Something thought provoking from an unusual post

[smutangama]

When it comes down to domains, the domaining community is absolutely obsessed with EMD's and generic keyword domain names and for the most part shun brandables. I'm also on that boat I'm afraid, mainly because when trying to sell brandable domains on forums like this one, you would normally get a "reg fee" type appraisal just because it has no EM or related keyword in it.

This sort of thing kinda puts a lot of new domainers down. One thing that people choose to ignore is that a short, memorable, easy to spell brandable , even if it means nothing, has an almost limitless value but only if you're willing to wait. yet people would rather religiously go for long tail generics and be limited by values like "local exacts" and "cpc" rather than short and snappy.

This isn't a rant, rather an observation inspired by an unusual blog I randomly found surfing the internet.

here

It might piss a lot of people here off.

Also read the alternate Google story, it's interesting.

 

[Stephen]

Thanks very much for the post, it is always nice to view domains from another angle.

 

[namealot]

“Brand” the wonder cure for many a crap name emd generics etc can make money till there sold? Many seam to ignore a lot of “Brands” are generics, apple, orange, red , amazon, etc anyhow ?

If you go down the boga boga route then impossible no but I’d say statically more people have found buried treasure than have ever sold one ? I d say don’t bother buy a spade and get digging?

 

[smutangama]

True, but then you have Google, Instagram, Youtube, Photobucket Facebook, Squidoo etc
Even the brands you mentioned have nothing to do with their generic meaning.
e.g. Apple sells computers.
Amazon sells books.
Yelp does reviews.
Orange does telecom.
Oracle does computers

in a more traditional sense of EMD's,

someone searching apple and orange should want to buy fruits. oracle should be looking to have their future told, yelp should be looking for pain relief and amazon should be an organization doing business in south america or more specifically the rainforest.

Don't get me wrong though, some people do try to pass off some crap as brandables but in the end if its something easy to remember and reasonably short, it does have immense value.

 

[namealot]

True, but then you have Google, Instagram, Youtube, Photobucket Facebook, Squidoo etc
Even the brands you mentioned have nothing to do with their generic meaning.
e.g. Apple sells computers.
Amazon sells books.
Yelp does reviews.
Orange does telecom.
Oracle does computers

in a more traditional sense of EMD's,

someone searching apple and orange should want to buy fruits. oracle should be looking to have their future told, yelp should be looking for pain relief and amazon should be an organization doing business in south america or more specifically the rainforest.

Don't get me wrong though, some people do try to pass off some crap as brandables but in the end if its something easy to remember and reasonably short, it does have immense value.

Google, Instagram, Youtube, Photobucket Facebook, Squidoo how many do you think were bought from domainers…. Try and find 50 names regged by domainers and sold that have become “brands” in the last 3 years that are not generics, emd terms, old or both then try made up words, then co.uks without the com even if someone likes them most of the time there are alternative e.g. “giga” gigga, giger, gigar which may well be free to reg etc not saying they don’t sell more the chances a miniscule… even amazon etc are all generics what they sell is immaterial really...

 

[Edwin]

True, but then you have Google, Instagram, Youtube, Photobucket Facebook, Squidoo etc
Even the brands you mentioned have nothing to do with their generic meaning.
e.g. Apple sells computers.
Amazon sells books.
Yelp does reviews.
Orange does telecom.
Oracle does computers

You're giving those as examples because they're "famous".

They're famous because they've become well known.

They've become well known DESPITE their brand, not because of it.

Your argument is like going to the Olympics, and picking the starters of the 100m to support the statement "people can run very fast". In other words, it's true because it's true (biased sample).

If you want to talk about brand domains, you need to also focus on the ones that failed miserably that nobody has heard of, as well as the stellar winners. The snag with that is that nobody has heard of them - including you

 

[stellar73]

If you want to talk about brand domains, you need to also focus on the ones that failed miserably that nobody has heard of, as well as the stellar winners. The snag with that is that nobody has heard of them - including you

Good point Edwin however most of these failures will happen after the domains have been purchased (so from a purely selfish domain selling point of view it doesn't matter quite as much).