In the mix of things as you need to market your business and promote your brand, domain names are inexpensive and they cost a fraction of a battered reputation or the legal expenses incurred if someone registers your name and uses it to drive traffic to their website or to post objectionable material. For most businesses, a single lost customer each year could account for the price of multiple domain registrations.
Below are recommendations from our Developing an Effective Domain Strategy whitepaper. To request a copy of the complete whitepaper, please email corporate@webnames.ca.
Critical Domain Areas for Businesses
All Product Names & Trademarks
For example, Kellogg’s has the various cereal names registered and Proctor and Gamble has their entire line of products from “Crest” to “Palmolive” registered.
Taglines, Straplines, Slogans, Mottos, Signatures
Nike owns “justdoit.com“, Apple owns “thinkdifferent.com,” Volkswagen owns “driverswanted.com,” Dell owns “easyasdell.com,” McDonald’s owns “imlovinit.com,” Molson Coors owns “tastesgreatlessfilling.com” and Telus owns “thefutureisfriendly.ca” (and .com).
Many companies actually neglect to do this only to have their slogan catch on and become one of the most visible pieces of their corporate identity, for example Mazda’s “Zoom zoom.” Even if you’re just testing out a new tagline or slogan – register it.
Current & Future Marketing Campaigns
Contests, promotions and campaigns typically have their own landing page on a company’s website, marketing material and advertising spots. Registering a short domain name like “yourproductpromo.com” or yourproductcontest.com can help people remember your campaign and find the details easily on the internet.
Future Products and Services
Protect all your products or services that are being developed or are currently in the pipeline for future launch. Use Webnames Privacy Service to protect the registrant information so competitors in your industry don’t find out about your upcoming initiatives and products
Blog, Facebook, Events
Register a short name for your blog. If you use WordPress or other blog applications rather than yourname.wordpress.com/… it looks more professional to get yournameblog.com.
Many companies are also now registering their associated domains and pointing them to their social media sites eg. yourcompanyfacebook.com and yourcompanyfacebook.ca
If you host, sponsor or participate in an annual event or charitable initiative that you promote or fundraise for, you should also the event name as a domain, for example “WebnamesCanaryDerby.ca” or “CanadaSafewayFoundation.org“.
We also strongly advocate, if your budget permits, registering common typos and misspellings of all of the above.
Request the whitepaper by emailing corporate@webnames.ca
