Click here to republish this article, or click here to email this article to a friend. It's a nightmare scenario prospective Web site owners face. But when you try to register one, you find out every last name has been taken.
Most people do the obvious and settle for registering another name.
This is a reasonable strategy, especially if your budget is tight and time is short. Short names are easy to remember, easy to type, and take less space in marketing material and in URLs and e-mail addresses. Competition is fierce. Customers often guess at company domain names, typing them directly into the browser. And when they do, your potential customers might be whisked into the arms of a rival organization.