What to Do With All Those Startup Domains You Bought and Never Use

If you’ve been building startups for more than a year or two, you already know the problem.

You don’t just have ideas. You have domains.

A lot of them.

Domains you were excited about at the time. Domains you bought fast so no one else would grab them. Domains that felt right at 1:47 AM when the idea made total sense and you could already see the landing page in your head.

And then… the startup didn’t work.

Maybe it failed hard. Maybe it quietly faded. Maybe it actually worked a bit, got users, got traction, but not enough to justify another year of your life.

So now the product is gone, but the domain is still there.

Renewing every year. Doing nothing. Just sitting in your account like a reminder.

Most founders don’t talk about this part, but it’s super common. Almost everyone I know who builds has a pile of old domains they don’t really know what to do with.

This article is about that pile.

Startup Failure Is Normal. Domain Neglect Is Optional.

Let’s be honest first.

Most startups fail. That’s not being negative, that’s just math. If you’re a builder, you try things. Some work. Most don’t. That’s the job.

But what usually happens after a startup fails?

The repo gets archived The site gets ignored The domain gets renewed “just in case” And then nothing.

The idea dies, but the domain lives on in a weird zombie state. Not useful, not gone.

That’s a waste.

Because even failed startups leave something behind, and that something is often traffic, links, and memory.

The Internet Doesn’t Forget Your Old Products

Here’s something that surprised me early on.

Even when you stop thinking about a product, the internet doesn’t.

Old blog posts stay indexed. Product Hunt pages still rank. Tweets get retweeted years later. People bookmark stuff and come back randomly.

I noticed this with one of my older products, Colaunchly.

The product itself is basically dead. I’m not working on it anymore. No roadmap, no updates, nothing. But when I checked analytics, people were still visiting the domain.

Not massive numbers. But real people. Every month.

That traffic didn’t come from marketing I was doing now. It came from stuff I did years ago.

That’s when it hit me: killing a startup doesn’t mean killing its domain value.

The Trickshot: Redirect Everything Forward

Here’s the move I want more founders to steal.

I took all my old startup domains and redirected them to my newest project: makers.page.

Every single one.

No shutdown page. No apology note. No “this product is no longer maintained” essay.

Just a clean redirect.

Now, when someone clicks an old link, or types an old URL, or finds an ancient blog post through Google, they land on what I’m building now.

And yes, it actually works.

Analytics show it clearly. People still access those old domains. And instead of hitting a dead end, they end up on my current startup.

It’s simple, but it’s one of those things people rarely do.

Why This Works (Without Overthinking It)

This isn’t some growth hack. It’s just common sense applied late.

You’re Reusing Attention You Already Earned

At some point, you worked for that traffic.

You wrote content. You launched somewhere. You shared links. Other people linked to you.

Why throw that away?

Redirecting lets you reuse that attention instead of letting it evaporate.

You Reduce Friction for Curious People

Someone clicking an old link isn’t looking for a shutdown notice.

They’re curious. About the idea, or the founder, or both.

Sending them to your current project answers the real question they have: “What is this person doing now?”

It Tells a Cleaner Founder Story

This part matters more than people think.

When all your old stuff points forward, your journey looks connected instead of messy.

Old idea → new idea → better idea.

That’s how real builders operate anyway. The redirect just makes it visible.

It Takes Almost No Effort

This is the best part.

You don’t need new content. You don’t need copywriting. You don’t need a launch.

Just set up redirects at the DNS or hosting level and move on.

But What About SEO?

Yeah, let’s talk about it.

No, this isn’t some magic SEO exploit. You’re not suddenly stealing rankings.

But a few real things happen:

Old domains often have backlinks Some pages are still indexed 301 redirects pass some trust Branded searches flow to your new site

If the old product and the new one are even loosely related, it helps more.

Even if the SEO impact is small, it compounds. And again, this is traffic you already paid for with time and effort.

Other Useful Things You Can Do With Old Domains

Redirecting to your current startup is my default move, but it’s not the only one.

Depending on the domain, here are other options that actually make sense.

Redirect to a Personal Page

If you don’t want everything tied to one startup, redirect old domains to:

A personal website A “now” page A simple “what I’m building these days” page

This works great if you build multiple things or change direction often.

Turn Them Into Small Legacy Pages

Some products deserve a bit more respect.

If a startup had users, content, or a recognizable name, you can turn the domain into:

A short case study A lessons learned page A static explanation of what it was

This helps with credibility and gives context when people stumble onto it.

Email Forwarding Still Matters

Old domains still get emails.

Support requests. Random questions. Sometimes interesting opportunities.

Set up forwarding. It takes minutes and costs nothing.

Selling (Sometimes)

Most domains aren’t worth selling. Let’s be real.

But occasionally you’ll have:

A clean brand name A niche keyword A domain with backlinks

Those can be sold. Just don’t overestimate their value. The real value is usually in using them yourself.

What You Should Not Do

A few anti-patterns I see all the time.

Letting Domains Expire Without Thinking

Once a domain expires, you lose control.

Someone else can buy it. Spam it. Rank for your old brand.

At least make a conscious choice before dropping it.

Leaving Broken Sites Online Forever

A half-working site with outdated copy looks worse than nothing.

If it’s dead, clean it up properly. Redirect or shut it down clean.

Overengineering the Whole Thing

You don’t need clever funnels or long explanations.

A redirect is often enough.

This is about momentum, not perfection.

Domains Are One of the Few Things That Carry Forward

Most startup assets don’t survive failure.

Code gets stale. Designs age badly. Tech stacks change.

Domains are different.

They persist. They accumulate history. They carry memory.

If you treat every startup like a dead end, you reset yourself over and over again.

If you treat them like steps, domains become connective tissue between everything you’ve built.

How I Actually Set This Up

Nothing fancy.

I gathered all my old domains. Set 301 redirects. Pointed them to makers.page. Watched analytics quietly.

No announcements. No tweets. No blog post about it.

Just infrastructure doing its job in the background.

Final Thought

Failed startups aren’t wasted time.

They’re experiments. They’re proof you shipped. They’re part of your builder identity.

Your domains are artifacts of that journey.

You can let them rot. Or you can make them useful again.

Redirecting my old domains to my current startup was one of those boring, practical decisions that paid off without drama.

If you’re sitting on a stack of unused domains, don’t ignore them.

They already know how to reach people.

You just need to tell them where to send them now.