One of my first tasks when working on a client strategy for a new product or business name is to check that the domain name is available.
Because I’m based in Australia, I first check .com.au, but I also recommend acquiring the .com address and other top-level domains.
In fact, we’ve actually tweaked the name of products before when we were unable to secure the domain name; they really are that important to your brand and findability online. You can imagine, therefore, how perplexed I was when admiring some fantastic work by New York-based brand-building agency, Collins, only to find they had the domain name, collins1.com.
Now, I don’t want to pick on them here, because I believe they do some great work, but why would you choose to add a digit to your name in order to secure the domain?
It piqued my interest—what available domains could have worked for them? I spent ten minutes, and discovered the following domains are available:
- collinsagency.com
- wearecollins.com
- collinsny.com
- collinsnewyork.com
There’s no way of knowing whether these were all taken when they first set up their website, but it seems improbable. If I hadn’t written down their domain name in order to write this piece, I would have long forgotten it. Wouldn’t they have been better with one of these, or another alternative?
Speaking of domains, the domain name for Open, a New York design studio, has always impressed me. Obviously open.com was taken, so they opted for notclosed.com. Now that’s a memorable domain name!
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Miles BurkeAs Director of Bam Creative, and Chairperson of the Australian Web Industry Association, Miles spends his time managing his business or speaking about managing businesses. Recently awarded as one of the top Western Australian entrepreneurs under 40 years old, Miles can also be found writing at his blog.
