Show HN: Nuage – Domain names with no hassle | Hacker News Reader

Show HN: Nuage – Domain names with no hassle

nuageapp.com

79 pointstrueduke46 comments

Really like the light touch to the website design and copy. But it may be too light as I've clicked on two links to find out how it adds value to my life and I still don't know.

Some first impressions:

* I want to enter something where it says 'your domain name' under features. My domain name what? This looks like an input box but it's not. I'm left confused.

* Under pricing, "All our domains including" should read "All our domains include".

* "Download the domain prices". Are you joking? Make this a searchable list. Jets will make implementing this a breeze - https://github.com/NeXTs/Jets.js/

* As I scroll down the homepage my eyes move from 'buy' to 'A-Z' to 'Day-30'. This block layout feels odd as I associate items at the top with higher priority but they all seem like equally important features and the 'A-Z' is just kind of hanging out solo on the right - something like display: flex with justify-content set to 'space-between' may be worth trying.

My feedback mostly cover aesthetics, sorry. I would comment on the service if I knew what it was! ;)

> This looks like an input box but it's not.

Looking at the element, is is an input box, but disabled. Enabling it by modifying it lets me type in it, but not do anything. I'm guessing it's something that works when you sign in, but that's not remotely clear.

And I'm not creating an account just to search domain names, when there are a million sites that let me do that without registering.

> And I'm not creating an account just to search domain names, when there are a million sites that let me do that without registering.

And one of its selling points is:

    No need to fill out a zillion forms, just
    enter your contact details and credit card.

I'm not sure which registrars need a zillion forms to pay (once registered), but every one I've used has Paypal as an option, where even entering contact details and credit card isn't necessary.

Copy and design is pretty swish, but it's too over the top for me. I don't want buying domains to "have never been this cool" or to "blow my mind". I want it to be simple and easy. Which it already is elsewhere. Input box looks like I can use it to search for domains, but I can't. That was frustrating. I do think there's a lot of room for improvement in spite of the competition, but this isn't it.

1) Give me a modern search interface like namecheap - I want to be able to search for keywords and see suggestions for TLDs in a sensible way.

2) Don't use "cheap" in your name (probably main problem with namecheap).

3) Show me a demo of your DNS control -- this is really badly done in all the registrars I've tried, and that would be a big drawcard if I could see it without signing up

4) Show me all the prices for different TLDs -- not just the five stylistically but impractically arranged ones on the pricing page

So, basically this appears to be an agent model.

I assume they make their money by selling domains and taking a cut of the price. Based on my current registrar's prices, even comparing a single domain (i.e. no bulk discount), this service would be more expensive by:

.org US$7.45 .com US$2.99 .co US$11.63 .net US$6.61 .biz US$7.53

The lack of details (they don't specifically detail which registrars they work with) makes me wonder who would ever sign up for this.

There's a notice that they're a Gandi reseller.

Yep, they are a reseller.

> - We are a reseller of domains, we get our cut when you buy and renew (coming soon) your domains through Nuage

https://www.producthunt.com/tech/nuage-2#comment-374487

Edit: Posting fixing link

On their site? I've looked through every page I can find and don't see that information.

It's when you go to check out ... there's a footer.

I left the site before reaching this point because they withhold that information.

Site looks nice, responsive, and useful. It is missing an "About" though. Who are you, where are you located? If I register a domain through you, who is on the administrative, technical, and billing information for the domain? Thanks!

We are french guys between Paris and SF. We have a strong partnership with Gandi registrar to register your domains. Nuage Inc. is the technical and billing contact, you are the owner and administrative contact.

I'm not entirely sure what problem is being solved here. Domain registration and renewal is already pretty simple and easy, with a plethora of registrars, many with lower prices.

The key feature seems to be "Manage domains from different registrars in a single app"

Do that many people maintain domains on multiple registrars? Seems to me like the kind of person for whom this is a problem would have already simplified their own life by picking a single registrar.

I mean, i have yet to find a registrar that has all the TLDs i want. However, most of the TLDs i want i already find too expensive.

If this type of service minimizes "their cut" to the bare minimum, and made it very transparent who it was coming from so i could price check, i would likely use this service because they're bound to have more TLDs (due to aggregation) than typical registrars.

Unfortunately, currently i feel like i'd just be paying a significant premium for something i already find too expensive. And if this isn't true, i see no information to indicate otherwise (at a quick glance, at least).

We do not earn money when you use the site. There is no subscription fee, no premium stuff. We take our cut when you buy a domain from Nuage and/or renew your domains. It is transparent, and just to make sure it is clear, we do buy our domains from Gandi which is accredited by ICANN.

I have two gandi accounts (one for personal, one for business). Managing that can be a pain sometimes. I also use dnsimple for more complicated and team needs. Gandi is cheaper for simpler things, so I want to keep most of my domains there.

Nuage has a very simple UI (much easier to use compared to gandi, imo)

What am I missing here? This looks like a lot of domain registrars in 2016.

