DomainTools – Information about Domains

DomainTools enables an advanced whois lookup about a specific domain or about the domains owned by a specific person. If you ever wanted to find out who is behind a specific website, who is running it and what other domain names does he have, this is the right tool for the job.

A domain name is a string, usually ending in “.com”, “.net” or “.org”, that appears at the top of the window when people navigate on it via the Internet. Although new Internet users tend to have Google on their homepage, and navigate directly on sites by typing desired keywords in the search box (without ever knowing the actual domain name of a site), a memorable and easy to remember domain name is still an asset nowadays as users tend to remember the brand as they become more advanced in Internet usage and more loyal to their favorite sites.

As opposed to other whois tools, DomainTools has several improvements. First, they provide a shortcut for quickly accessing the whois information: just type “whois.sc/example.com” (without the quotes and with the actual domain instead of example.com) and you’ll be redirected to the DomainTools whois page for that domain. Secondly, in addition to standard whois information, you’ll find out how many other domains does that person have registered, and for a fee, what those other domains are. In the registration tab you’ll also be able to see the registration status for the other extensions (is example.net or example.org available?).

DomainTools has, every month, 2 million unique visitors. According to its Wikipedia page, the site is in the top 200 Internet sites (in Alexa ratings). The company is based in Seattle, United States. They make money via multiple sources: they sell domain reports for a fee (as mentioned above) and they offer domain monitoring services (which are free only up to specific limits). Recently they’ve begun letting you know when a domain is taken but available for sale via a 3rd party provider; those links include the ability to track the referrer and I suspect DomainTools gets a commission in case the sale actually happens.