Namecheap began to target college students earlier last year when they became involved in college hackathons. According to the company’s website, students who use Namecheap receive the following in the “student bundle deal”:
Free .ME Domain (1 year)Discounts on .com/.io/.rocks/.link/.club/.website (1 year)Free about.me Premium or GitHub Pages 1-click setupFree Private email account
Namecheap is currently available at various colleges and universities in the US, UK, and Canada. The company’s main goal is to continue to expand while also having mentors teach students the importance of building a brand online. “We have continued our presence at hackathons. We also have a lot of great partnerships with startups like Github and About.me who help us spread the word about the program,” says Worcester. Another interesting aspect of the company is their involvement in activism. “We consider ourselves Internet activists, having raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for Electronic Frontier Foundation to fight important issues like SOPA, PIPA, and most recently, net neutrality,” says Worcester of the company, which also ran a program called the FreeBike project which donated bikes to children in developing countries. While there are other websites that offer domains, Worcester says there are a few factors that set Namecheap apart. “We just make it incredibly easy to register and manage a domain. No frills, no upsells,” says Worcester who says the company is passionate about helping students.
