Brands spend millions of dollars every year on all kinds of assets, from human capital to trademarks to real estate, but there is a highly valuable type of intellectual property that might go unnoticed: premium domains.
We covered the importance of premium .com’s before, however, big brands are on a different playing field. Some of the world’s largest companies go after the top-of-the-line .com’s: dictionary word domain names.
If you think about it, it makes sense that Citibank bought mortgage.com for $1.8 million, or that Toys “R” Us paid $5 million for toys.com. It is a smart marketing strategy that immediately links a brand to the word at hand. Wouldn’t you want to go to book.com and get to Barnes and Noble’s website?
Wouldn’t you want to go to book.com and get to Barnes and Noble’s website?
We decided to compile a list to highlight some of the dictionary word domain names owned by brands of various industries.
Finance
On top of mortgage.com, Citibank also owns finance.com, while Bank of America acquired loans.com for $3 million in the year 2000.
Along these lines, there is American Express with open.com and serve.com, Fidelity with 401K.com and retire.com, and Discover with studentloan.com.
Intuit, the company behind TurboTax, owns domains like apps.com and payroll.com. Speaking of payroll, money.com is surprisingly not owned by a bank, but rather a media company (keep reading).
Technology
It is also logical for tech companies to be ahead of the game when it comes to internet domains.
Microsoft is in possession of office.com and docs.com while Apple owns airport.com, next.com, newton.com, carbon.com, in addition to all of the .com’s for their signature products.
AOL has advertising.com, games.com and strangely enough, love.com. Intel naturally owns chips.com, as well as PC.com and netbook.com.
Salesforce, famous for their CRM solutions, owns domains such as: data.com, desk.com, social.com and work.com. Oracle, on the other hand, owns sales.com.
Health
Domains containing specific disorder keywords such as asthma.com, diabetes.com and depression.com are owned by GlaxoSmithKline.
Sanofi-Aventis has allergy.com and stroke.com, Johnson&Johnson has cancer.com, Pfizer has arthritis.com, Bayer has aspirin.com, and Novartis has shingles.com.
1800 Contacts of course needs to own contacts.com and they also happen to have eyecare.com.
Entertainment
We mentioned earlier that book.com is owned by Barnes and Noble (as well as books.com), while movies.com is owned by Fandango, and TV.com is owned by CBS.
Disney is behind very appropriate domains like family.com and kid.com. TIME is the owner of money.com and health.com.
Last but not least, film.com is owned by VIACOM, currently linking back to the MTV website. If you go to history.com, you’d end up on the History Channel site, owned by A&E Networks.
Disney is behind very appropriate domains like family.com and kid.com.
Consumer Goods
What happens when you type snacks.com on your browser? You get to PepsiCo’s Frito-Lay website. Contrarily, when you go to salad.com, you will end up in Hidden Valley’s ranch sauce site.
Soup.com is owned by Unilever, as well as sauce.com and eat.com, and Campbell’s has soups.com. Kraft owns pickles.com, jello.com, and dessert.com. Nestle is in possession of a broader word: meals.com.
Alcohol related keywords such as rum.com, scotch.com and malts.com, are all owned by beverage giant DIAGEO.
The domains bleach.com and grease.com are owned by Clorox while Procter & Gamble has clean.com, conditioner.com, laundry.com, nails.com, and toothpaste.com.
Apparel
Tell me what clothing item you are looking for and you will end up on a fairly related website:
- Coat.com is owned by Burlington Coat Factory.
- Shirt.com is owned by Amazon.
- Tux.com is owned by Men’s Wearhouse.
- Shades.com is owned by Sunglass Hut.
- Clothes.com is owned by Zappos.
Other
There are many other premium dictionary word domains owned by big brands that we also wanted to give a shoutout to.
PetSmart owns dogs.com, pet.com and pets.com. OTIS, the elevator company, has elevator.com, escalator.com, and lift.com.
The domain jobs.com is owned by Monster, vacations.com by Travelocity, painting.com by Sherwin Williams, motorcycles.com by Honda, and toys.com by Toys “R” Us.
Final Thoughts
The internet bubble might have burst many years ago now, but the value of dictionary word domain names is still high, and this can be seen beyond the ones owned by big brands.
Domains such as sex.com, beer.com, wine.com, casino.com, diamond.com, have all been sold for millions of dollars. The rationale is simple: common dictionary words are more likely to be typed in a browser.
The rationale is simple: common dictionary words are more likely to be typed in a browser.
And it is true that search engines and social media have now replaced the need to type a URL in a browser – yet websites are not going anywhere
Brands will continue to send people back to their sites. Whether it is to their e-commerce stores, or to their content marketing, or to a specific landing page, this is not changing anytime soon.
So if you are still planning to start your own company, don’t forget that branding is fundamental, and a premium domain will always help you develop your brand. 💸