Brandable Domain Naming Ultimate Money Making Guide

Intro:

‘On “Brandable Domain Naming Ultimate Money Making Guide”. If you want to learn about Brand Naming for businesses and buying domain names then follow this post written by BECKPLANET, the pen name of one of the pros in the Brandable Domain Market, from Nairaland, with over 6 years experience in the art of domaining.’

Whether you want to learn just how to effectively pen down a name for your domain to match your business setup or want to make money by so doing by being creative with branded names. Then, this guide shows you the right way to go about it.

Without further ado, let’s us welcome BeckPlanet, to begin with the tuturial:

Important Note:

In this post I’ll be using Dot Com instead of (.) com.
I spent a few days of research to put up together this piece, I hope it’ll be helful to us.

Disclaimer on Brandable Domain Names:

The Brandable Market is not for Everyone, It is for Creative minds only. Most times it can be frustrating to invest in Brandable Domain Names due to prolonged delays to make a sale, but when you hit a sale. It’s like a Hit Back to Back. 

Brandable Domain Name:

A brandable Domain Name is any made up word or non-definite string of wods.

Brandable names are names companies decides to go for to make their brand UNIQUE and stand out from the CROWD. That is why a mobile phone company will decide to name her Brand “Apple” instead of “Phones”, why because they want their brand to be “Unique” and different from the rest.

Now we all know that Apple is still a fruit but that doesn’t matter today because whenever you think APPLE, you think iPhone also.

Another example is a popular TAXI company choosing to term her brand “UBER” instead of “Taxi”. How about a mattress company called “Purple”, and the list goes.

And then you begin to wonder why these companies chooses unrelated names for their products or services.

This is because they want to stand out from the rest of other brands and thus becomes UNIQUE with their Brand name.

A brandable domain name is an invented word that might not necessarily have a real meaning but yet have a sound that makes sense and conveys a feeling when pronounced.

Examples are: Konga, Jumia, Lenovo, Nexus etc.

Now these names has no real meaning neither are they real English words yet, their brands have made them stick in our hearts.

Simply because they are Short, Pronounceable, Easy-to-Remember, Catchy to the eye and have a Unique tone when said out loud. 

The above mentioned features are very important characteristics of a Brandable Domain Name.

Hence, if you’re planning to register the next Brandable Domain Name make sure it meets all the above listed conditions.

Who Buys the Brandable Domain Names:

According to Brandbucket, a reputable brandable marketplace, most of her brandable name sales are from New Startups, Venture Capital firms, Incubators and Serial Entrepreneurs starting a new business.

However, sometimes brandable name sales can be generated from companies that are looking to REBRAND, for example: A company called “FoodieBay” rebranded to “Zomato” in 2008. (Zomato dot com, was then listed on Brandbucket and bought by “FoodieBay Dot com”. A food company who were looking to rebrand at that time).

Types of Brandable Domain Names:

Brandable domain names can be categorized into four (4) major types:

1. One Word
2. Two Word
3. Hybrid Word
4. Invented Name

With each example given below:

One Word Brandable Domain Name:

Apple, Purple, Dove, Bird, Ice, Coin, Money, Love, Pure, Smile, Panda, Monkey, Business, Market and any single word you can think of.

Two Word Brandable Domain Name:

Microsoft, PayStack, PerfectDesk, HeartLion, NairaLand, FaceBook, BrandBucket, SquadHelp etc. Made up of (Word+Word)

Hybrid Brandable:

Taxify, Deliveroo, Domainly, Sitesy, Pinterest, Qualtrics, SmartLytics, Namerific, Greenzie, Taximo, Hubvia, Webzy, Hempcy, Ebook etc. Made up of (Word+Suffix or Prefix+Word).

Invented Brandable:

Klevio, Google, Konga, Jumia, Nokia, Zillow, Tovoro, Envato, Zomato, Twitter Avant, Hulu, Mozido, Quroaetc etc. Made up of (Invented/Coined Words).

By Definition

The One Word:

A one word brandable domain name is simply a Dictionary single Word that can be used to brand a company. These names are considered as Ultra-Premium names and are highly Scarce in the market.

With relatively High Value due to their uniqueness, quality and demand. Moreso, they are Highly Brandable commodities and most companies cannot afford to own them because they are relatively expensive.

