Manage DNS records
• Handle domain renewals
• Require API integrations
• Force you into a complex dashboard

You have enough complex tools. This one is simple. Add domains, get alerts, handle renewals however you already handle them.

Comparison: How Agencies Handle Domain Monitoring

Common Objections

"My clients should handle their own domains." They should. They often don't. And you're still the first call when it breaks.

"We already have enough tools." This one takes 5 minutes to set up and saves hours per incident. The ROI is obvious.

"It's only $9/month but that's another subscription." One prevented domain expiration crisis pays for 10+ years of monitoring.

"We can just check manually." You can. Until you forget. The point of monitoring is that you don't have to remember.

Get Started

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Part of Boring Tools—boring tools for boring jobs.