Does dot com have to be available when picking a name for your new business?

Conventional wisdom says that grabbing the dot com is essential when entrepreneurs start a new business. I’ve long thought this was true. It might have been true once upon a time. I don’t think it’s true any longer.

Lately, I’ve seen and read about a bunch of startups that don’t have the.com. What top level domain are they using? Doesn’t matter. The point is that it’s not .com. Guess what? I haven’t been looking down my nose at them and an increasing number of businesses seem to be getting launched and funded where the business doesn’t have the dot com.

All in all, I’d like to have the dot com. But my oh my, we sure do jump through a bunch of crazy hoops to come up with a name that is available. I’ve decided that I’d rather have a great name than worry about is the .dot com available. I don’t think having dot com is as important as it used to be. More and more people seem to be reaching this some conclusion.

So, I give you permission to start your next biz and pick a name even if the dot com isn’t available.

P.S. How much does a name matter when starting a business? That’s the topic of a future post.