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How to generate web 2.0 names on NameStation?

Tauno — Thu, 01 Mar 2012 21:24:50 +0000

You have probably heard about websites such as Pinterest, Zynga, Flickr or Instagram. Those names, characterized as web 2.0-ish, are a step forward from the ordinary this-site-is-about.com names. From the previous article you got an idea what are web 2.0 names in general and now it’s time to get down to it and create some names yourself. If you are thinking about applying web 2.0 naming techniques to your own business, you might want to check the variety of name creation features on NameStation.

Getting down to business

Let´s take the first name on the list – Pinterest. It is a combination of two different words – pin and interest. The domain search tool to use on NameStation to obtain such results most effectively is Combine Lists. It blends two conceptual word lists with the possibility to choose whether you want the whole word to appear in the name or just a part of it.

For example, when looking for a name for a fitness blog, you may combine the lists like Health and Dynamic, Positive and Sport, Your Contest Keywords and Health, etc. It all depends on the concepts that you need to be reflected in the name of your company.

To create business names that include a particular word or a part of this word, choose Append Lists. This feature allows you to combine the word with any of the predetermined conceptual word lists. You can also choose if you want the word to appear at the beginning or at the end of the name.

Even more web 2.0-ish – looking further from compounds

If you don’t need your name to resemble a compound, you should also try the Substitutions Search or Random Name Generator to coin new words such as Zynga or Meebo.

The Random Name Generator is the easiest way to create names that essentially have no meaning; consequently, they won’t evoke any associations with your field of business. Such names could be very distinctive and in addition they enable you to build up the meaning of your brand from scratch.

For a wider selection of name alternatives, you could also use the Random Name feature in different languages, such as French, Latin or even Afrikaans.

Substitutions Search differs from the Random Name Generator in terms of letting you determine some parts of the name you would like your company to have. You just need to follow the key, presented on the right-hand side of the search feature.

For example, if you want to find a name, comprising of 6 letters so that the 1st, 4th and 6th letter are consonants and the rest are vowels, you can create a suitable name pattern with the help of the key. Having done that, you only need to press Search and NameStation will generate names according to your criteria. In case of the previous example, the pattern would be !**!*!.

Some examples of name patterns:

R?!*** – 6 letters, begins with R, 2nd letter is a vowel and 3rd a consonant
!?!?graph – ends with graph, preceded by the combination of consonant-vowel-consonant-vowel (CVCV)
Tan****! – 8 letters, begins with tan and finishes with a consonant; in between are 4 random letters
?!??!? – 6 letters, begins with a vowel, followed by a consonant, 2 vowels and another consonant and a vowel.

More ideas and information are available in our User Guide.

What are web 2.0 domain names?

maarjaliis — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 13:45:25 +0000

Many of you reading this article are probably struggling with finding a great domain name for your business or have faced the challenge at some point. The most obvious domain names, such as furniture.com, bestwishes.com, mylife.com, have been snapped up by companies or domainers ages ago, and to reach what is left out there requires a fair amount of creative thinking. This is also the reason why web 2.0 domain names have grown increasingly popular.

To be honest, there is no clear definition what makes a domain name web 2.0. The most common criteria you may often hear is that the name should be trendy, cutting-edge and unique. Sounds ambiguous, doesn’t it? It should, because the term itself is rather intuitive and abstract; therefore, most interpretations have at least a tinge of truth in them. Nevertheless, some domain names just seem more web 2.0-ish than others.

Web 2.0 itself refers to websites that enable users to communicate with each other and generate content as opposed to web 1.0, which consists of sites that are plain information providers targeting passive readers. Web 2.0 sites include, for example, social networks, wikis, blogs and other content sharing websites. Facebook and Twitter would be the most obvious examples. Web 2.0 domain names, however, are only related to web 2.0 as much as the fact that such domain names established their popularity together with the development of web 2.0 itself. While a huge number of web 2.0 sites have a name that could be characterized as web 2.0-ish, it is not a must.

Main characteristics of web 2.0 domains

Like I said before, no one has actually established the specific characteristics of a web 2.0 name. However, everyone seems to agree that when the name does not exist as a real word, it is somehow related to web 2.0. Names such as computers.com, plasticbottle.com or coffeeandtea.com obviously do not belong to the group, but domains that look further from the plain dictionary-style could already be called web 2.0-ish.

