Does anybody have any experience where a competitor buys your domain .net, .org or other .thing and puts a site up? I noticed somebody purchased my domain .something and put up some strange site with links pointing to other businesses they had. Anybody have an idea of what the point of that would be?
Through the whois info I found out other sites this guy had registered. I took his biggest site and registered the .net ext of his domain.
I then emailed the webmaster telling him what a great inspiration he had been and I was trying out my own .net scam too, with his domain.
Two wrongs don't make a right but this guy deserved it, cheeky move.
If they are a non-profit I tend to advise to buy the .org and .com ...if the .com is gone, I don't like to buy the .org and the other way around.This is to avoid confusion later with email etc.
I'm with you on this. I own a .org domain and the .com version is a non profit medical site. You'd be amazed at the emails I get sent to me by accident. I've had x-ray scans intended for doctors and all sorts heading my way. So much for patient confidentiality!
Personally, I feel as long as you have the main widget.com name which comes up first when searching for widget
You say that as though you have any control over whether widget.com will always come up number one in all search engines.
Another thing I have been part of, involving two different brands that both do this, is to use different sub-concept websites for the main three. For one example, the .org site is the ORGanization's main brand site of information. Then, the .com site for the brand is used for the organization's COMmerce, selling its products and services. The .net site for the brand is used for providing interNET services (e.g., webhosting) for supporters of the organization. The effect is to further strengthen the branding while building three different web-sites doing three separate functions. For branding, the logo is the same on all three versions, but the .org/.com/.net are accentuated in the logo to assist the user in knowing which version they are on. Additionally, not only does this system add powerful branding value and name recognition, but it also "enlarges" the appearance of the brand in the user's mind, just from the simple fact of there being three sites instead of one. (Yes, WE who are web developers know that that doesn't mean anything, but users perceive a brand with more sites as being "bigger." That "perception" can translate into "larger" credibility, which gives the user more confidence, leading to even even more sales - or whatever your entity's goals are - etc.) Lastly, by teaching the user to "think" which one to use based on what they need (need ORGanization? choose brand.org - need COMmerce? choose brand.com - need interNET services? choose brand.net ) it is pro-actively making them deliberately remember the brand in all three situations. Doing that in the user's mind only empowers branding in their mind even more, of course. While this is one example of how to use this technique, any web developer or team can creatively apply this multiple-TLD technnique in any number of other ways.
As for doing multiple TLDs to protect a trademark, that may not be necessary. Yes, it is a very good to buy the main three TLDs just to stop competitors from getting them. However, trademark holders (in the US anyway) are already somewhat protected. In 1998 or 1999, the U.S. Congress passed a law specifically to protect trademark owners from others buying TLDs of their existing trademarks. If I recall correctly, the law was passed after a number of big business horror stories. For example, Dunkin Donuts, I think it was, was blackmailed into paying something like $500,000 just to pay off an anti-Dunkin-Donuts site on a DunkinDonuts.org (or was it .net?) domain name version of their trademark. After the law, though, if someone now does something like that and buys a TLD of an existing trademark like that, the trademark owner is protected. The trademark owner does not have to succumb to the blackmail to stop others from misusing their trademark in other TLDs. The person who acted in bad faith has to, by law, give up the domain to the existing trademark owner. No more blackmail.
You say that as though you have any control over whether widget.com will always come up number one in all search engines.
this is not the same as the I feel lucky button .
the dotcom is virtually always going to do that in "G".