It's actually not a registrar, but a platform that aggregate registrars in a single UI. You basically sync your accounts from registrars (GoDaddy, Gandi, ...) and it let's you manage them from the same place.

and what's my 10x here?

...and it let's you manage them from the same place.

Why would I want to use different services? I (personally) use godaddy, my company uses namecheap.

Both seem to be doing fine and we check in on them once a year.

Different TLDs at different registrars, I guess. I don't see that feature relieving a big pain point either.

One irritation that has popped up for me is that I was unable to combine my domain names into one registrar. I managed to move most of them over to Namecheap, but they won't accept transfers with a .ws TLD, so that one remains at register.com. I suppose in theory I could move to Nuages and manage everything from one account, but something tells me I'd just end up using all 3 and my situation would be slightly worse off than it is now.

On the pricing page: "545 domains available, yes sir."

What does that mean? TLDs?

Looks very nice in presentation/style. I'm not seeing what value the service provides over using a registrar directly. I've never had to enter my details multiple times after I've registered for one domain at a registrar - I can just select the details that are on file for any subsequent domains.

"We find you good domain prices on the internet" tells me that I should go elsewhere for the best prices. From common english usage, "best" is so often paired with "prices" that to see the word "good" coupled with pricing in marketing speak, one immediately wonders why it isn't "best".

    > On the pricing page: "545 domains available, yes sir."

Right, I read that and thought "TLDs? Or they're parking?"

Firefox doesn't seem to support this on Debian (Linux?) or Android (or more?):

Debian/Firefox:

Tried typing in the animated 'Hello!' at the top of the screen on the home page, in order to enter a domain name, but nothing happened. Reason for trying clicking and entering something was because the animation seemed like indication of input functionality to search for names and domains, but no input happened.

For something to happen, could be nice, especially as the comments here suggest you make revenue only from domains managed through Nuage - get signups early by getting people on the front page.

Checking further, the https://www.nuageapp.com/features page suggests checking domains is possible, without needing to log in first, but the text box is not selectable.

For fun, tried on mobile: Android/Firefox

The 'Hello' on '/' is unclickable as when trying with desktop - not sure if it is supposed to be or not... The burger menu is also unclickable; when going to /features the input box was also unclickable like on desktop.

No word on private registration, which is essential these days if you don't want your address and phone number posted online for anyone to use in a social engineering attack.

Since this seems to be a Gandi reseller, I should mention that I really like the way Gandi handles whois privacy, with my name in the clear but my contact details hidden, so there's no uncertainty about ownership if there's ever a dispute. I keep my most important domains with Gandi for this reason. The problem is that they only support whois privacy with some TLDs and not others. They cite registry restrictions, but the same TLDs are often available with whois privacy from other registrars. If a reseller could fix this situation, that would be very helpful.

"All our domains including domain WhoisGuard, Free DNS server, Anti Cache poisoning, Transfer security" (from the Pricing page)

WhoisGuard is what you're looking for and apparently it's available for "all domains".

WhoisGuard is a service from NameCheap. Unless otherwise specified, I wouldn't assume that it would be available to domains registered through other registrars.

It also replaces the owner's name with WhoisGuard, which is IMO inferior to the way Gandi does whois privacy.

The WhoIS we are talking about in the pricing page is the Gandi one. It is not available for every TLDs has some registries don't support it. Majors one does.

Looks nifty, I just signed up!

Lots of naysayers in this thread, but this looks super useful to me. I have domains with a few registrars, and I manage them via a Google spreadsheet today.

Looks cute, but (just take this as feedback for your "onboarding" process) I don't like to sign up for things without being able to test them. Like GoDaddy, you should allow a user to search for a domain name, see the price, and then sign up. At least, that's what you'd have to do to get business from a curmudgeon like me.

The lead feature here seems to be "buy domains with no hassle", but that already exists: Hover.com and Google Domains, to name two major ones.

Perhaps your lead should be the unified domain management. Because I will be honest, at these prices I would NEVER use your service over the two I mentioned above.

There are dozens of sites that let me buy these kind of domain names... I'd like to see a service that will reach out to an existing site and broker a price for me, without a commitment to buy it. I just want to know how much they'll sell for.

Definitely falls under the kind of tool I would use if my friend wrote it, but otherwise doesn't really do anything for me. I'm a namecheap user and they do a perfectly good job.

Amazing webdesign, congrats to your designer.

Is it possible to purchase with an API.. because that would be a gamechanger (if you can support your 500+ tlds).

API is on it's way but not ready yet. We are basically trying to create a standard for domain names. Also a lot ore is coming like instant landing pages, service integration ...

FWIW, API is probably what'll set you apart and make you money for the other stuff, else you've no big differentiation.

How would that be a "game changer"? GoDaddy has had a purchase API for a while... I'm sure others do as well, but I've only used GoDaddy's.

https://developer.godaddy.com

https://developer.godaddy.com/doc#!/_v1_domains/purchase

One blocker for OVH is 2FA enabled. Also I'd like to see internetbs.net

+1. Also, uniregistry as well.

Are you affiliated with OVH?

No we are not ! We are working with a lot of registrars to connect all your domains through their APIs.

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