Typical Examples:

Flickr, Google – misspelled words (flicker, googol)
Facebook, YouTube – while they are simple compounds consisting of two nouns, they had no use before the websites were established
Instagram, Pinterest – combinations of two recognizable parts of real words (instant + telegram, pinboard + interest)

Naturally, these three groups do not encompass all the possible methods of creating web 2.0 domain names. Sometimes the name could be made up from scratch (such as badoo.com) or be a real word with a metaphorical application. For example, amazon.com has essentially nothing to do with the river but the size of the Amazon is used to refer to the sales potential of the online store, which initially focused only on books. All in all, the possibilities are unlimited; you just need a bit of creativity. And of course luck.

Having clarified the essence of web 2.0 names, it would be appropriate to post an article about the simplest methods on how to generate web 2.0 domain names with the help of NameStation. Keep yourself posted!

A Quick Solution: Naming a Company after Yourself

maarjaliis — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 11:59:01 +0000

What do Hewlett-Packard, Armani, Bacardi, Cadbury, Calvin Klein, Fazer, Ford Motors and McDonald’s have in common? That’s right, all of these brands have been named after their founders.

Naming a company after oneself is a very common practice in the business world. Many service providers, e.g. law and accounting firms, do it. It is the easiest way to save time and avoid the trouble of developing a unique name for your business. It looks professional and in most cases the .com domain is also available, so why not? After all, even branding consultants have adopted the practice.

Stop and consider a moment

While there are many success stories and even more advantages in giving a personal name to a business, in a longer term perspective it might not be the wisest strategy. Of course, there are cases when naming a business after yourself is the best solution, but in these instances the primary motivation does not usually stand behind lack of money or time.

It is advisable to take a look at some of the following aspects. What if at one point you want to sell your business? In all likelihood the buyer does not see the benefits in operating under someone else’s name. However, once the brand has already been established in the consumer’s mind, it is very difficult (not to mention expensive) to change the name. OR. What if you decide to expand your business abroad? In a different culture, your name may be difficult to pronounce or spell, damaging your brand awareness and memorability.

The most important disadvantage, however, is that using your own personal name derives you from the opportunity to develop a catchy, impactful and easily memorable brand name that conveys the message you want to send out. A good brand name may give some idea of what your company does, how it does it, who the target customer is or what distinguishes your business from others in the same field. These messages are vital in establishing your brand’s identity, since they give people some indication with which to relate the business.

Hesitating?

If you are unsure what sort of a name you should go for, see what your competitors are doing. In many areas, personal names, such as in the case of doctors whose company’s success is closely related to their own reputation, are widely accepted. On the other hand, do not be discouraged by the time and energy you need to put into crafting an entirely new brand name. After all, if it’s worth doing, it’s worth doing well.

Finding Dictionary Domains

Tauno — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 19:59:27 +0000

Dictionary Domains consolidates a group of searches based on lexical data.

Single-word .com and .net domains are rarely available, but there are a number of ways how words can be tweaked or affixed. There are also plenty of available dictionary domains with other TLDs.

Intersections

Join words that have overlapping parts with your keyword. Kinetic + ticket = Kineticket

Alliterations

Append or prepend words that have the same sound with your word.

Alliterations can be matched by beginnings (Rocket + Rocker) or endings (Rocket + Docket).

Related Words

Find dictionary words which are semantically related to your keyword. Try this with adding a Prefix or Suffix.

Word Lookup

Find words containing specific characters.

Translate

Translate a word to and from English. Check to English to see whether a randomly generated word has a meaning in any other language.

Translate domain search results

Tauno — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 18:38:33 +0000

With the help of Google Translate we’ve added an option to automatically translate generated domain names into 20+ languages. This works best with Keywords, Lists and Dictionary searches. The original English words are listed in the search results too.

To select or deselect the translation language, click on the Translate Results link in the right column on any domain search page.

This brings up a popup dialog where you can select which language to translate to.

Top 20 Domain Search Keywords in December

Tauno — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 22:14:43 +0000

In December 2011, over 1.1M domain name ideas were generated at NameStation. The following are the Top 20 keywords used in all domain searches combined.

