What your domain name says about you.
The world of .com has dominated the internet for almost 25 years. But all of that is changing. The folks who run the internet are trying to move everything to the right of the dot. There will be 1,000 new top level domains being offered over the next year including new extensions relevant to photographers, such as .photography – .photos – .photo – .gallery – .camera – .pics or even .pro.
Success Tip #1: Having a Website... What is Myth and what is Fact.
This major change to the internet is very cool and makes awesome domains that were previously unavailable for years, readily available with these new extensions. If you are going to register a domain on one of these new extensions, the thing to remember is you need to make sure your customers know about it and can still easily find you. I have already spoken to a photographer using .photography and there has been an issue getting people used to it.
Your domain is very important so let’s go over some things to think about. The first question I would ask myself – “Is my end goal to sell this photography company down the road?” If the answer is yes, then I might want to go with a neutral name. Second, it depends on what type of customers I’m going to cater to and what is easier to remember. If my studio is going to focus on sports photography then maybe something like michigansport.photos or I could shorten it to misport.photos. Specializing in schools, maybe michiganschool.photos, myschool.photos or mischool.pics. I might even consider schoolphotosmichigan.something. If I am specializing in HS Senior photography, michigansenior.photos or myseniorshots.pics would both be good choices.
If you do not intend to sell the studio, here is another important question to ask yourself – “Should I use my own name?” In my case I could use – michaelconnorsphotography.com – connorsphotography.com – connorsphotos.com. For discussion, let’s say they are all three available. If I have been in the business a long time and people know me and my company as Michael Connors Photography, this might be the way to go. If I’m fairly new and people are just getting to know me maybe I should make it easy to remember, such as connors.photos. Or suppose you are going to photograph both sports and horse shows, again the easier the name is to remember the better. If you want to be a high end portrait photographer you might go with connors.photography or back to michaelconnors.photography – these sound more professional.
When writing this I thought of my good friend, Enrico Traverse, from www.traverselegal.com one of the top domain name attorneys in the country. The first thing he would ask me if I was looking for a domain would be, “Is the name already trademarked?” To give you an example - I have morephotos trademarked so even if morephotos.photos was available you could not use it. To be safe, you should double check before you start putting money and time in your new name.
Happy Domain Name Hunting
Writing by Michael Connors – www.morephotos.com