- Impact
- 6
Hello .us domain holders -
I wanted to share a story about the development of Spiders.us. I feel this story could help motivate .us domain holders and help encourage them to not give up on this ccTLD. Furthermore, this story could be used to help market or promote .us domains when defending the extension to potential buyers.
Original Brand on a gTLD
The project was originally called SpiderIdentification.org, a very literal brand which demonstrates my desire to rank well on "spider identification" in Google. We quickly achieved high rankings for this keyword because not only do we apply the obvious technical steps with regard to SEO, we really are creating the best spider destination on the Internet. Our product and content is authoritative and not poorly created.
Expanding our Goal
We realized that our goal of ranking well and attempting to compete on "spider identification" wasn't enough. We wanted to do whatever we could to actually work our way to #1 on "spiders" as well. Ideally, this would involve a one word Spiders.TLD or a catchy two word brand. The problem with two word brands with "Spiders" in them is that the majority sound best with Spider being the first word, which means singular: SpiderCenter or SpiderExperts or SpiderIdentification. Google is getting better at understanding quality sites that don't over optimize and brand themselves as generically as possible, but we wanted to be certain. Rebranding is a serious step, and having a one word generic was important.
Spiders.com/net/org were either not for sale or out of our budget.
Last year we were able to buy Spiders.us from a re-seller for a reasonable amount, and officially re-branded in November. After a few months of serious ranking problems in Google (we had correct 301s but something was throwing off the site), we have been consistently ranking on page 2 and continue to climb and fluctuate.
I think .us is an extremely valuable extension for the right purpose. I also have termites.us which we will be developing soon.
Why .us is perfect for us?
I hope this story helps motivate and encourage .us domain buyers, sellers and developers.
I wanted to share a story about the development of Spiders.us. I feel this story could help motivate .us domain holders and help encourage them to not give up on this ccTLD. Furthermore, this story could be used to help market or promote .us domains when defending the extension to potential buyers.
Original Brand on a gTLD
The project was originally called SpiderIdentification.org, a very literal brand which demonstrates my desire to rank well on "spider identification" in Google. We quickly achieved high rankings for this keyword because not only do we apply the obvious technical steps with regard to SEO, we really are creating the best spider destination on the Internet. Our product and content is authoritative and not poorly created.
Expanding our Goal
We realized that our goal of ranking well and attempting to compete on "spider identification" wasn't enough. We wanted to do whatever we could to actually work our way to #1 on "spiders" as well. Ideally, this would involve a one word Spiders.TLD or a catchy two word brand. The problem with two word brands with "Spiders" in them is that the majority sound best with Spider being the first word, which means singular: SpiderCenter or SpiderExperts or SpiderIdentification. Google is getting better at understanding quality sites that don't over optimize and brand themselves as generically as possible, but we wanted to be certain. Rebranding is a serious step, and having a one word generic was important.
Spiders.com/net/org were either not for sale or out of our budget.
Last year we were able to buy Spiders.us from a re-seller for a reasonable amount, and officially re-branded in November. After a few months of serious ranking problems in Google (we had correct 301s but something was throwing off the site), we have been consistently ranking on page 2 and continue to climb and fluctuate.
I think .us is an extremely valuable extension for the right purpose. I also have termites.us which we will be developing soon.
Why .us is perfect for us?
- Allowed us to obtain a 1 word generic for a reasonable price.
- Instantly communicates our regional focus on spiders. We will never expand beyond the US/North America. We still take in ID requests and most spiders can get identified outside the USA, but it isn't our expertise.
- Inherit search engine and brand authority benefits from having a one word generic.
I hope this story helps motivate and encourage .us domain buyers, sellers and developers.
