It’s OK to not have the best domain. But at least choose a decent one.
We talk a lot about how a great domain name gives a company instant credibility.
As an example, entrepreneur Jason Calacanis recently said:
When people see a great domain name like robinhood.com or calm.com, this inspires people because it’s hard to get those domain names. It’s hard to have the one-word domain name and it makes you look like you have a serious brand.
I’d argue the inverse is also true: if you have a horrible brand, your business loses credibility.
There are plenty of good domains out there that businesses can acquire for a few thousand dollars. These are respectable, professional domains. They won’t give their users instant credibility like Calm.com and Inside.com do, but they also don’t look bad.
Then there are domains that make a company look fly-by-night.
I recently evaluated online event platforms (for something unrelated to domains). It’s imperative to choose an online event platform that won’t disappear the night before your event.
A lot of virtual event platforms are, not surprisingly, new. Some have chosen bad domains that make them hard to trust.
Consider Run The World. By all accounts, it has some great customers. It just raised $10 million.
Its domain name is RunTheWorld.today.
I don’t have a problem with companies using new top level domains. It can make sense. But taking a long name like this and tacking on two more syllables?
Other choices make more sense, like .live or .events.
I certainly scrutinized the company more given its domain choice. The social proof from its investors and customers was much more important given the domain.
Some other options are Crowdcast, which uses Crowdcast.io. That’s a pretty good company name. There’s also Hopin.to. I don’t love the fact that it’s on Tonga’s top level domain, but at least it plays well with the company name.
None of these companies need to use the domain events.com. But a bit more effort would go a long way.
Mark Thorpe says
The wrong domain extension can hurt your credibility as well.
.COM is the only way to go.
George says
Bs, if you live in europe for example then the .eu domain wont hurt your trust. Same for companies operating only in one country where a .de is the way to go in germany
Brad Scott says
.org as well. In fact, that makes it more credible. My domain is AtlantaCivics.org; I also own AtlantaCivics.com, but I choose to have the .org as the actual domain and the .com as a simple rerouter just because generally .org is more credible.
Brad Scott says
Also, even some other top-level donains can be better than other options. For example, I’m registered to get khi.music once it’s available. I can’t afford khi.com. So my next best bet would be khimusic.com, which just sounds more clunky.
RaTHeaD says
I don’t have a problem with companies using new top level domains. REALLY? Why don’t you? just askin’?
Jack says
Rat Head, I don’t know what your grift is, but I think Andrew made it clear and included examples. Using a new tld is not the issue when it’s done right.
gpmgroup says
Moving between TLDs after the fact is very expensive, if you tie your efforts into a single TLD more so. New gTLDs fail to provide basic protections because of the flawed agreement between the registries and ICANN. Unfortunately ICANN has in the last year or so rolled out that flawed thinking to some legacy gTLDs.
This really needs to be corrected if you want to prevent other issues like the .org fiasco.
John says
.to is for Tonga. Tongo is not a place.
Tria V. says
Tonga is an island nation in the South Pacific.
Andrew Allemann says
I typo’d it. It’s Tonga.