Choosing a website name for guys with long names?

So I'm in a dilemma. I have a 14 character name (first + last) so making a website like firstlastphoto.com is out of the question. Guys with long names - what do you do? I don't run a business but I'm thinking of coming up with something *not* cheesy..? Something like redringphoto or something?

Thoughts?

I used my initials.

Cameron N VanAusdal Studios.com was too long to your point. So I just shortened it up to cnvstudios.com. So far it has worked well. It's not the best name in the world but it works.

My two cents.

I started as MJPhotos, using my initials as using my full name seemed weird, but wasn't happy so changed to a longer and my actual name (mikejanesphotography - 20 characters) and haven't had a problem since. Don't worry about how long it is and worry more about how memorable it is - you make a name for yourself and it's not a problem. Is just your given name available? There is a guy using just my name (and his) for his site and have had people tell me they visited his site by accident, so maybe that's an option. If you choose another name make sure it's one you would want to run a business under, just in case you do want to take this full time some day.

I ran into this a few months ago. My full name was taken (by another photographer, lol) so I went with photosbyX.net (.com was also taken) and used my first initial for X.

I wanted to use my name so I chose to use Mike instead of Michael ( Mike Rubin Photography) and for my web address I use MikeRubinPhoto.com just to shorten up the name a bit more and ended up with 14 letters instead of 23

lol office space trumps all

gravy graffix wrote in post #7012639
lol office space trumps all

Haha love that.

Well there really is no short name for me: Darshan Shankar. ...I don't want to use nicknames, and my initials would be DS Photography which doesn't seem very powerful/good either...

Why not Darshan Photography?

do you have a nick name that people know you by? I use jrob and my name is Jim Robinson. It has worked for me and since there are already people who know me by that it helps out. The other thing is that even if the nickname is a funny one like "Tiny" or "the king" you can still implement it into your web site name. But I guess you shouldn't use names like "boogerhead" or "fishface" if you were lucky enough to have a nickname like that although I wouldn't completely toss those out because their is always a way to put a spin on a name. I have a client that uses his dog's name as his business name and it works great. just my .02

wetclay wrote in post #7014540
But I guess you shouldn't use names like "boogerhead" or "fishface" if you were lucky enough to have a nickname like that although I wouldn't completely toss those out because their is always a way to put a spin on a name.

+1.

I'm googling boogerheadphoto.com now... (j/k)

Darshan, You have a lot of choices. And depending on your target market, you might try (admittedly, I haven't checked if these are available or not, but here goes anyways)...

ShankarPhoto.com
ShankarPhotography.com
DarshanFoto.com
PixByDarshan.com
DShankarPhoto.com
... keep going. you'll find one that sticks.

Do you have a middle name? (e.g. if your name was Darshan Robert Shankar, you could go with DarshanRobertPhoto.com for example)

Good luck, and do let us know what you end up with.

Greg Petliski = Greg P = G! on my business card. Hopefully Gphoto.com or Gphotography.com opens up lol.

amccomis wrote in post #7015563
+1.

I'm googling boogerheadphoto.com now... (j/k)

Darshan, You have a lot of choices. And depending on your target market, you might try (admittedly, I haven't checked if these are available or not, but here goes anyways)...

ShankarPhoto.com
ShankarPhotography.com
DarshanFoto.com
PixByDarshan.com
DShankarPhoto.com
... keep going. you'll find one that sticks.

Do you have a middle name? (e.g. if your name was Darshan Robert Shankar, you could go with DarshanRobertPhoto.com for example)

Good luck, and do let us know what you end up with.

I'm targeting senior port/family candid/wedding type clients. I don't want to use abbrevs like Pix and Foto so I'm considering DSStudios.com or DSPhotography.com?

I have 13 letters for my first and last name, so when I did my website I came up with something short and easy to remember (see signature). If I added "photography" to the end of my name that 11 more letters for a total of 24.

Part of the reason its not my name is because when I started it I was shooting with a friend of mine and that was the "business" (<--read a couple of guys shooting on the side in addition to or non-photography day jobs) name at the time, but when we stopped shooting together I kept the website and domain name (I registered the domain, paid for the hosting, and maintained the website). The reasoning behind using what we did at the time was because we shot a lot of youth sports so it also described what we did.

The point is that its easy to remember even though its only 1 letter less that if I did my first and last name and its easier to spell which is the really important part.

but why photography? Yeah, it's cool when it's BobRockPhotography, but with a longer name I would simply use DarshanShankar.com and never think about it again...

you can still put photography in the page title and get google to find you

I'm having a similar problem and have pretty much decided on bornacavrag.com, but I'm going to put Borna Cavrag Photography on all the banners, business cards, page titles and so on... when thinking about web-domains, less is more

www.shankar.com is available (depending on how much the holding company wants for is of course!)