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Starting an Offline Business: .net Domains?

by harmana
7 replies
Hey All,

I'm starting an offline business - web/seo/etc consultancy and development. I've landed two clients so far, which is great

I registered a domain for my business a few weeks ago, I came up with a great name which I love, but the .com domain is taken. Right now, I've bought the .net domain, and the .co is available.

I'm a little worried however that people may try to email me at the .com domain, especially if I contact them through fliers, or cold calling - they might not read the domain name correctly and just presume it's .com. The .com domain is parked.

I do really love the business name, but there's no way to get the .com. For offline clients (non technical people who may presume everything is a .com), is this going to be a problem for me? Would a .co be better?

Anyone any experience/advice on this?

Thanks!
#business #domains #net #offline #starting
  • Profile picture of the author Rus Sells
    If your worried about people trying to make contact with you but going through the .com domain then you should check and make sure that the site your worried about doesn't have a trademarked name.

    It can also be very tough outranking that domain unless your only doing it at a local level.
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    • Profile picture of the author harmana
      Russ: Thanks for the reply.

      It doesn't appear to be trademarked (just did a quick search). I'm not worried about ranking - I believe most of my clients will come from referrals and real life networking, rather than through online searches.

      Any thoughts on whether people "understand" the concept of a .net domain name, or a .co domain name? E.g. when they see your email address, will they notice that it's .net/.co rather than .com?

      Thanks!
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      • Profile picture of the author flyinghammers
        Before Groupon was Groupon they had a different name and business model. When they came up with the Groupon name they found the domain was already taken so they trademarked the name. The domain owner was not at all interested in selling even though he wasn't actively using it. Groupon trademarked the name and told the domain owner he could keep the domain name but never do anything with it. The rest is history.
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        • Profile picture of the author RKCastillo
          I don't think the email@domain.net would be that big of a problem.

          The .co email will be much more confusing.

          Did you use WhoIs to find out who owned the parked domain and contact them to see if you could buy it from them?

          I have done that before.
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          “Free Video Reveals: The 7 Step System I Used to Create An Email That Closed An Offline Business Owner Without Ever Talking on the Phone”
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          • Profile picture of the author harmana
            Originally Posted by RKCastillo View Post

            Did you use WhoIs to find out who owned the parked domain and contact them to see if you could buy it from them?
            There's no way I could possibly buy the domain - I wouldn't have the cash (I'm presuming it would be at the very least $1000).

            VegasGreg: That's a good point. I'm spending a little time trying to find a good .com - I'm in a position that it could be easily re-branded.

            My real concern is that, as you say, people will "hear" .com - I imagine this could happen a lot.

            Thanks for the input everyone
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  • Profile picture of the author VegasGreg
    Using a dot net is not a good image for your business, and yes people will still hear and type dot com.

    If you are in the "dot com" business, by all means, use a dot com. Seriously!
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    Greg Schueler - Wordpress Fanatic... Living The Offline Marketing Dream...

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    • Profile picture of the author Rus Sells
      To the OP, this is just a matter of perspective.

      I have many many sites with different domain extensions running for some of my offline clients and they still get calls and emails about their businesses.

      The .com thing isn't as big a deal as it used to be and having a different domain extension isn't a as big a stigma as it used to be.

      Keep in mind that many business owners don't even have an email address the matches their domains, they use gmail as a contact email. I do and it keeps spam off my servers.


      Originally Posted by VegasGreg View Post

      Using a dot net is not a good image for your business, and yes people will still hear and type dot com.

      If you are in the "dot com" business, by all means, use a dot com. Seriously!
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