Choosing a URL when most are taken

In one of the "Feet to the Fire Groups" this week, Carrie Hamilton of Kismet Design offered this advice to a colleague who is trying to find a URL for her already named company:

Finding the perfect URL is almost impossible. My company is called Kismet primarily because it was one of a few words I liked the sound of that was available with "design.com" after it.

When people are looking for you on the web, they’re likely to try .com first, as I’m sure you know, though personally, I Google practically everything anyway. I would think that if someone wants to find you, they will, whether you’re a .com or a .biz. (or a .net). We’re all more internet savvy than we used to be.

Aesthetically speaking, though, .com is just a little bit nicer.

Why not try slight, memorable variations on your business name, like thesavvygal.com or thesavvygrl.com or even thesavvygrrl.com? How about savvygals.com, since your target market is women? Using underscores (_) might work, too.

You could also try adding a word to it that describes what you do, like savvygalconsulting.com. Or try savvygalconsultants.com and make it sound like your company is just a bit bigger than it actually is.

One more tip: URLs are cheap. Once you settle on something, buy up what you can that’s similar to it, so you can get as much traffic as possible going to you. At least get the .net as well as the .com, and link them all to your site. (Oddly, in my case, someone had already bought the .net version when I bought my original URL.)

Also, see what’s available for your own name and link it to your site as well. I own three URLs that all go to my website: kismetdesign.com, carriehamiltondesign.com and carriehamiltondesign.net. (Unfortunately, there was a quasi-well known actress with whom I shared a first and last name, who sent the cost of owning carriehamilton.com into the stratosphere).

I agree with everything Carrie advises here, especially the tip to own your own name, if at all possible.
Any other good ideas out there on the topic?

Comments

[Tig Wallis]

Definitely, owning your name is a must when marketing. For some reason I did, and now I don't. hmmm....

Many domain registration sites will suggest alternate domains, if your first choice is taken. It may be helpful to those with common names. (That's why I'm "Tig" BTW.)

[Mark - Productivity501]

If you don't get the .com it is important to know what is at the .com site. If you have bluedesign.net for your design firm and another firm has bluedesign.com it is more of an issue than if bluedesign.com is owned by a company selling quilts that only come in shades of blue. Some minor SEO work can help make sure that your site comes out on top in the search engines--which is where most people tend to look anyway.