Company Name: Weblogs Vs Publishing

[tonyjk3]

I run about five blogs and I will be adding a few more in the next couple months. I run them all in a blog network under My Net Weblogs. I do this so I can consolidate my advertising and such.

Eventually I want to add forums, newsletters and hopefully netcasts - some as part of my blogs and others independent of the blogs. I also may add non-blog web sites as well.

My question is . . . does running my blogs/sites under the My Net Weblogs banner help or hurt my business and its potential. Would it be advisable to run it under a different name to reflect the (eventual) diversity of content? I was thinking My Net Media (but the domain is taken) or My Net Publishing. Obviously with mynetmedia.com being taken that leaves My Net Publishing as the front runner. Would My Net Publishing better represent my content network?

Another thing to think about is the recent shift of companies away from the blogosphere. Syntagma Media has made a huge effort to move away from being a blog network to a web magazine. And more recently b5 media just got funding and in the press release they refer to the company as a "global new media network".

I know this seems trivial since my venture is so young, but I feel branding is very important and I would rather get it in line with my direction now then have to change it half way into the game so to speak.

Any feedback or suggestions would be helpful.

Thank you.

[Chris]

It is an interesting question, how naming your business can affect it's prospects.

Blog isn't as bad as you think, it is a popular buzzword right now and there are existing precedents for the valuation of blog companies (see AOL's purchase of Weblogs Inc).

However we all know blogs are new, publishing websites for profit predates the blog phenomenon. However among laypeople, especially business executives, blogs are better known.

So, if you were hoping for a buyout, I might stick with the "blogs" name.

[tonyjk3]

Thanks Chris, I was hoping you would reply.

I'm not so concerned as with a "buyout" as I am just building the network and the name being reflective of everything the network does/has. We all want to make money, but I'm more concerned with building it into hopefully a viable company. This content network has been a dream of mine since 1998.

I see several companies shying away from blogs and I'm just concerned as this bubble 2.0 builds and eventually bursts, blog may end up as the dirty word of web 2.0, so to speak.

I think maybe blog will fade as the big keyword and start being seen as passe' in the next 2-3 years, thus having a negative effect on the branding of companies with blog in the name. I could just be thinking too much in to this and too much in the future.

The other point that bothered me about sticking with blogs was that I am planning to add forums and newsletters to the network. And hopefully in the future netcasts or vidcasts. Some of the new content may be part of the blogs others may be stand alone forums, etc. So at that point I think my content network grows beyond just blogs - hence publishing being the more appropriate name.

I love the blogosphere and I love the My Net Weblogs name. I just want to make sure I don't handicap the network as it grows into a company/business.

[Chris]

Well for those reasons I'd go with a more open name.

Another good word to use in a name is Interactive.

[tonyjk3]

Yeah I was thinking that too. I own mynetinteractive.com and mynetpublishing.com. I was thinking mynetmedia.com but the domain was taken.

This is a hard decision to make, I just want to set this network on the right path.

Thanks for your advice.

[Westech]

Just a heads up: inetinteractive ( www.inetinteractive.com ) is an established company that owns a portfolio of large forum and other websites. mynetinteractive might sound confusingly similar.

[Cutter]

weblogs could simularly be confused with weblogs inc (http://www.weblogsinc.com/)., even though it is kind of generic.

Two of the largest internet property holders are IAC/InterActiveCorp (http://www.iac.com/) and News Corp/Fox Interactive Media (http://www.newscorp.com/management/fim.html). I think having My in the name would be a bigger hinderance than having or not having blogs in the name.

I would think about the following words: media, interactive, content, net. Depending on the focus of your sites you could also include, b2b, niche, b2c, US, global, Euro, etc.

Using those words you could come up names like this: US Niche Media, Global Content Interactive, Euro Niche Media, etc.

You can always add a wildcard to ensure domain availability. This wildcard can be practically any word that sounds ok and doesn't have a negative connotation. I would consider words that sound more corporate, like Enterprise than edgy like Shark.

Once you can come up with a list of 5 or 6 names, do a trademark search (http://www.uspto.gov/main/trademarks.htm) and eliminate anything questionable.