To have a better chance of finding a suitable domain with competitive words, consider combining them with Themes that may seem like an unconventional match (e.g. “cloud” + Energy) or using alternative keywords.

web
tech
cloud
travel
design
my
social
shop
go
media
job
local
pro
android
match
game
health
bit
mobile
ad

Keyword suggestions and definitions

Tauno — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 14:47:01 +0000

In Domain search, clicking on any word brings up the dialog box with the definition and hyphenation. This addition also enables one-click continuous searching across all search types.

The Dictionary link opens Google’s Definitions with synonyms and translations.
Related Terms goes to Onelook Reverse Dictionary. It’s a really useful tool for finding alternative keyword ideas and worth trying.
Wordnet is a super-thesaurus that displays semantic data and relations for each word.

New Feature: Aftermarket domain contests

Tauno — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 11:07:55 +0000

Contest holders can now choose to receive domain suggestions that are taken and sold on the aftermarket. There is also an option to specify the budget limit.

The list of contests accepting aftermarket entries already has a couple of entries with significant budgets. If you own a domain that would suit the contest requirements, please feel free to post a suggestion!

55 available domains for Halloween

Tauno — Mon, 31 Oct 2011 18:20:55 +0000

Need a domain name for Halloween? All of these domain names are available as of October 31, 2011, 1:30 PM EST. Grab them now before someone beats you to it!

Click here to generate more

Top 25 domain search affixes with alternatives

Tauno — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 13:46:56 +0000

Each day, thousands of domain searches at NameStation are performed with common keywords.

The top 10 words account for about 50% of the searches and there is a lot of demand for available domain names with those affixes. Here is a list of alternatives that you might consider when searching for available domains.

To find available domains with any of these words, simply Append affixes or find domains by Similarity.

web – online, page, site, home, dot, point, channel, link, click, source, gate, world
cloud – stratus, nebula, cirrus, air, grid, mesh, space, ether, sky, serve, virtual, stack, thin, agile, open
tech – vac, tron, matic, gadget, logic, sys, digi, robo, auto, mill, motor, rocket, rational, kit, suite, unit
business – focus, vision, solutions, alliance, advisor, commerce, office, suite, team
deal – save, bargain, budget, cent, dime, discount, drop, less, offers, penny, promo, sale, value, wallet
studio – atelier, gallery, lot, scene, location, floor, workshop, forge
social – club, group, circle, buddy, connect, crowd, folk, forum, guild, lodge, mate, meet, member, mix, nation, network, nexus, pal, people, public, quorum, set, summit, team, tribe, world
design – adapt, create, custom, illustrate, model, shape, form, figure, pattern, make, build, frame, style, variety, class, prototype
my – self, ego, own, id, take, be, personal, private, secret, inner
shop – boutique, store, market, bazaar, browse, outlet, retail, commerce, vendor, mart, order, merchant, purchase, buyer
photo – pic, picture, scene, screen, shoot, shot, snap, studio, film, focus, flash, frame, image, lens
game – arcade, compte, contest, goal, mark, player, score, team, trophy
buy – cart, catalog, purchase, outlet, store, seller, trade, sale
media – connect, interactive, link, report, scoop, public, story, bulletin, broadcast, message, topic
smart – brilliant, bright, clever, creative, fox, guide, genius, insight, inspire, intellect, master, mind, prodicy, sharp, specialist, talent, wise, virtuoso
host – online, site, server, home, domain, digital, website, access, gate, route, avenue, channel, station, click
net – grid, signal, relay, comm, contact, mesh, wire, connect, zone, maze, node, transmit, transfer, pipe, send, scan, post, traffic, uplink, tube, cirquit
ad – promo, advert, sell, hype, target, push, drive, boost, campaign, press, force, promote, reach, agency, market, info, target, contact, deliver
green – fresh, foliage, leaf, sustainable, preserve, sustain, viable, future, vision
go – run, move, travel, jump, act, walk, drive, step, ride, start, launch, begin, enter, embark, kickoff, fire, spring, init
pro – expert, ace, maven, analyst, strategist, master, guru, wizard, hotshot, genius
app – use, work, utility, device, gizmo, kit, tool, run
trip – getaway, leave, leisure, travel, hike, expedition, explore, tour, holiday, journey, passport, sights, takeoff, trail, vacation, wander
easy – accessible, bare, basic, breeze, convenient, fot, handy, plain, pure, ready, simple, smooth
data – input, format, record, info, stats, table, file, stack, archive, list, storage, save, log, book, track, ledger