BlogSmall business, Marketing, Promotion and Web Design

(initially this was a reply to the discussion on WebHostingTalk in regards to the .ws domain name for web hosting business web site)

Running your company’s web site doesn’t really require .com domain. However, for marketing purposes, .com domain is almost a necessity, since most people are so much used to all domain names ending in .com (unless you are running del.icio.us, but that’s whole another story and you wouldn’t need an advice in such a case). One of our clients is running a web site with .us domain (actually, he’s the only client who has a non-dot-com domain, as far as I know), but he is marketing to a different niche and in a different way.

In the early days of .biz and .info these TLDs were offered at a huge discount, or even for free. A lot of fraudsters, scammers and spammers have grabbed nice looking domains in those zones which led to the common perception of these domains as “knock-offs”, “fakes” or businesses in third-world countries that shouldn’t be trusted. Currently it’s not exactly true, but that’s what we usually hear from prospective clients when choosing domain name for their web sites.

.COM is a must if you are running E-commerce web site. I would also suggest same approach if you are running web hosting business. There are a lot of aftermarket names you can snatch for a very low fee (we also have some hosting domains for sale). If that’s too expensive - your business model must be wrong.

Popularity: 31%

You might also be interested in reading this:

• Network Solutions Plays It Dirty (January 9, 2008): So, after all this time it turns out to be true - someone DOES snitch domain names at the time of the search. Guess who that might be? Some anonymous hacker? Wrong! It's one of the largest domain name registrar - Network Solutions. Multiple blogs and other sources confirm that NetSol preserves any .com name [...]
• Network Solution Saga Continues (January 11, 2008): After numerous confirmations of scam-like business practices, Network Solution is now looking into implementing a feature that will allow users to "lock" domain for 4 days, instead of doing this for them automatically. Ironically, this feature look just awfully familiar - just like "domain tasting". With difference being that now anyone can lock the domain [...]
• Updating the blog (December 20, 2007): My sincere apologies if the blog will malfunction tonight - I am installing a plug-in to list domains I have for sale and the site might be a little unstable during this time. Please bear with me.
• Small business in Chicago (November 27, 2007): Yesterday I have returned from a Thanksgiving trip to Chicago. Aside from matrimonial errands (my friends were getting married) I had a chance to communicate to a lot of different people from various social groups. Aside from regular chit-chat I was inquiring on the cost of living. Obviously you can get data from various web [...]

Glad I was brave enough in past time to snatch some of my own:
BUKB.COM
BUKB.NET
BUKV.COM
BUKV.NET
BYKB.COM
BYKB.NET
HO5T.BIZ
HO5T.COM
HO5T.NET
IZBG.COM
VGRU.COM
VGRU.NET
WGNX.NET

Popularity: 14%

You might also be interested in reading this:

• Why .COM domain name is important (December 30, 2007): (initially this was a reply to the discussion on WebHostingTalk in regards to the .ws domain name for web hosting business web site) Running your company's web site doesn't really require .com domain. However, for marketing purposes, .com domain is almost a necessity, since most people are so much used to all domain names ending in [...]
• Network Solutions Plays It Dirty (January 9, 2008): So, after all this time it turns out to be true - someone DOES snitch domain names at the time of the search. Guess who that might be? Some anonymous hacker? Wrong! It's one of the largest domain name registrar - Network Solutions. Multiple blogs and other sources confirm that NetSol preserves any .com name [...]
• Network Solution Saga Continues (January 11, 2008): After numerous confirmations of scam-like business practices, Network Solution is now looking into implementing a feature that will allow users to "lock" domain for 4 days, instead of doing this for them automatically. Ironically, this feature look just awfully familiar - just like "domain tasting". With difference being that now anyone can lock the domain [...]
• Buying A Domain On A Smartphone (December 18, 2008): Yesterday I noticed that the very first domain I ever tried to own, but never did - CatBegemot.com (it's coming from here, if you must know. Not that I am infatuated with Woland figure, it's just that specific character - Cat Begemot - is very appealing to me.) is actually free (as in Deleted [...]