A Company That “Gets It” – What Does It Mean To Me?
Posted on | January 9, 2009 | 4 Comments
Being a domainer, I normally have my eyes open at all times looking out for domains. It’s actually pretty annoying… especially when staring at company trucks to see what domain they have chosen to be plastered all over their trucks while driving on the freeway. For example, I was out for dinner two nights ago. After ordering, the waitress was taking away the menus, but I asked her to leave mine with me. These were the types of menus where every other page had some sort of full-page advertisement, and it’s definitely in my interest to see what company is using what for future knowledge and possible idea sparks. My cousin asked if I was going to end up ordering something else since I kept my menu, but I smirked and said, “No, I’m going to look at the advertisements”. I always like to keep an eye out to see what domains comapanies use depending on their niche just because I like to get an idea of trying to “think outside the box”. At times, I’ll see a really good domain and think “Wow! ‘So-and-so’ gets it!”… and others I’ll be like BLAH! What kind of domain is that?! Wrong thinking?
What does it actually mean “to get it”? From a domainers point of view, whenever I see a company using a generic, they “get it”. But I was thinking about it a lot in the past week, and an article by Yofie got me really thinking… maybe the way I consider companies “getting it” is absolutely twisted. I mean c’mon… only SO MANY companies can “get it”–not because they are stupid, but because if I stick to the ideology that they get it because they own a premium generic, there can probably be only a couple generic terms available to describe the company/business, which makes it extremely hard to get the domain names. Of course, “getting it” means that you buy the generic term hoping you get targeted traffic; which in turn paired with an actual business provides you with new clients and business. Moving on, if there are a hypothetical 3,500 firms in the insurance industry, are the firms that only own insurance.com or <niche>insurance.com the ones that get it? I think not.
It seriously all started when I saw the commercial Yofie mentioned on his blog. Seriously… when I saw that the company “Tax Masters” had resorted to the domain “txmstr.com”, I nearly died. I see this commercial pretty often every week. Guy comes out tells people about taxes and what not and tells people to call… and they never mention the website. It’s just flashed onto the screen… but I really don’t blame them. Who the hell can pronounce that? First thing that popped into my head? “This company definitely does NOT get it!” After a mini-laugh, I moved on with life… but this darn commercial, like I mentioned, is just everywhere. Everytime I see it, “they don’t get it”. Then, another commercial: “Knowledge Generation Bureau”. Know-it-all lady answers questions like how many Syrian (I think Syrian? It was Syrian vs Russian) hamsters would it take to line them up and get the distance from the Earth to the Moon. Eye-catching commercial, but when I saw “kgb.com”, I was like wow… these people GET IT! And seriously–that’s where the idea of this blog post came up. If they didn’t own kgb.com, would they get it? Would I have considered them another “Tax Master” case?
Then everything changed. I figured I would only consider companies that “get it” to be companies that protect their image. If you go full out and advertise on national television, it would be pretty smart to protect your image–even if it’s online–and make sure you present yourself in the most professional way possible. Seriously, TxMstr.com is such a disgrace to the Tax Masters company I don’t even know why they went with that or if they even tried to inquire about getting another domain name. Why should/do I care? Because I have domains that seek end-users. Domaining is always about being 2-3 steps ahead. People that think outside the box end up benefiting, just as the “Most Expensive Domain Names Sold” post shows. You can have generic domains, but shouldn’t it be in the interest of a company to make sure their name is protected? KGB.com “gets it” because they ended up going with a 3L domain that makes it easier for people to get to their site… but WTF?! They don’t own knowledgegenerationbureau.com! So do they still get it?! I’d sorta say yes because judging from their site, it seems that they just want to become some sort of online encyclopedia, and the easiest way to brand would probably be KGB. Going back to “getting it”, I’d say that having a generic domain is great, but it probably should never overpower a current company name. Hersheys.com probably shouldn’t switch to Chocolate.com, IMO. Although owning Chocolate.com would be great, when you have your name everywhere (Hershey’s), I’m sure you would want to make sure you own the name corresponding to the brand. And that, my fellow friends, is what I think it means to “get it”.
Not exactly sure what kind of post this was, but it’s already written… so it’s getting posted. All in all, if you have a specific name that describes you, make sure you get your name so no one can screw with it. It also makes you look a lot more legit and will probably make your life easier somewhere down the line.
Why You Should Invest $6.99 And Get Your Own Domain
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Tags: choose a domain name > Domaining > domains > get a domain name > kgb > tax master > txmstr
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4 Responses to “A Company That “Gets It” – What Does It Mean To Me?”
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"there's nothing like having a vision, imagining it, making it, then having it work, especially if your very being depends on it"
January 9th, 2009 @ 5:16 pm
Interesting point on KGB and knowledgegenerationbureau.com. KGB.com is a valuable domain, given the large history of the security agency. But I do find it quite puzzling that they don’t also buy knowledgegenerationbureau.com and simply have it forward to KGB.com. Crazy.
Would it be worth selling of KGB.com, since it’s obvious someone would be willing to pay top dollar for it, and going with an alternative name? They can either pick up another short url (*KGB.com, KGB*.com, KBGNY.com, etc) or use a call-to-action and redirect it to knowledgegenerationbureau.com. They could raise a little capital doing this. Would it be worth it?
January 9th, 2009 @ 5:53 pm
With KGB I really think this might be one of those sites where they created it in order to protect the domain. There are a couple live “KGB” trademarks, and we all know how people go WIPO crazy to try and get their domains. The only thing that puzzles me is it might be a somewhat legit project considering spending advertising money on television.
Whois knowledgegenerationbureau.com:
Created: 2008-12-29
Why do I have a feeling that KGB.com doesn’t really care for what they say KGB stands for?
For this specific case, I’d say using KGB.com is worth it, especially with the trademarks “live”. If for some reason someone wants to buy KGB.com for a large amount, I’d personally sell if I wasn’t using it, but having a parked page on this domain might not be the wisest of things. They could probably get away with using another domain, like TheKGB.com, but if you have it and want to protect it, develop it! If you could make money and find a somewhat workable domain and sell the premium to raise capital to make sure you own the rights/development to a site 100%, selling to raise capital might be a smart idea. If I had to split kgb.com between a venture capitalist in order to get it up and running the way I wanted vs getting thekgb.com and owning it full out and doing things my own way with my own cash, I would go with the latter. Obviously, this might only work in a case-by-case scenario.
January 10th, 2009 @ 6:23 pm
You know, I never saw the KGB commercial you were speaking of until today. And seriously, it’s a funny one.
The right is Shinola!
October 4th, 2009 @ 10:27 pm
How many licks does it take 2 get 2 the center of a tootsie pop?