This Monday, we are expected to witness a total solar eclipse – the last eclipse until 2044 that will be visible from the continental United States. I am headed up to Maine with friends for a day of skiing and an eclipse watch party at Sunday River.
To safely view the eclipse, I am going to buy a pair of eclipse glasses. I took a quick look at Amazon, and there are a ton of brands I’d never heard of, including a couple I couldn’t even pronounce (YDKOJGW, for example). In addition to the plethora of brands, it isn’t easy to know if the glasses are going to be protective. If I buy a pair of glasses that doesn’t protect my eyes, what is the point of even buying them?
A bit of research led me to the American Astronomical Society website, which published a list of US-based suppliers of eclipse glasses. One company on the list stood out to me because of the domain name they chose for marketing.
A company called American Paper Optics – which I hadn’t heard of before – uses the generic EclipseGlasses.com domain name for its website. This is smart.
Not only does EclipseGlasses.com sound like the authority for eclipse glasses, but the website also ranks well in Google. It sits just below Amazon on Google’s search result page for eclipse glasses. The company uses EclipsesGlasses.com as its brand name for this type of glasses rather than as a forwarder or redirect.
I think this is a case where a generic term can be very helpful. As far as I am aware, there isn’t a leading brand name in the eclipse glasses business, so people are more apt to search for the generic term than for a specific brand name. My personal feeling is that EclipseGlasses.com sounds like a more trusted brand name than American Paper Optics.
I suspect this descriptive domain name being used as a marketing brand is driving substantial revenue for this company. The only downside is that this a time limited event that happens infrequently.
