Guinevere.ca

Facebook Vanity URLs Take Two

// June 24th, 2009 // No Comments » // Internet, Marketing, technology

The first round of Facebook vanity URLs proved to be a huge success. Within minutes of the feature being made available, Mashable reported that over 200,000 usernames had been registered. If you didn’t pick up a URL the first night, head over to Facebook.com/username to register one now.

But what if you were trying to get a URL for one of your Facebook Pages and found that you couldn’t? In the first round, Facebook restricted the vanity URL feature to Pages with 1000 fans or more. If your group had 999 fans or less, you were out of luck… until now. This Sunday at midnight ET, Facebook will be opening the vanity URL feature to ALL pages, regardless of the number of fans.

The vanity URL feature is still for only usernames and Pages. Facebook Groups don’t yet have the option of getting one.

Happy Birthday from Offtopic

// April 29th, 2009 // No Comments » // Marketing

I just received a happy birthday email from Offtopic.com — one of the largest forums on the internet. I hadn’t been to the website in months. Its very existence had slipped into the recesses of my mind. But today, they sent me a simple, automated email just wishing me a happy birthday.

Setting up an automated message like this to your users is simple to do and reminds your users about your community without it looking like a marketing message. I didn’t get warm, fuzzy feelings over an automated birthday greeting, but I did think, “Oh right, Offtopic! I wonder what’s happening on that site now?” Seconds later, I was back on a site I hadn’t been to in months.

Don’t underestimate the potential that simple communication with your community can have. Maybe Twitter can think of ways to use this strategy to help retain some of the users they bleed each month.

8 Domain Name Ideas for People Named Sandi Jones

// November 3rd, 2008 // 2 Comments » // Marketing

Last week at the Geek Girl Dinner one of the points of discussion was about personal branding and the importance of owning your own domain name that is associated with you. One of the women in the group (Sandi Jones) brought up the difficulty of purchasing your own name as a domain if you have a very common name. Sandijones.com had long been taken and she was looking for suggestions from the group. Here’s a few domain name ideas for people with common names considering personal branding. These suggestions come from both the group and myself.

1. Try a country specific domain name
   If the .com is taken, but you’re in Canada, what about the .ca? If you’re in Italy, what about the .it?
2. Try other extensions
   The .name domain extension could be the most appropriate one if you’re looking for a personal branding domain.
3. Use a variation of your name
   Try just your first name, then just your last name, then both put together. Still no dice? Try inserting your middle initial, then middle name.
4. Try a nick name
   Amber MacArthur is widely known as “Amber Mac”, hence AmberMac.com.
5. Combine your name with something that describes what you do
   Jeremy Schoemaker combined a variation of his last name with a keyword that relates to his blog about making money to come up with shoemoney.com. If your site is going to relate to an activity or specific industry, you may want to consider this.
6. Combine your name with something that describes you
   Sandi had bright red hair, which you remember when you meet her. She could use that distinguishing feature in combination with her name. Some people use the way that they dress or the city that they live in to pick a domain.
7. Offer to buy your name
   If someone already owns your name, contact them and ask them if they’d be willing to sell it. If their price is reasonable to you, buy it up.
8. If all else fails, drop using your name
   If you’ve tried every combination above and still can’t get a domain you like, maybe you want to simply pick something else for your site. aboutnewmedia.com is taken.

Fortunately for me, I have quite a unique name, so I own a few domains associated with it. I’ve run my personal blog at guinevere.ca for a few years. I have guinevereorvis.com redirecting to it and I also used to own orvis.ca until last year when I sold it (see point #7).

Do you own domains associated with your name? If you’re in the same boat as Sandi Jones who can’t get her name, what do you suggest?