Examples are Research.com valued at around $20m, March.com with a $10m valuation, Cool.com value at $7.5m and Ice.com valued at $25m etc.

The Two Word Brandable:

A two word brandable domain is the combination of two English words in the format of (Word+Word).

Example: “LionHeart”. The most important thing to consider when forming a 2 word brandable is to ensure that your word combinations has a synergy, flow or connection and hence makes sense.

A good example is the keyword mentioned above. Of course we know that a Lion is brave at heart. Thus, making “LionHeart” a suitable 2 word brandable name. Other examples are Healthcare, Firefox, RedLabel, WordPress, MicroSoft, MetricDesk, OfficeBox, TechCrowd…etc.

The Hybrid Brandable:

Just like we have hybrid animals, plants etc so also do we have Hybrid domains which are classified as special breed and are highly Brandable.

Thus a Hybrid domain name is the Combination of a Dictionary Word + Suffix or a Prefix + Word. A hybrid brandable name must have Real word in them combined with a prefix in the front or suffix at the back of the word.

Examples are: Spotify, Feedly and Bitly etc.

Further Examples: Namerific (Name + Terrific), Smartlytics (Smart + Analytics), Bionetics(Biology + Genetics), ProBook (Professional + Book) etc.

This kind of brandable names are highly sought after by new businesses because of it’s stylish built, Uniqueness and ability to retain the real Word.

Hence, these type of names are often great alternatives to businesses looking to retain their brand identity or services in a brand name they choose.

Another category of Hybrid names are deliberate misspellings of words or a name that is phonetically similar to a real word (Play on real and the Hybrid Double letter word. Think FlipKart, Lyft, Quickr, Thiink, Cryypto, Automaatic, Flickr, Fiverr and Qubit etc.

These words tends to give you a feeling of the Real Word in Disguise.

Examples on Hybrid Brandables:

A web service company can decide to use any of these hybrid names for their brand:

Web + Suffix, Prefix + Web.

E.g.: Weby, Webi, Websy, Webly, Webzy, Webvia, Eweb, Uweb, iWeb, UniWeb etc.

Likewise, a Payment Company can decide to use a hybrid of the name for her establishment combining it with the word “Pay”.

i.e. Pay + Suffix or Prefix + Pay.

E.g.: Payza, Payly, Payco, Payoneer, Payro, Payify, Epay, Unipay etc.

Invented Brandable Names:

An invented name is a non-dictionary word that is made-up and doesn’t contain any dictionary root words.

Some examples of invented brandable names include Nexus, Jumia, Konga, Roku and Hulu, Jeelo, Envato, Igloo etc.

The adage of the shorter the better definitely applies to invented names because they aren’t real words.

So the more consonants and letter, the less likely someone is able to remember it because they don’t have any reference points like if it were made up of real words.

Analysis:

Every brandable name falls into one of the above mentioned categories either One Word or Two Word or Hybrid or Invented Brandable Names.

Illustration:

A taxis company looking for a Brand name for her business may decide to go for one of the following names:

• Taxify.com (Hybrid)
• Taximo.com (Hybrid)
• Taxica.com (Hybrid)
• Taxico.com (Hybrid)
• Taxy.com (Hybrid Misspelling)
• Tazi.com (Hybrid Misspelling)
• Taxii.com (Hybrid Double Letters)
• Taxxi.com (Hybrid Double Letters)
• TaxiTo.com (Two Word)
• TaxiGo.com (Two Word)
• TaxiCrowd.com (Two Word)
• TaxiFast.com (Two Word)
• Uber.com (Invented)
• Taxi.com (One Word)

Of course we all know that a new Start up business might not afford to buy “Taxi.com” for say ($5m-$20m), but they can get Taximo.com or any of the other above listed names for say $2500-$5000 at brandable marketplaces like (Brandbucket, Brandpa, SquadHelp).

So they’ll most times go for the alternative Brandable Names to the Real Dictionary Word.

With this mindset, you can easily decipher (understand) what end users are looking for thus, you can make a better decision while registering a brandable name having the above mentioned tips in mind.

Note: one thing is common and constant amongst shought after Brandable Names is that, they are always very short words, memorable, catchy to the eyes and yet conveys the right emotion or meaning of what a company represents or stands for. 

Selling Brandable Domain Names as Business:

Well the truth is not all brandable names make sense and not all will sale after being bought or registered (Hard Truth).

