DN vs. DOMAIN - .COM

[Nexus]

Ok, I have to ask this. I'm working on a project that may have wide ranging potential, and I'm interested in hearing some advice on naming.

If presented with the need to BRAND, is a DN- name comparable to a DOMAIN- name in terms of branding power? For instance, DNForum.com is a DN- name. A comparable name would be DomainForum.com... but as you can see, DNForum.com is shorter, though DomainForum.com is more easily recognizeable to the casual passerby. "DN" in this industry has become a nice shorthand, but at the same time, I'm unclear as to how powerful it is when branding a product or service for the widest audience recognition.

There are two names I am considering for my project, and I'm wondering if I can get the DN- name fairly easily, if I should bother continuing to persue the Domain- version.

Also, to be clear, assume that anything hyphenated is NOT part of this conversation. Also, I'm the difference between a "domain" and a "domain name" can be considered, but I'm assuming "domain" to be understood as a viable nickname for "domain name" (ex. MyDomain.com, State of the Domain, Domain.com, etc.)

Thoughts?

Thanks,
~ Nexus

 

[Anthony Ng]

Hey, how about NAME (as in nameslave.com)? LOL!

Okay, my take is that it's not good to stir fry acronyms (like DN) with full words (like Forum). So DNForum.com is by this standard NOT a good domain name. (Dan, the previous owner, made this name up; but the true value of DNForum.com lies not in the name itself but its member base and traffic, right?) Moreover, I do NOT think that DN has become a recognizable shorthand in the "industry", at least not yet.

 

[DNQuest.com]

Domain is more recognizable, but DN is shorter. I went the DN route because anything I found with "domain" did not sound good at all. The best I was able to do is thinkdomains.com. I settled on DNQuest because of branding.

No matter which way you go, if you can build up a site and promote properly, either will work.

 

[gariben]

i myself have picked up about 6-7 DN names....

 

[.com.net.org]

I like name or names for domain related.

For DN and Domain, I vote for Domain.

 

[namedropper]

Plain old "Name" would be the best bet, as it's also potentially useful for things other than domains as well. "Domain" would come after that, and "DN" would be absolute last. Abbreviating the full term so that it misses out on all potential keywords makes no sense at all.

 

[chatcher]

It depends on your target audience. Many non-insiders would not know DN is short for Domain Name. Many insiders do not even know "domain name" is what the web address they want is called.

I like DNForum.com as opposed to DomainNameForum.com for its intended use. I would like DNF.com even better. But any time you use an abbreviation for your brand it would be nice to also own the long version and redirect to the main site.

 

[Kid Kool]

i don't like any "DN" names. i think its about the worst trend around.

 

[yesonline]

Originally posted by nameslave
Hey, how about NAME (as in nameslave.com)? LOL!

Okay, my take is that it's not good to stir fry acronyms (like DN) with full words (like Forum). So DNForum.com is by this standard NOT a good domain name. (Dan, the previous owner, made this name up; but the true value of DNForum.com lies not in the name itself but its member base and traffic, right?) Moreover, I do NOT think that DN has become a recognizable shorthand in the "industry", at least not yet.

You are right on this, I did not even know DN stands for domain name before I came to dnforum.com

 

[Christopher Marks]

Yeah, I had never seen DN used for Domain Name until dnforum.com either.

Like mentioned earlier, it would all depend on the target audience. Anyone here would understand, but the average joe would have no idea it was for domain name.

 

[tassos]

netnames or webnames i think are more easy for people not in dn biz

 

[Anthony Ng]

The big brother who once oversaw dot-ca registration (very much like NetSol in the old days) chose webnames.ca as their domain and company name.