I’ve been tasked with coming up with Domain and Blog names for three businesses. Here are my proposals:
The first one is for a small bakery, named Bill’s, located in Syracuse, that features cupcakes.
The obvious choice for the domain would be billscupcakes.com, and after performing a search on Namecheap.com (http://www.namecheap.com/domains/domain-name-search/results.aspx?domain=billscupcakes&tlds=&searchall=&type=single&) I found that billscupcakes.com is available. The corresponding blog name would be “Bill’s Cupcakes”.
One advantage with this combination is that the domain name and blog would match, and provide customer loyalty and recognition to the actual business. While the name is descriptive, and provides connection to the actual bakery in Syracuse, this combination does not reference other products sold by the bakery, nor does it provide a connection with Syracuse.
In order to address these concerns, I would recommend branding on the blog that would provide this customer loyalty and recognition, making the connection between the location of the bakery, and the blog.
The next proposal is for Fang Films. Fang Films is a movie studio that focuses on horror films, most of which are released direct to DVD.
After performing a domain search, I found that fangfilms.com was not available. Fangfilms.net, however, is available. I chose against using this, due to the fact that most people associate the .COM name with a business. Also, fangfilms.com appears to be a parked page, and if people went there, they would see an empty page, and not try to look further for Fang Films.
I chose to go with moviesthatscareyou.com, as many other .com choices were unavailable. The blog could also be called Movies That Scare You, and Fang Films could be referenced on the blog. The advantages of this combination would be the descriptive name, and provide a recognizable theme for the blog. That being said, the company name of Fang Films was not used, nor is the connection with DVD online sales.
The last proposal is for Happy Puppy Dog Day Care, a new dog daycare business in Syracuse. Being this is a new business, I chose to go with syracusedoggiedaycare.com. A domain search revealed this was available. I would choose the same name for the blog, with a reference and transition to Happy Puppy Dog Day Care after the brand had been established.
The reason I chose this name for a number of reasons. First of all, since this is a new business, there is no brand recognition, and I would take advantage of people searching for doggie day care in Syracuse, and this domain name and blog name would solidify this business as the premier doggie day care in Syracuse. How many times have you gone to a site where the name of the site evokes professionalism and experience? (i.e. batteries.com, or news.com). There is no branding tied to Happy Puppy, so striving to be THE doggie day care site is a good opportunity.
The disadvantage of using this combination is that it doesn’t provide an immediate tie-in with the Happy Puppy name, so someone may not associate the actual bricks and mortar business to the online site. Many companies get around this by choosing a domain name, and having that name forward to another site. (News.com forwards to Cnet.com).