Do you need the DOT COM?

[tattoo.dan]

I have a dot net website and my email is through that and I get a bunch of people who say yeah I sent the email. I used to try to find it in my junk folder and other things, now I just say, did you send it to DOT NET? oh no, i did dot com....after i just told them my email or they have my biz card with it right in front of them. Do people automatically assume dot com?

 

[cdiesel]

Yes. Businesses should have a simple url, ending in .com. Otherwise you open yourself up to issues like you're having.

 

[tattoo.dan]

i wanted to keep it my biz name, but it was taken. now i think i should try to come up with something that has part of the name or add something on. want to keep it short though......frustrated tonight. sorry

 

[cdiesel]

What about <your name>online.com? Or <yourname>web.com?

We just bought a few domains to market to the national market.. Url's are all about easy to remember, spell and find.

 

[tattoo.dan]

i thought about the <nameonline> but i am a name graphics.net that would be a lot of typing....namegraphicsonline.com...easy to remember tho. thought .net would be too. i was way wrong about that!

 

[cdiesel]

What about losing the <graphics> part? tattoodanonline.com?

 

[WildWestDesigns]

I have a dot net website and my email is through that and I get a bunch of people who say yeah I sent the email. I used to try to find it in my junk folder and other things, now I just say, did you send it to DOT NET? oh no, i did dot com....after i just told them my email or they have my biz card with it right in front of them. Do people automatically assume dot com?

Yes, people tend to automatically assume dot com. Problem is now, a lot of the dot com names are being taken, so people like me have to do dot biz(or like you dot net).

 

[cdiesel]

Owning plurals and common mispellings is a good idea too. We own customautowraps.com, and I always get email for Jack at customautowrap.com. Luckily, I'm friendly with Jack and just forward the messages to him. Just imagine what could happen if your emails ended up in the wrong hands..

 

[tattoo.dan]

that was my next question i thought of while tucking my daughter in....


my biz name is name graphicS

what if i used www.namegraphic.com not plural? too confusing? probably

 

[tattoo.dan]

just checked.... www.nameonline.com not available

 

[James Burke]

I set up my domain in the midst of the big dot com bust in early 2000.

Not wanting to be associated with a dot com stigma (or so I thought), I chose dot net and haven't had any trouble with it. I just make sure my customers are aware of the difference. My domain name with a dot com had already been taken, so I didn't worry about it in the first place.

 

[oldgoatroper]

Have you thought about using ".us" ?

from the wiki page:

.us is the Internet country code top‐level domain (ccTLD) for the United States and was established in 1985. Registrants of .us domains must be United States citizens, residents, or organizations, or a foreign entity with a presence in the United States. Most registrants in the country have registered for .com, .net, .org and other gTLDs, instead of .us, which has primarily been used by state and local governments despite any entity having the option of registering a .us domain.

Using .ca is very common in Canada, but I haven't seen too many .us domains...

There's no reason why you couldn't...

 

[thinksigns]

I've had a similar problem. I chose to use a hyphen (www.think-signs.com) instead of a .net

I just purchased www.mythinksigns.com just to have it. I'm still deciding if I'm going to switch to using that.

 

[Dentafrice]

I agree with thinksigns, I used a dash for my .com.

 

[Fanaticus]

try to get "keywords" that people might search for when trying to find you. Naming you're domain name keywords instead of the actual business name will help your organic SEO... unless you intentionally want to target people who are specifically searching for you by your business name (if you only want local exposure, etc etc). Then try to get your business name. PLUS, a lot of people will type the dot com they are looking for into the search engine instead of their address bar.

Use your meta tags too if you have access to them, this helps search engines categorize your pages and list you according to relevency. A relevent page will get listed higher on the SERPs, bringing you more traffic that could be monetized.

But, yes, dot COM will do better then dot NET or any of the other dots.

 

[Craig Sjoquist]

YES you need a dot COM ... I also tried using a dot ..WS was my 1st website learned how to make them etc. using a web builder and it was with organisation that had bought up the WS pretty much well sorta as I learned later anyway found how to make websites for free cancel that real quick now I'm dot COM and it works alot better more normal.

 

[digitalwoodshop]

When I was looking for a Web Name I found one I liked but wanted to Sleep on it.... Came back the next night with my Credit Card and found it was taken and a page marker that I could have it for $5K.....

Someone was able to see my search the night before..... Pretty Good Money Maker....

I picked a new name and had my Credit Card in hand....

So far all of last year and this year 98% of my business has found me on a Search.... In 2010 I did over $2K in Print and Internet Ad's with ZERO business..... The other 2% was word of mouth.... I make it a point to ask each Customer how they found me.... Know how my Ad Bucks are working out.... I don't bother with Yellow Book... My Customers are in Texas, Kentucky, North Carolina, and about 10 other states....

On a Search I show up in Websites and Images with the Big Boys on page 1..... I have 7 images in the first 5 pages.... I was cleaning up my Website and deleted a few old pages with pictures. Imagine my surprise when I did my weekly search to see where I stand and found 5 of the 7 now had a 404 error as I had deleted the page.... I quickly added the pages and images back.... That was Shooting me in the foot.....

Then I clicked on my Competitors Images and found a few 404 errors too.... So I was not the only Web Challenged Owner.... Added a Business Facebook page with growing hits...

AL

 

[inthesignbiz]

I looked for a .com that was suitable and couldn't find one that wasn't going to
be a mile long. Not digging the hyphen thing so I used a play on the .biz and went with
inthesign.biz. I tell our customers that's because we are "in the sign biz".

 

[Fred Weiss]

We get email from customers looking for signs101 dot ca a couple of times a month. And then there's a competitor who registered sign101 dot com and has it forwarded to his site. So, yes, I definitely feel like .com is the only way to go. And, if you think someone may want to trade on your name, then pay for the closely related domain names.

I think you can still come up with a reasonable dot com name if you're willing to do some searching and are willing to allow a small word addition. We had a site (now closed) named digitalartnow dot com (2008) which was as close as we could get to simply digitalart and we had no problem, at the time (2005), getting expressclipart dot com.

 

[bob]

I would rather be beaten with chains than have a web presence, regardless of what characters might terminate it. I thoroughly enjoy being a Luddite in this regard.

That notwithstanding, just what is the regulating authority, what are its powers, and what is its reach? I'm unclear as to whether these names are actually regulated by force of law or what.

What is to keep me from bringing up my very own server and naming things whatever it might please me to name them. When and if someone should complain, to whom are they going to complain? What authority does any apparatus possess to cause me to cease and desist?

I remember way back before the most of you were born a friend had his very own UseNet server on which he could and would do the most outrageous things. People would get their shorts in a wad and threaten to denounce him to his ISP. He would point out that he was his own ISP so denounce away.

In short because he ran his own server and the buck stopped there, he was essentially immune from any repercussions fomented by his actions. Would that same situation apply today vis-a-vis the internet? If not, why not?