But, there are criteria and conditions that once met, then your names stands a better chance of selling.

Here I’ll be discussing on what sales in the 3 Brandable Categories (Keyword, Hybrid and Invented Names). Excluding the “One Word” names of course we all know they sale themselves.

I’ve had success in the Brandable Niche because I keep track on data of past sales and new trends, every time someone reports a brandable domain sale in a Conversation, at a forum or blog. In an email or even on a brandable marketplace.

I write it down and try to figure out why it sold, and then it helps me make a better decision when checking names from the expired list ( At ExpiredDomains.net) or when hand registering a new name.

Hence, it is very important to always find out “what’s hot and what’s not”. Hence, Stats and Data can give us good insights of what sells in the brandable market and the more data we all have, the better decisions we can make as Domain Investors.

How to Pick the Right “Two Word Brandable Name” and What’s Selling

In my research I discovered some hot selling keywords. Which is listed below:

High Selling Keyword: Agro, Dot, Ever, Hey, Key, Lend, Oak, Acti, Agent, Aura, Bio, Block, Bond, Boost, Chat, Coin, Digi, Fin, Flex, Go, Hatch, Hello, Hub, Motive, Metric, Nest, On, Pay, Pivot, Pure, Sage, Sky, Team, Tech, Volt, Wealth, Work and Zen, Cut, Cyber, Buzz, Buy, Call, Card, Cash, Chimp, Click, Code, Care, Digital, Crowd, Fit, Fuel, Ninja, Robo, Sale, Sell, Stat, Space, Stack, Swipe, Style, Tap, Travel, Talk, Web and Wire.

There may be more hot keywords, just do some research to find out.

Now by combining the above keywords with one another, you can easily make up a good and decent Two-Word Brandable name.

For Example, by combination of (Word + Word) we’ll get: Helathcare.com, DigitalCrowd.com, MediaSpac.com, LendCoin.com, FitNinja.com, StackPay.com, PureZen.com, TapFuel.com and the list goes on.

If you check, you’ll notice that all the words I used in the combination are all listed above and the combination all made sense.

If you check, you’ll notice that all the words I used in the combination are all listed above and the combination all made sense.

Hence, in your bid to pick or register a two Word Brandable name make sure the word combination has a good connection or synergy this will increase its demand in the market.

And that is the only way a brandable marketplace or End-Users will always be interested in your name.

And they’ll hardly turn down your names when they come across them.

Two Conditions to be met here are:

• Ensure your selections are High Selling, Hot or Popular Keywords
• Ensure the combination Makes Sense, Let there be a Synergy between the two words you choose.

I recently sold SwiftRestore.com by just following the simple step I outlined above.

If the 2 above conditions are met, you can always have a potentially valuable 2 keyword Brandable name.

N/B: Also note that all brandable marketplaces desires you submit shorter names to them. Names not longer that 12 letters. This applies to most brandable marketplaces I know.

Watchword here is “The Shorter, the Better”.

Recent Two Word Sales Report from Brandable Marketplaces:

• BookGenius.com ——————-$2,499 (SquadHelp)
• HomePeak.com ———————$2,999 (SquadHelp)
• WhiteGlove.com———————-$79,000 (SquadHelp)
• Flowfox.com—————————$ no record (Brandpa)
• MadMilk.com————————–$4195(Brandpa)
• Zipchain.com————————– no record (Brandpa)
• PepFuel.com————————–$1695 (BrandBucket)
• PrimeOracle.com——————–$1895 (BrandBucket)
• NightNest.com———————–$3,395 (BrandBucket)

How to Pick the right “Hybrid Brandable Name”

Like I previously mentioned, Hybrid names are the most sought after brandable names and sells fast because they are stylish, unique and retains meaning of the keyword they portray.

To form a Hybrid brandable name is pretty easy, simply bring a real word and attach the suffix word at the end or a prefix in the front of the word.

The format to do this simply “Word + Suffix” or “Prefix + Word”

Example of Suffixes are: ly, ify, io, ia, sy, ry, via, lytics, zia, sie, vo, zo etc.

Examples of Prefixes are: i, e, u, pre, pro, uni, multi etc.

Now let’d do a practical hybrid brandable name formulation:

Using the Word “Hub”, to for. a hybrid word all you have to do is attach any of the listed prefix above at the front of the word “Hub” or any suffix listed above at the End to the word “Hub”.

