Don’t Put a Hyphen in your domain name. Ever.

Jacob Malthouse
Jul 10, 2017 · 3 min read

Realized last week that I’ve been working in the domain name industry for almost 10 years! That’s a long time to be an environmentalist in a not environmental industry. I had a moment when I realized I actually know a lot about domain names.

It was triggered by the hyphen (or the dash). You see, lots of people don’t know the first thing about domain names. They don’t know how much they are worth. They don’t know which ones are good. They don’t know about new domain endings. They don’t know all manner of things that they should know.

Your domain name.

They should know these things because domain names are powerful tools. My Dad is a carpenter. One of the most useful bits of advice he gave me was always buy good tools. A domain name isn’t a bandsaw that sits in your garage gathering dust while you think, someday, maybe, I will use the bandsaw. A domain name is a hammer. You use your domain name every single day. For your email, for people who visit your website, for your print communications. In social media. That is some critical kit. But you don’t think about it do you? Especially if you don’t have thousands of dollars to spend on a domain name. You just:

… oh maybe i can just add a dash or… blergh. gross.

Don’t. Just don’t. You are being fooled by two things:

  1. Searching for a domain name creates a false sense of urgency. You’re trying to get the name you want but you can’t. It is unavailable or way more expensive than you thought (because you don’t know anything about domain names). So you panic. You add the hyphen. Wow it’s available! Not thinking to wonder why this particular piece of critical kit is of no interest to anyone on the planet but you, you buy it. Done. Behold your franken-domain. It’s alive!
  2. You think that there are no options. This is understandable. For a long time we have lived in a world in which there are two types of peanut butter. Crunchy and smooth. That’s it. But this world has ended. You can now choose chili peanut butter, or goji berry peanut butter, etc. It’s the same for domain names. You can now choose from any number of domain name endings that don’t require you to destroy your domain with a hyphen (like www.global-environmental-event.org or www.my-new-eco-entrepreneur-blog.ninja).You might have to look around a bit, but you’re looking for a hammer, not a bandsaw. So it’s worth it.

But why is the hyphen bad?

Type a hyphen. Do it now! Quick.

You have no idea where in the Sam Hill the hyphen is on your keyboard. It might as well be the manual for your blender. You think you know where it is, but you don’t. You will never find it. It exists, in your office, mocking you from its lair. Like the hyphen. I could drop the mic right now. But I won’t.

The hyphen isn’t just awkward. It tells a story about you. It says, I don’t care about my tools. I don’t put effort into the things I use every day. I didn’t think carefully about what is in my domain name, or what domain ending I want to use to efficiently tell my story.

The hyphen is showing up to your job interview in jogging pants. And not good ones. The crappy jogging pants you watch Netflix in.

Now that I see this, it hurts me. I see it all the time. I especially see nonprofits doing it. I’ve seen it three times this week. Credible nonprofits showing up in their to unprofessionally promote their websites, their events, their contests.

I hope this post will convince some of you to stop doing this. If anything good comes from my mishmash of a career, maybe it’s being able to share some of the Harry Potter of domaining with the world. I’ll keep at it, and you go make your domain names better! Cause we can’t change the world in jogging pants.

Jacob Malthouse

Written by

I love to explore connections between technology, society and planet.

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