Ask HN: Paying for a "premium" domain name?

[profquail]

Like me, a large number of the members here on Hacker News work in some area of web development. I've thought about starting a few free websites as hobby projects before, only to find that all of the names I could think of were registered by domain squatters who wanted hundreds (if not thousands) of dollars for them.

What does everyone else do if you get stuck in this situation? Is it worth paying for a better domain name, since it helps with SEO for your site? Would you pay money to get one of these domain names for a non-profit, hobby project? Would you consider paying for a domain name for a startup company, since you would presumably want to build your brand name and market materials on top of that domain name? If so, how much of your limited budget do you think you should spend on the name?

This is something that has been bugging me for a while, and I'm interested to hear how everyone else deals with it.

[Mz]

I bought a domain name for a non-profit and the only version available was the .us version of their name. They were happy to get it for the $8 or so that they paid. I've found that a lot of the domain names I think up aren't already taken, though initially some of the ones I thought up were. Karen Ellis, who does Planet Karen, bought PlanetKaren.co.UK instead of paying hundreds of dollars for the .com. She just didn't have the money. People who are interested in her comic seem to have no problem finding her website without the .com. I know of another website using .net that started out piggy-backed onto another site and I think the URL changed a few times over the years before settling on .net. My observation has been that if you are doing something worthwhile and people really need or want the information, a non-premium domain name can work just fine. Content is king in that regard.

[ScottWhigham]

I think that, depending on price vs. revenue potential, that it can totally be worth it - otherwise people wouldn't still be paying premiums for .com domains. Your questions are so generic - "how much of your limited budget do you think you should spend on the name?" I don' know - am I funded? What's my projected revenue if I don't get the domain vs. getting the domain? What will I do if I don't get the domain?

[profquail → ScottWhigham]

Well, I'm interested to hear what others think is the correct percentage amount of your funding to spend on domain names or branding.

Take YC for example. If you have two founders, you get $17k now. What is the maximum (prudent) percentage of that money that should be spent on the domain name and branding? $1k? $5k? Would it be better to get a longer (and perhaps less marketable) domain name that is cheaper/available, or to spend some serious money on it knowing that it may or not pay off in the end?

How often do people buy a longer domain name (say, hackernewsconsulting.com) and later purchase a shorter version (say, hackernews.com)? If you've already got a successful business going on the longer one, will the owner of the shorter one raise their prices knowing that you can afford it now?

[Mz → profquail]

I kind of idolized a couple of webmasters who had very large sites on subjects that were of interest to me. They both were big believers in owning every variation of a domain name that could link to your site. They also have generally been frustrated with not making much money from their websites. I eventually gave up my idols and began looking for examples of commercially viable sites that supported the owners and found that the ones that fit the model I was hoping to develop typically only had one domain name, bought cheap. I dropped most of the domain names I owned, thereby saving myself a lot of money. If I start making big bucks, I might buy some of them back. I did have success getting one of my domain names back that I lost when Yahoo screwed me over. (Long story.) I don't think it cost me any more to get it back than it had originally, except that I had to wait a year for the folks trying to make money off it to let it expire. I'm "once bitten, twice shy". So I have come to believe that it's a bad idea to spend big on domain names.

[janitha]

Domain names are a little like desirable woman, they are all unavailable. But visit a foreign country, and you will find them in abundance

[Mankhool]

I've never really understood premium domains as being that important to a site. Oh you have to be able to find the site (keywords) but then, personally, I just bookmark it and if it is something I use all the time then I drag the site icon to my bookmarks toolbar, DELETE the NAME and just use the icon to show me what it is.

[vaksel]

you have 2 options:

a) web2.0 the domain name(flickr, kayak)

b) make up a new word

b) use 2 words, i.e domainpigeon