Meryl's Notes Blog

On occasion, I get an assignment from a specific client that includes brainstorming company names as well as finding potential matching domain names. Lifehack has a nice article on How To Brainstorm Domain Names. When I brainstorm names that need domain names, here are things I keep in mind:

• Avoid words where the end of one word is the same as the start of the next word. Car racing, for example. This would translate to carracing.com. When recalling a domain name, I debate whether it’s carracing.com or caracing.com.

• Put the domain name together and make sure the URL doesn’t look like an embarrassing URL. Bet you’ve seen a “forward this e-mail” that listed funny domain names like www.expertsexchange.com (Experts Exchange) and penisland.com (Pen Island). Innocent and good names, but not so good URLs!

• Skip dashes, if possible. URLs with dashes have received a bad name because of spam sites. However, many wonderful sites use dashes like www.digital-web.com. This site came out long before spammers got the idea to abuse the dash.

• Check the spelling. Is it hard to spell?

• Add another word, if you already have a company name where someone else already registered the domain name. If you’re ABC Painters, try adding a word such as “abcpaintersdallas” and “abcpaintersinc”. Obviously, a painting business would want to drive locals to its site, so adding a geographical name can help with search engines.

• Make the thesaurus your friend. Sometimes you discover a better word for something that represents your business. Coffee, java, and cafe are commonly used in coffee shops, so using a thesaurus to find something different might yield great results.

What URL naming dos and don’ts do you have?