Get YOUR name domain name!

[CameraQuest]

Before its too late,
get YOUR domain name!

YOUR NAME that is.
As in JohnSmith.com or whatever.

The SuperBowl will have a John Malovich commercial urging people to buy the domain of THEIR name, like, well, YOURNAME.com

there are probably hundreds of people (or more) with YOUR name world wide.

Anyway, with billions of people watching the super bowl,
there is going to be a BIG push to get their own domain names
after seeing that commercial!

So, beat the rush!

The best domain registrar I have found, and the least expensive,
is WHOIS.COM

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

My name was taken long before I built my first website 14 years ago. Back then, I tried chriscrawford.com, christophercrawford.com, and crawford.com and all were taken. That's why my site has always been chriscrawfordphoto.com

When I set up my photo tutorials website a few years ago, I tried my name again, and the two versions of my name were still taken, so I did crawfordphotoschool.com

I will give two pieces of advice:

1) If someone already owns the .com version of your name, don't bother getting another domain extension of it like .net or .biz. People surfing the web tend to think in terms of .com and will often type that instead of the actual one you're using, and they'll get sent to someone else's website.

2) If you can get the .com then also register the .net version. Doesn't cost much more and keeps your audience coming to your site if someone gets confused and tries .net. Also, if you're a professional, there's a good chance someone will register the .net or .biz version of your name if they have the same name as you and are also in the same professional field.

There are several professional photographers in the world named Christopher or Chris Crawford! There are also a professional basketball player, a famous video game designer, a gay porn star, and a couple of lawyers with my name.

As Stephen noted, there are probably a lot of people with your name out there.

 

[johannielscom]

While .com isn't used as much in Europe and elsewhere as it is in the US, I still registered a .com domain www.johanniels.com, since my business is in photography and communications.

My business also is named johanniels.com. Turned out (long ago) that there was another Johan Kuiper with a Gmail account, who regularly received emails that were meant for me. Including medical stuff concerning my daughter. So I chose to register a domain name and create email addresses there. I looked for uniqueness too. I chose both first names and left my family name out.

 

[coelacanth]

Great advices. I've had mine for many years (Yahoo! was THE search engine back then).

My first name dot com was taken but I have http://suguru.net which is useful when only a small space is available. I also have http://sugurunishioka.com Since I'm a Japanese and my first name is not that common even in Japan, I guess I had it somewhat easy at least back then.

I used to have more of a designer portfolio site (I'm a UX Designer by day) and a photography site, but I now just have my rather outdated photography one.

This topic reminds me that I really need to do something about my website for my upcoming mini exhibit in SF.

Oh and one advice: for important domain names like your full name dot com, make sure to setup an auto renewal or register for as many years as the registerer allows.

Oh oh and one more: if you are married and your family name has changed, I recommend trying to register both current name and maiden name. My wife is an illustrator/children's book author and her author name stayed after our marriage so we got her http://ryokohiruta.com

 

[ornate_wrasse]

I used to have my first and last name dot com registered, as in www.ellenquale.com, and was planning to use it for my tax business but I actually ended up using it for underwater photography. I registered it through GoDaddy and I have no idea if that business is still around these days. I eventually stopped renewing it so don't have it now. My photos are currently on www.pbase.com (as you can see in my signature) and that works out well for me. As far as my tax business goes, I'm mostly retired so don't really need it anymore. When I was younger, I found I got most of my business though word of mouth referrals and a business networking group I belonged to, so didn't really feel the need to keep my domain name.

I'm sure, as you predict, that there will be a rush of people buying all sorts of domain names after the commercial is seen on the Super Bowl. Definitely a good idea to buy ahead of the masses!

 

[grouchos_tash]

I just bought my domain name, now what? haha!

I haven't a clue how to make a website :/

 

[dmr]

All the good ones are taken! I had the guy who does our corporate domain stuff help me search and register and the best easy to type one that we could find was the first two letters of my first, middle, and last names in the .me (yeah, Montenegro) domain.

 

[willie_901]

And, don't forget to promptly renew your domain name every year.

 

[Hogarth Ferguson]

my name has also been taken, that is why I made up this fake name and bought that. Now everyting to do with hogarth ferguson on google and so forth comes back to me.

 

[cz23]

I could only get .net, which is fine with me. I bought my son's .com address shortly after he was born. At 23 now he's just starting to use it. He's pretty happy to have it.

John

 

[benlees]

I just bought my domain name, now what? haha!

I haven't a clue how to make a website :/

I'm in the same boat. I've been meaning to set up some sort of website- I guess I have to figure it out now!

thanks Stephen!

 

[Nyc Dito]

Thanks. I just did 2 years although the $5.88 doesn't apply to anything after 1 year. Still cheaper than what i was paying before.

Now time to build my portfolio =)

 

[DanskDynamit]

I have mine under register.com
the price has been going up so I've been searching on how to change the domain register provider but I have no clue how to leave register.com and try another one.
I don't use my name.com website anyways.

 

[kxl]

I own leonin.net and serve up content (images) via zenfolio. When I first got the domain I developed the code, but soon got tired of doing that so I just decided to subscribe to zenfolio to make it easier for myself. I've been with them for a few years now.

I would love to own the .com version, but last I checked, the domain owner was selling it for a premium. No thanks.

 

[KM-25]

Mine was locked up for about 10 years by a finance guy in K.C. Missouri before it opened up.

It cost me about $800 to get it but it was well worth it, I locked it up for 10 years, the longest I could buy. Annoying I had to pay that much but a bargain as a business investment.

 

[dmr]

my name has also been taken, that is why I made up this fake name and bought that. Now everyting to do with hogarth ferguson on google and so forth comes back to me.

Well, it's certainly better than another "Ferguson" name that's used in a Jeopardy spoof on SNL. 🙂 🙂 🙂

 

[Timmyjoe]

Tried to get TimCarrollPhotography.com back in the late 1990's and someone else already had it. Figured it was gone for good. Then, just out of curiosity I did a search for the domain in 2007, and it popped up, nobody owned it anymore. I guess who ever got it originally got tired of having a web site or something. So I grabbed it and plan on holding onto it till they "pry it from my cold dead fingers".

 

[DanskDynamit]

Ten years ago I paid $175 for 10 years of a ".com" now they are asking $180 for 4 years.
bye bye register.com 🙂

 

[sara]

I bought my domain name nearly 10 years ago, and thank god I did because I saw a few variations of my name being bought.

I buy domains at Namecheap - they do discounts sometimes. 🙂

 

[JChrome]

".com" is still the most popular top level domain. But since they've opened it up, it won't stay that way forever. Now you can buy "JohnSmith.camera" or "JohnSmith.xxx" (for those exotic John Smiths). Anyway the .com monopoly won't last forever.


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