Example (Hub + Suffix) and (Prefix + Hub) we have the following below:

• Hubly.com
• Hubify.com
• Hubio.com
• Hubia.com
• Hubry.com
• Hubvia.com
• Hublytics.com
• eHub.com
• iHub.com
• UniHub.com
• ProHub.com

and so on.

I recently sold Digilytic.com (Currently a tech firm website) by just using the above outlined template.

Recent Hybrid brandable names Sales Report from Brandable Marketplaces:

• Hubvia.com———————-$2,699 (SquadHelp)
• Healor.com———————-$2,799 (SquadHelp)
• Hempcy.com———————-$2,199 (SquadHelp)
• Autoxo.com———————-$2,499 (SquadHelp)
• Zigzy.com———————-$9,999 (SquadHelp)
• BuzzLi.com———————-$3,195 (Brandpa)
• Breedsy.com———————-no record (Brandpa)
• Cabsy.com———————-no record (Brandpa)
• Greenzie.com———————-$2,895 (Brandbucket)
• Payello.com———————-$1,645 (Brandbucket)
• Lendvia.com———————-$1,790 (Brandbucket)
• Mintago.com———————-$2,395 (Brandbucket)

How to Pick Right Invented Word Brandable Name:

To come up with an invented/made up brandable name you need to be really creative minded and think abstract.

For example, the person that came up with Zomato.com was actually thinking “Tomato”, another is Zenefit which relates to Benefit.

How about? Jumia, Konga, Kanabis, Banxa, Credovo, Lanexo etc.

Now this names are simply the combination of vowels and consonant letters.

For example, if you wish to come up with a good 6-letter invented brandable, all you need to form a 3 Syllable Vowel/Consonant 2 character combination example:

• La/ne/xo=Lanexo. It recently sold on BrandBucket.
• Zo/ma/to=Zomato . It sold on BrandBucket too.
• Le/no/vo=Lenovo (Currently a Mobile Tech Company) etc

Notice that Each 2-Letters syllable in the combination must have a Vowel and consonant letters combined.

Note, that there are so many invented names still available to hand register but, while trying the above format make sure the name conveys a feeling when pronounced.

Also, there are a lot of this kind of names dropping everyday. Check ExpiredDomains.net regularly.

Recent Invented Brandable Names Sales from Brandable Marketplaces:

• Asparia.com———————-$2099 (SquadHelp)
• Banxa.com———————-$7,799 (SquadHelp)
• Lovaco.com———————-$2,199 (SquadHelp)
• Genuve.com———————-$1,999 (SquadHelp)
• Hexub.com———————-no record (Brandpa)
• Intrusta.com———————-no record (Brandpa)
• Kanibi.com———————-$1700 (Brandpa)
• Credovo.com———————-$3,195 (BrandBucket)
• Lanexo.com———————-$2,895 (BrandBucket)
• Puzala.com———————-$2,795 (BrandBucket)
• Novoxa.com———————-$2,995 (BrandBucket)

What Brandable Name Category Sales the Most:

On a Survey carried out by Keith De Boer (A Brandable Veteran) Using his own sales Record at BrandBucket.

Here are his metrics on how the brandable categories rate in sales outcome:

• Hybrid (41%)
• Invented (31%)
• Keyword (28%)

I too recently did a brief Survey using SquadHelp sales report Data and here is the result:

• Hybrid (48%)
• Invented (30%)
• Keyword (22%)

It’s fair to say that Keith De Boer’s BrandBucket survey report and mine shares similarities.

As observed the Hybrid brandable names has higher sales ratio than it’s counterparts.

In summary:

Key Components to being SUCCESSFUL in the Brandable Niche:

• Being Patient
• Keeping good records and stats of what’s selling
• Be Creative
• Always Research
• Finding a formula that works and refining and repeating it
• Expanding slowly, gradually and steadily
• Learning from reputable Brandable sources (Dngeek.com, Dnbot.com, tldinvestors.com, BrandBucket.com, SquadHelp.com, Brandpa.com, Namepro.com). That is the Brandable Section and other brandable forums you can find online.
• Being flexible and moving with current market trends.

Search for “Dngeek’s Top 100 Brandable Names Sales Report of 2018” on Google.

It’ll further give you a better scope of what brandable names have been selling over the years.

GoodLuck.

Reference: BeckPlanet, Nairaland.

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