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Developing an online brand name

• Using your offline name online
• Creating a new online brand name

What is a brand name? The American Marketing Association, in its Dictionary of Marketing Terms, defines a brand as "A name, term, design or symbol, or any other feature that identifies one seller's good or service as distinct from those of other sellers. The legal term for brand is trademark." The key to this definition is that a brand identifies one seller's good or service from another.

Think about this definition in practical terms. If you go to a supermarket and have two choices of cookies, like Oreos and the store brand, which one would you choose? You might choose the store brand if you had tried those cookies before, were satisfied with their taste, and could save some money. You might also try the store branded cookies if you were familiar with some of the store's other branded products. However, if you've never been to that store before, then you would probably choose the Oreos because you were familiar with the brand name.

Now think about the Internet. Since it is such a new medium for many consumers, what do you think will be the primary motivator for selecting one product over another, or one Web site over another? If you said brand name, then the point is clear. When consumers have nothing else to rely on, they will choose the brand that they are familiar with.

Using your offline name online

There is a fair amount of debate about whether you should use your offline brand or business name for your online business. If you have already established a brand in the offline world, that can be ported to the online world, then you should choose that for your domain name, or dot com. However, there are a few exceptions to consider.

Firstly, will your online business will be doing something different than your existing offline business? For instance, if you were currently running a beauty salon, and were thinking about starting to sell beauty supplies on the Internet, then you may want to consider a using a different online name. However, if your name is Max Factor or Chanel, stick with the brand name you have established in the "real" world. Established brand names are one of the strongest selling points you can have on the Internet. They give your business instant recognition, and provide an element of trust for a user that might be thousands of miles away.

Secondly, if your offline business has a name that can't be easily ported to the Web because it is hard to spell, or too long, then you should consider a new name for your online business. Think about how people find your offline business today. Do they walk or drive by it? Do they call you on the telephone? Or do they read about it in newspaper or yellow page advertisements? Many of your prospects, and especially repeat customers, are going to type your name into the Web browser's address box. You want to make your domain name as easy to spell and remember as possible.

Finally, and this is probably the most difficult situation, what do you do when you can't register your dot.com because someone else registered it first? For instance, if your offline business is called "My Store" and someone else has registered www.mystore.com, what are your alternatives? Assuming there are no legal implications, then you must either register another name like www.mystore.net, or look for another name like www.mybigstore.com. The trade-off is ".com" versus establishing a new name that ends with dot com. Your other alternative is to buy the name from the person who registered www.mystore.com.

Creating a new online brand name

If you are starting a new business, then selecting the right name is more difficult. Everyone would like to think that their online business is going to be the next Amazon.com, or Yahoo!, and will get instant recognition once they publish their Web site on the Internet. However, the odds of that happening are minimal. Therefore, you should establish a name that meets the following criteria:

• Conveys what you do, or your type of business
• Will be easy for prospects and customers to remember
• Is not too long and easy to spell
• Hasn't been trademarked by someone else

Begin by making a list of appropriate domain names for your online business. Test them out on your friends and colleagues to see which ones they like best. Make sure when you are testing your list that they can be easily pronounced and spelled by your test audience. Finally, rank them in order of popularity.

Once you have completed you list, you can begin to research them in the Network Solutions Domain Names database to make sure that no one else is using your carefully thought out names.