A LIVE Lesson in Picking a Domain Name.

Afternoon Folks!!

Ocean, River, Lake, Pond, Puddle. Pick which one you want to aim for.

Hint: There is Pigeon Shit in the puddle. So pay attention if you want to avoid. One extra word can be the difference between a 6 figure domain and a worthless domain. I see it all day long.

So verbs and adjectives LIMIT your audience but at the same time TARGETS your audience. Target too much, you have a puddle or maybe just a dried up hole. Here is the recipe for the happy medium.

So here is a real world example of targeting and limiting.

HallofShame.com is universal.

It may not be the ocean of Shame.com for example, but it is a universal domain that is targeted and you know you are going to see some bad behavior when you get there. And in time can become subdomains to include different subjects, industries and companies etc.

What I did not do is use DomainHallofShame.com which would have been much more targeted, but much more limited when we are trying to hit a wider audience. Plus, I already have that ability. Add one more word and you are at worthess.

In each case you must decide who you are aiming for. In this case I am trying to vault over the walls of a POND that would be DomainHallofShame.com. What I am trying to do is jump into the RIVER because the River goes places. It has greater circulation than a pond. It travels. Sometimes you only want to be in that pond. And that is fine. KNOW THE DIFFERENCE! Many do not.

In my case the River may be better than the ocean. That is what targeting is about but you must have a target audience and they don't go to puddles and dried up holes. I could have also had DomainNameHallofShame.com or Domainnameshallofshame.com. Each one gets increasingly further away, harder to remember, less traffic and so on. On the other hand owning those combos can't hurt if you have a business. But that is the extent of it and the value is severely limited.

This is a 3 word domain that just happens to work because it means something. It is a known phrase. It has already been advertised and sold to the public before I ever entered the picture. Something most domains and most new gTLD's won't have the luxury of.

Now I have a running start and all I have to do is BRAND. Yes Brand. Not selling. I have nothing to sell. I have something to brand. Something the startup guys need to learn the difference about. If THEY are busy branding they are busy going out of business because they CAN'T sell. If they COULD sell, they would be busy selling because that way they make money and grow. Branding means you got  a bag of shit and the only way you can make it is trying to be cool. Good luck with that.

Point is, if you approach it from left field you may end up in left field. These are the basic building blocks I and most other successful domainers use and you can reject at your own peril. Most do. I can only put it out there.

AdjectiveKEYWORD.com

VerbKEYWORD.com

NounKEYWORD.com

DescribeKEYWORD.com

LetterKeyword.com (i or e)

NameKeyword.com

LocationKeyword.com

That is the foundation I use.

Rick Schwartz

 



8 thoughts on “A LIVE Lesson in Picking a Domain Name.

  1. Michael

    Hi Rick, then what about the internet web giants such as Google.com and Yahoo.com? What do you have to say about the fact that all of the top 10 sites in the world use “cool” domain names?

    Reply
  2. bill

    Thats definitely trademark infringement. The Fox Network should be sending you a C & D letter soon.

    Reply
  3. Altaf

    @Michael, what Rick wanted to make the folks understand the difference between type-ins with no cost/expense at all, and made brands with spending huge money and energy.Who knew the words, Google or Yahoo before(has it got any meaning or did you get it in the dictionary?). Now we know them after spending huge advertising money while same amount of $$$ if you spent on “hotels” “Cars” you would make better brand than those.

    Reply
  4. UFO

    Michael

    Rick is highlighting innate, intrinsic value of domain names as opposed to ‘in use’ domains that have other developed attributes.

    Try thinking of domainers as wholesalers, we don’t have ideas or technological solutions to bring to the market only our ability to register domains that could have value for others.

    Google and Yahoo wouldn’t be worth much as domains even now, however the massive ‘in use’ attributes make them significantly valuable.

    Reply
  5. Michael

    I’m well aware of the “intrinsic” value of domain names. I own many extremely valuable generic names, such as FoodWriters.com, CardCollection.com, and Unsweetened.com. My portfolio receives over 1k type-ins every day. I simply wanted to see how Rick would respond to my question.

    Reply
  6. UFO

    @Michael. As Shakespeare.com once said “To suck, or not suck eggs.. that is the question”.

    Reply
  7. Rick Schwartz

    Michael who cares?
    Let me make a suggestion.
    You have a 1000 type ins a day right?
    Congrats, that’s the first step. That is not your end point.
    Now repeat what you did 100 more times and THEN ask me that question.
    Look at the 3 domains you posted. They ALL met MY criteria.
    Why didn’t you post the “cool” domains you own?

    Reply

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