Shaun Le Cornu from Slam Strategy wrote a piece today on their blog about why a dotbrand is better than a brand.com.
The article is worth a read as it shows the thought process that those consulting in the space are trying to get across. Obviously there is some bias because everyone wants to talk to brands about the hot new thing and get paid while doing it. That’s fine to get on board the dot whatever train, but make sure the advice is rooted in logic.
In the first paragraph Le Cornu states, What ever you think dotcom makes from selling domain names will pale into insignificance when dotbrands unleash the full potential of their secret weapons. And if that wasn’t enough great reasons to have a dotbrand lets not forget that its a closed shop with only 500+ kids allowed in the sandpit.
One concept from the article is that .com is ugly, I have never seen any real research that shows people using the Internet have ever been finicky about the look of a url.
From the article:
Why not a brand.com? (The ugly, irrelevant middleman)
Well the first thing to do is to just write it out and have a look at it, its ugly and partly irrelevant. The middleman “.com” waters down the relationship between brand and customer because dotcom means nothing to the consumer, its like wasted text on a short advert, you don’t need it so why have it? So which looks more visually appealing to you? offer.ferrari, product.ferrari, customer.ferrarri or ferrari.com/product? Which looks and feels more authentic, which is more memorable and which could be the brand and which is the brand? One can only be the brand, actually owned by the brand at the highest level of the Internet while the other is just bad advertising. A dotbrand means it is run by the brand, by people who work with the brand. One has a logical order about it that says we run our own slice of the internet and you can trust us. A dotbrand actually makes you feel like you are more than just a customer of the brand but an integral part of it existence while brand.com says your just another number.
Read the full article here…
