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Ask HN: Does domain name affect success?

11 points by hinoglu ↗ HN
English is not my native language, and suffered from this issue when picking domain names in the past. One was almost meaning "a gay hookup central" instead of poker fans community site...

Anyway. Finding a domain name for my latest "next big things" is the hardest part of the projects.

Looking at monster.com, omegle.com, amazon.com i.e. names are not related to the content.

So i wonder if i chose some bogus or completely irrelevant name for my -say- joblisting site, would it affect the success in any way? Of course the shorter/the sweeter/the nicer/the easier the better, but they don't exist out in the wild anymore :)

thanks

9 comments

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matthewphiong
A good, short, memorable domain definitely gives a startup a greater advantage in marketing & branding.

Kumo -> Bing, TheFacebook -> Facebook, GetDropbox -> Dropbox

I do agree that find a good domain name for a project/startup is hard especially you dont have lots of cash in hand (to acquire registered domains) but I don't agree with you that other shorter/sweeter/nicer domains didn't exist anymore in the wild. This might be true for 4-char, one syllable name but not all. I think it's fine if your domain is not directly related to the service/content of your project as long as it's reasonable/logical (e.g. if your project is about news don't use a domain like tropicaljuice.com)

You can always go for 5-7 chars, 2 syllables name. You can use tools like Dotomator or Domainr to find a good, fresh name for your project.

BTW, if you are willing to tell HN your "next big thing", we are more than happy to help you brainstorm a good name.

Good luck with the name!

hinoglu
Thanks Matthew,

my next big thing is..uhm.. basically a job listing site :)

I'm in the process of tidying up the environment, fixing obvious bugs and dressing up the site a little bit before going public. When done, will be back here requesting for critics :)

I believe that, as you've also mentioned, when product becomes well known, an upgrade to domain name will not be that problematic. what i fear is a way wrong name at the beginning might prevent it from gaining public liking.

I guess I'll stick to a simple general name, then will try to rename if it still bothers me.

Thanks

josefresco
From an SEO standpoint changing your domain is always a headache. Even with tools from Google/Bing to facilitate the transfer your listings can go offline for a while before they re-index and hopefully pass your PageRank along.

If SEO is not a concern and you're strictly talking about your brand, I think you have more flexibility as many people will simply be unaware of your service until your achieve a certain level of visibility.

hinoglu
rentacoder has changed it's name to vworker, yet still keeping rentacoder name and domain and related links pointing to vworker. Of course i'll not be updating the name every two weeks, but may be in time it might be a necessity to rename the service.

Also i'm seeing this solution for "how to not postpone the project for not finding an awesomely awesome domain name" problem. So seo is not a main concern for now, before going public :)

thanks

matthewphiong
A general name should be good for a new startup. Do make sure to check the name of your choosing properly to make sure it's totally 'free' from any trademark names.
percept
I believe it does, but not enough to worry about if your domain name isn't perfect. Releasing a product and acquiring customers (or vice versa) is more important.

At the same time, I recommend putting some thought into your domain name. You might make a list of keywords related to your product, based on your market and research to determine what potential customers are searching for (Google provides tools for this). Then work on short variations. Phrases seem to be popular now (past years saw "online," "web," "net," "central," "hub," "app," Swahili words, etc.).

I'm surprised to find that short, memorable domain names are still available--you just have to be a bit more creative to find them.

You might find the following blog(s) helpful (IIRC some older posts there were particularly good):

http://www.igorinternational.com/blog/

hinoglu
i think beginning with a simple name, then changing it if it still bothers me might be a possible solution. well indeed "somethinghub" was what i had in my mind, but i may be somewhat late for it :)

thanks for the blog link, time to read.

Revisor
As an abstaining domainer let me sum up what I learned:

The shorter the name the better.

Don't use hyphens nor digits.

Dot com is the king for any international project.

In many countries their CCTLD is better than a .com (eg .de in Germany).

Do three tests:

- Radio/phone test. Say the domain name over a phone. There should be no problem spots you should repeat.

- Writing test. Look out for any easy typos: repeating letters and language-specific grammar problems.

- Association test. Ask your friends for their first impression and what occurs to them immediately after they hear the name.

Made up names are ok.

A good rule of thumb is: Make sure there is only one thing the users have to remember.

Eg unusual TLD + a made up name = 2 things to remember. Reduce to just one.

IMO the domain name doesn't really affect success, there are far more important things like founders' skill and passion.

However not observing the above-mentioned rules can make the success harder to reach.