As a domain collector and cultivator of world wide web addresses that are fun to say, I have a different love for (what I call the original NFT) the most popular digital asset, uniform resource locators. When you register a domain, even the registration service suggests that you can register several domains to secure that no one else has access to own your idea or identity, and that only you can own the dot com, dot net, dot org etc. Knowing that building a website for every URL as the same is not a good idea and goes against major SEO and search engine ranking best practices. And so for these provisional domains, I simply set as a redirected web address, that points to relevant web pages. But more recently I’ve noticed that social media and some website services are frowning on using these redirected URLs, and I don’t think thats cool.

We’ve had social media platforms reject our paid advertisements, and even noticed organic placements decline when using these relevant redirected domains. For example, using WorkAtCapers.com as a redirector to the ‘Jobs’ page on CapersEatAndDrink.com. Another example was during the pandemic using FRKtogo.com to help guests quickly find EatOystersAtForthright.com for takeout. But in both examples, our ads were rejected and we experience lower than normal traction organically. Not cool considering the URLs were memorable and relevant.

I know this article won’t help social media platforms change their ways, but I think its important to talk about with the coming of so many other dot things (like dot cool and dot life and dot club). Sure, someone most likely ruined it for all of us by trying something sneaky or devious, but I believe a round of vetting would help qualify the use of these redirected web domains.

And when I open the article saying that I love URLs that are fun to say, its because one of the URLs I registered is ADabLDoYa.com, to now own fun domains like TimeToGet.money or TheKnockOn.com, along with useful URLs like WeCanBuildYouA.website or TheRight.solutions. But sometimes I’ll get crazy ideas and register fun names like YouCanFindMeIn.club or ThatsHella.cool which I redirect to my friends platforms just for fun.

URLs are fun, and when used properly, can be super useful. So when social media and some website services penalize us for using them, it makes no sense. And as one of my old friends Chris Dobie would say…’Don’t hate. Congratulate.’

Written by Carl Foisy