According to a post this week on the Demand Media blog, the company just launched a new website called Stronger, which can be found on Stronger.com. The website is “a subscription-based online fitness and nutrition program – that builds on LIVESTRONG.COM’s continued success.”
Off the bat, I found it very interesting that Demand Media chose to make the url part of the Livestrong.com website. When you visit Stronger.com, you are instantly taken to Livestrong.com/Stronger/ instead of a standalone website. The company could have gotten away with branding the new website without the matching domain name, but clearly they were smart enough to get the domain name first since they know many people will automatically type it into their browser.
I did a bit of research to learn more about the domain name, and I did not see a recent sale listing for Stronger.com, so it appears to me that this was a private acquisition. The domain name has been under privacy guard at Moniker since 2oo6. According to a post on Domain Name News, the Stronger.com domain name was sold for $25,000 at the August 2007 Domain Roundtable live auction. As a result of the privacy shield, I do not know who bought the domain name back then.
Based on a historical Whois search from January 1, 2013 in conjunction with a screenshot from January 3, it appears that Stronger.com was parked at Internet Traffic. In April of this year, privacy was briefly removed, and Demand Media was the registrant. Shortly thereafter, the domain name was transfered to eNom, a domain registrar owned by Demand Media.
Even though some people might argue that Demand Media didn’t need to own the Stronger.com domain name to succeed with this new program, they were wise to acquire the descriptive domain name prior to the launch. It’s very likely that it would have driven traffic to the .com, and owning Stronger.com helps protect the new brand. In short, it’s a great tool for marketing and
Demand Media is an intelligent company who uses Demand.com to point traffic to their DemandMedia.com corporate website. Stronger.com is a great domain that will boost traffic to the LiveStrong.com brand.
New outlets use generic names to refer traffic to their main website. For example, Wonderwall.com points to Wonderwall.MSN.com and OMG.com refers a small portion of traffic to OMG.Yahoo.com.
Demand Media understands the value of descriptive and generic domains.
So it’s sort of “owning the whole space” strategy.
I don’t think any online entity can own an entire space. There is always a way to gain entrance. You can refine a space or even create a better way of doing things.