By Jennifer Dunn
There are a few basic truths about the Internet: cat pictures rule, people will fight over absolutely anything, and when you get a new website you generally have to choose a domain name from the well-picked-over supply of .coms or .nets. One of these truths, though, is changing—your options “behind the dot!”
The gradual rollout of hundreds of targeted new domain name extensions means that, instead of having to pick a less-than-ideal .com or .net or even a country-code top-level domain (like .it for Italy), you’ll have a ton of options to choose from when you start a new website.
This can have tremendous implications for your business. Just imagine if your tennis supply shop, “What a Racket,” was forced to use an unwieldy site name like Iswearthisisatennisstore.com simply because all the short, memorable domain names you liked were taken. With the release of all these new extensions, you can register WhataRacket.tennis –instantly telling the public what you’re all about!
What Does It Really Mean For You?
This opens your business up on the Web like never before. Gone are the days when you have to come up with some terribly creative campaign simply to let potential customers know how to find your business online. With the hundreds of new extensions hitting the market—starting now with .menu, .luxury, .build and .uno, all now available for pre-registration—everyone will know in the blink of an eye.
So just imagine your business’s domain name with an ending like:
- Business: Anything related to a vertical or industry, including whatever you happen to be selling. Examples: .app, .shop, .venture, .lawyer.
- Local: Does your website have anything to with a specific geographic area, country, city, or continent? Then .tokyo, .irish, or .africa might suit you.
- Community: Any type of group, community, or otherwise like-minded organization or collection of people. Examples: .fitness, .tennis, and .club.
- Generic: Have a more abstract idea for a domain name? Then generic terms like .free, .fun, .ninja, and .win might work for you.
And those are just the beginning! There are many, many more names to come.
The Dawn of a New Era?
So if you’re getting ready to launch a new website then it’s time to make a change! Your customers are desperately trying to find you, and now it’s time to help them. We hope this blog post has given you the tools to find the perfect domain extension for your business. Good luck!
This guest post is courtesy of GoDaddy® contributing writer Jennifer Dunn. As the Web’s top platform for small businesses, GoDaddy can help you easily start, confidently grow, and successfully run your own venture.
I think this leaves out an important consideration for any business owner when it comes to these names: How difficult it is to change consumer behavior. How many potential customers would ever remember WhatARacket.Tennis? Maybe 10-15 years from now when these extensions are more widely known, but more than likely .com is going to stay top of mind for the foreseeable future (mobile keyboard trays have a dedicated .com button for example).
The real test is whether you can give out your domain name in conversation and not be embarrassed by it or have to do a bunch of explaining. Imagine telling someone at a cocktail mixer to check out your website–TennisDeals.com. Now imagine the same conversation, only you tell them to check out your website–Deals.Tennis. I doubt you could say it without wincing or smiling sheepishly.
“40% of business is “Word of mouth” and few on the Internet have gotten that memo. If you know that 40 cents of every dollar you make is word of mouth then you would think folks would focus on what might be the biggest pool of customers they have. So .whatever has to do one thing and one thing only. It MUST be memorable and easy to communicate to 3rd parties that you do not communicate directly to.”
http://www.ricksblog.com/2013/10/meaningless-com-domain-name-vs-meaningful-whatever/#.UuqX1HddU1o