I was driving home last night and in front of me was a van with a website across both doors, www.companyname.freewebsitehostname.com and the first thing I thought was how horrible it looked. For the cost of a domain and a simple dns record this company could have made a vastly superior first impression, companyname.com, we don’t even need the “www.” anymore, which makes saying it easier too. So now, we’re down letter count, syllable count, and we look more professional, all for just the cost of a domain. Why wouldn’t anyone want one?

Buying domain names is a hobby of mine, I have several, some strange, some useful, far too many great ideas that have started then expired due to my lack of time, so I am only using this one at the moment. I was very lucky to be born with an unusual surname and I believe there’s very few similar names on the internet.

My domain is my last name only, meaning I can easily share it with my wife and daughter when she gets a little older. Even my mum, dad and brother can have a [email protected] email address, and they do! Though i’m convinced none of them are using theirs, my wife just asked if she can carry on using her gmail, so naturally her rumbles.me email just forwards to her gmail address in the event she may start using it.

Another benefit, is you can start taking back your search results from Google, while they may not “be evil” they will still happily display your embarassing photographs on page 1 when people search for your name. By having your own website and domain you can start making your own website appear first when people search for you on Google, and while those embarassing images are still there, at least they’re on page 6, and lets face it, nobody ever goes that far in the search results.

The point I want to make, is that you need a domain name, it will likely cost you less than a tenner. With it you gain a nice personal email address, control over your online presence and it’s so simple. You dont need a website on the end of that domain, you can just point it at your facebook or other social network profile and be on your way. With the way the internet is going these days I wouldn’t want to be the one stuck being unable to buy their name.

Image source http://www.doodledug.com/?p=13