research your brand

Research Your 

Brand

That’s why in order to get a good one, you have to start to brainstorm early. 

It’s going to take a while to come up with a brand name that you love and 

that is also available as a domain name. One thing is certain: most two�word-phrased domain names are already taken. You will probably have to go 

with three words or more, or you might try purchasing a smaller domain 

name from someone who is squatting on it and waiting for a buyer to offer 

him/her some money.

DO RESERVE YOUR PERSONAL NAME

Even if you’re not going to use it for business, you will want to reserve as 

many profiles and even a domain name with your name in it. Celebrities with 

established careers already have lawyers who do this on a regular basis for 

them. However, if you start your business brand and then you suddenly 

achieve fame in the middle of it all, you’ll probably end up paying someone 

else to give back your personal brand name on the Internet. There are many 

opportunists out there who go out and try to reserve names like Paris Hilton 

or other notables with large followings. If your following increases, so will the 

number of fake spammers out there, and you want to be ready by having 

already reserved your name on the biggest sites like Facebook, Twitter, and 

a personal branded .com name.

RESEARCH AVAILABILITY

Hop online now and check to see what’s available for your domain name 

possibilities using Whois.net. You can check a variety of different extensions 

besides .com sites. If the domain is already reserved or bought, you will see 

the owner of the domain name. It will also tell you who you can contact 

should you want to try and buy the name. Otherwise, you can get onto 

popular hosting sites of your choice and try to register the domain name. 

Whois.net will also tell you (when it’s not available) what other names you 

might try to reserve instead that are available. Typically, they are prefixed 

with the word my or something similar, but are slightly different. You can 

even register the domain name right there for a charge of $9.95/year.