Product Description

This book will help you obtain a brandable, memorable domain name within a few weeks at a reasonable cost, which will contribute to your brand equity and profits. You will be able to obtain a better name than your competitors have.

There are at least 10,000 words in a dictionary that would make great domain names plus at least 10,000 proper names and 10,000 great short coined-words. With a supply of 30,000 great names and millions of good names, it has always been a buyers’ market.

There is no need to pay more than a few thousand dollars for a great one-word domain name, and many good domain names are available for free. This book provides you with the information needed to beat domain name speculators at their games.

Both naming methodology to identify great domain names and negotiating/purchasing methods to obtain great domain names at low prices are covered. See the table of contents and excerpt for more.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #5577007 in Books
• Published on: 2002-11-11
• Binding: Paperback
• 48 pages

Review
Recommended book. -- DrName.com, December 2002

About the Author
Steve Baba has a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Maryland at College Park. Steve also has a B.S. in Computer Science and a B.S. in Business. He is the founder and CEO of Seemly.com, which provides consulting services to businesses. Steve can be reached at Seemly.com, where additional domain name information can be found.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Domain Naming Goals - Summary

Online naming compared with offline naming

Domain naming has four major goals or criteria, which are sometimes contradictory and tradeoffs must be made. Many of the goals are similar to offline naming goals, but there are important differences. A quick summary introduction of the four goals follows:

A) Image – Names project an image or may have a neutral image if the name is entirely new (coined words). Choosing a name to project a good, appropriate-to-the-business image is similar to offline branding, but online domain names have additional characteristics that affect the image. For example, short one-word domain names have a better image than long names, everything else constant.

B) Memorability – Without reminders, such as seeing a product on a store shelf, memorability is more important online than offline. In addition to having a better image, shorter names are easier to remember than longer names, everything else constant. There are sometimes conflicts between memorable shocking names and image.

Memorability also requires that your name or brand be distinguishable from competitors, which is often a problem with generic names. Is the company iHosting.com, eHosting.com, iHost.com or eHost.com?

Memorability is more important for smaller companies with smaller marketing budgets and less known products. No one is going to forget the names Pepsi or Coke.

Online, the exact spelling of the domain name must also be memorable. When typing in a domain name, close does not work.

C) Minimize Trademark Problems – There is no such thing as a perfectly legally safe name, but you can minimize the risks. Trademark problems fall into two groups:

1) Can you prevent competitors or other businesses from using a name similar to yours?

2) Can a competitor or other business legally challenge your name because it’s similar to their name?

If a competitor can use a name similar to yours, you will have both memorability and customer-confusion trademark problems. In severe cases, you will have difficulty building a brand name. For example, there is BankOne, CapitalOne, and occasionally fraudulent firms that use the "one" in their name to mislead customers/victims.

There are often conflicts between minimizing trademark risks and memorability and image, since other companies may have already used most dictionary words. It’s difficult to claim total ownership of dictionary words – especially popular dictionary words.

The major difference between online and offline trademarks is that every online firm is effectively national and international, with trademark conflicts possible with other firms regardless of physical location. In the past, small firms could just worry about trademark conflicts with other firms doing business in their geographical area.

Online there are anticybersquatting laws and mandatory dispute resolution, but these are narrowly aimed at cybersquatters 1) operating in bad faith and 2) without any trademark rights.

D) Buy the Domain Name at a Minimum Cost – There is no comparable activity for offline names. Offline, one can just pick a name and use the name after making sure there are no trademark problems. For example, the television show Survivor did not purchase Survivor.com, which is owned by Survivor Software – an unrelated company (as of late 2002).

Obtaining a domain name at a reasonable price is one area that conventional offline naming consultants have little knowledge of. But since consulting clients are usually large Fortune 500 companies who may want the best name regardless of the cost – up to $20,000 - most consultants have succeeded in spite of little knowledge of the domain name market.

Customer Reviews

Enlightening, Thought-Provoking
How To Select & Buy an Elite Domain Name was first written as a printable ebook with two pages on each side of an 8.5 by 11 sheet of paper - in case anyone didn't know. Such information and sample chapters are available at their website. I rank this book a 5 star book because the insights/examples provided far outweigh any concerns/problems I found with the book. This book caused me to look at domain names from a different perspective.

The book is segmented into four different sections. They are: Quality Naming Styles, Inferior Naming Styles (to avoid), How to buy from speculators/at auctions/brokers and miscellaneous topics at the end. Each section has approximately 20, one or two page subsections explaining the topic. What it does offer is quick, easy to read "business nuggets" that are a page or so in length.

I loved How To Select & Buy an Elite Domain Name for the following reasons:

1. It flat out states the importance of marketing & branding in choosing a business domain name. A brand or name is in the mind of the prospect. If you can build a powerful name brand, you will have a powerful marketing program. If you can't, then all the advertising, fancy graphics, sales promotion and public relations in the world won't help you achieve your objective.

2. Excellent examples of business/domain naming stupidity/effectiveness are provided. These insights, in my opinion, are quite on the nose, and he brings up good points.

3. He talks about the plethora of websites that are produced each year and the need to be memorable.

4. He discusses how names must get inside a consumer's mind.

5. The book was very easy to read - short, with examples.

I disliked How To Select & Buy an Elite Domain Name for the following reasons:

1. The price for, at best, a hundred-page book.

2. At times it reads like a college textbook, fair to all sides, but no absolute directions. Books by other consultants sometimes border on arrogance - my way is the right way.

3. It's NOT ideal for Internet-BEGINNERS seeking to learn what is a domain name. It's more a hundred-page executive report than a book filled with reference information. The author often refers beginners to the Internet for more information instead of explaining it.

Conclusion: Buy the book IF you are looking for an elite domain name. It is well worth the time and money.

A great how-to book, with lots of information and examples.
I found "How to Select & Buy an Elite Domain Name" a quick read that thoroughly covers selecting, valuing, and purchasing a domain name. The book is short, but it is packed with information and examples. It is well organized and easy to read.

If you are choosing a new domain name for the first time, this book will help you avoid many common mistakes like using numbers and words that sound alike. If the name you want is already registered, this book will help you with strategies to find an alternative and probably better domain name.

The book is definitely worth the price if you are planning on buying a domain name from a cybersquatter or speculator. After reading this book, I was able to confidently and logically negotiate a fair price from a speculator for the domain name I wanted.

Tells How To Find Cheap and Free Good Names
The author bought Shrewd.com for his domain consulting firm for $1,400 and tells how to buy elite domain names cheap.

Want a free name? Tells how to choose the best free name.

The book may contain thousands of dollars of consulting advice and increase your sales by thousands, but expensive for a book. Lose one star for price.

This is a marketing/branding book. Not a technical DNS book.