A few articles looking at domains from outside the industry

By: Raymond Hackney

Over the last couple weeks there were some interesting articles regarding domain names from publications outside the industry.

Larry Levenson wrote a piece on HubSpot entitled, "Why Marketers Should Care About The 1,300 New Top-Level Domains"

Levenson talks about things from using the new gtlds for brand protection to potential SEO benefits to innovation.

He summed it up:

The Bottom Line

Our suggestion is that you register domains that match your business objectives or that you want to protect, either because of your own trademarks or for future use.

These new TLDs are all coming in the next 12 months, and will completely change the Internet and our current concepts of internet branding. Savvy marketers will seize this opportunity to protect and/or expand their internet brands and continue to apply the latest best practices of inbound marketing. How will you take advantage of the new TLDs?

Amanda Foley wrote a really good piece for The Next Web entitled, "How to get creative with your domain name registration"

Foley takes a look at 10 start ups and how they chose to pick their name. She discusses the importance of naming to a start up and whether its worth it to pay big bucks if the name is taken.

From the article:

Whilst some argue that paying big bucks for a dot-com address is essential, sometimes it’s unavailable or just too costly to purchase from domain name squatters. So, what happens if you think of the “perfect” name and you can’t get that prime dotcom address you were hoping for?

Trends like dropping the vowels, misspelling words and using the other top-level domain names (TLD) like”.ly” or “.be” is still a very popular choice, and there are many companies who include a call-to-action in their domain name like “http://getpocket.com”

The comment section is an illustration of what some, most likely not domain investors think about domaining in general. There was one exchange between Samit from MWZD.com and a business owner who believes all domainers are scam artists, and that they are organized gangs of domain hoarders. I did weigh in with a comment as I just don't understand the "scam artist" connotation.

Martha Pierce also wrote an interesting article on The Nex Web entitled, "With new top level domains launching, what should your strategy be ?"

From the article:

How does picking the right domain affect your business?

There’s just one (albeit major) catch to these ultra-custom domains: most aren’t reasonably-priced. “Costs for these new registrations will vary, and the most desirable domain names will be sold at a premium,” Cooper says.

Jeremy Goldman, entrepreneur, strategist and CEO of the early-stage branding consultancy Firebrand Group, says premiums for custom domain names can cost upwards of $185,000. But Goldman thinks the price is right – on a few conditions.

“The longer a file name is, the longer the URL becomes and the less value it has from an SEO standpoint,” he says.

After authoring his book, “Going Social,” Goldman also purchased a customized URL (goingsoci.al) for branding purposes. To do that, he had to negotiate a bit; the domain .al is currently assigned to Albanian properties.

All three of these articles are worth a read, I think when a lot of domainers, especially new domainers only get their perspective from publications in the industry, its good to see how those outside of it look at branding,new gtlds and the overall business of domaining.

The people quoted and commenting could very well be potential customers or prospects for domains you own, its good for you to know how they think. They all don't believe .com is king, they all don't think the new gtlds are innovative. Make sure you get different perspectives to better your chance at being successful.