Re: Business Cards and domain names

From: Rob Frankel <rob_at_robfrankel.com>
Date: Thu 03 Apr 2003 08:41:47 -0600

At 2:56 PM -0600 4/2/03, Keith Pieper wrote:
>Branding campaigns and advertising over time have created what
>they are today. Like Google and Yahoo, in and of themselves they
>have a clear dictionary meaning.

I'd disagree with that one. In the old days, that sufficed to build
a brand's awareness. Not now. This is a big issue. Today, a brand
has to also communicate why it is "the only solution to your problem"
in a heart beat, as well.

Yahoo especially is an example of highly-funded and first advantage
brand, which are the exception, not the norm. Like Amazon, these
brands are first to market, and being such, can call themselves
anything they want. Down the road, however, they suffer from lack of
brand strategy, which is exactly the case with Yahoo and Amazon
today. Google is a permutation of that story, but that's for another
time.

>But it's through significant
>investment and time that those companies have created a large
>meaning and association. This is why "generic domains" are so
>popular - they have instant associations to the owner without
>additional brand-building investment.

Again, disagree. Generic domains are popular because they are
catch-alls, not brands. As an example, I own both BrandingExpert.com
and RobFrankel.com. Both lead to my site, but by far, RobFrankel.com
gets the major traffic. BandingExpert gets the runoff stuff, becuase
some people use generic domains as a shortcut to seraching.

The deal there is that generic domains rarely get to make the sale,
while branded domains do much better. This is again, because branded
domains make it a point to present the solution to their prospects
problems more clearly.

--
Rob Frankel, "Yes, I really do turn users into evangelists for your brand."
Big Time Branding (SM) http://www.RobFrankel.com
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Received on Thu Apr 03 2003 - 08:41:47 CST