Little did I realize the number of microbreweries that are sprouting and propagating the Northwest Austin corridor near The Domain.
It wasn’t until my wife and I were most recently invited to attend a graduation party from a person with our church’s community group.
As we drove to the location of the graduation party, I couldn’t help but notice microbreweries lining the streets of Metric over by Metric and Kramer in Northeast Austin.
One after the next, each microbrewery appear to specialize in its own delightful niche of homegrown brew.
When we finally arrived at our destination, 4th Tap Brewing Cooperative, I was kindly greeted with two different domains that had nothing to do with the brewery or party.
In fact, I struggled a bit to understand both domains and their respective uses.
Is it Milk or Trucks?
The first domain, GotTrucks.com, revealed a bit of context. I knew the domain had something to do with trucks in general, but “What about trucks?” was my next question.
It wasn’t until I attempted to visit GotTrucks.com that I discovered it redirecting to TrucksInTexas.com — a San Antonio-based broker of the highest quality of using pickup trucks.
More interesting is the fact that American Auto Brokers has chosen to brand itself using TrucksInTexas.com instead of AmericanAutoBrokers.com — a premium domain listed at GoDaddy for nearly an eye-popping $43K. ?
In addition, I checked domain availability for a few other variations containing “Texas” and “Trucks”, and found the following:
- TexasTrucks.com – redirects to TexasTruckSales.com
- TrucksTexas.com – registered and resolves to parked page with ad links
- TxTrucks.com – registered and not resolving
- TrucksTx.com – registered and resolves to parked page with ad links
- TrucksInTx.com – registered and resolves to a GoDaddy parked page
Even though TrucksInTexas.com is considered a geo service domain and a keyword phrase domain, it’s the perfect brandable domain candidate.
Branding TrucksInTexas.com is certainly clever domain use, seeing the offering and specialty is truck sales based in Texas.
In fact, searching “Trucks in Texas” using Google Trends displays a 5-year chart of moderate to high interest.
Combined with this fact, it’s amazing to discover TrucksInTexas.com ranking in Google’s top position for the term “Trucks in Texas” out of nearly 326 billion results. Truly AMAZING! ?
Who’s Oscar, and Why Should I Say Hi?
A few steps away from discovering GotTrucks.com, my eyes connected with a domain in white text on a banner with a blue background tucked away in what looked to be a storage bay at the end of the building: HiOscar.com.
I was a bit confused as HiOscar.com isn’t descriptive juxtaposed next to GotTrucks.com.
Nevertheless, I discovered HiOscar.com is the digital presence of a New York-based technology-focused health insurance company founded November 2012.
And just in case you’re wondering, Oscar.com redirects to the Academy Awards website — where various category winners are awarded a copy of a gold statuette, officially called the “Academy Award of Merit”, which has become commonly known by its nickname “Oscar”.
Back to the insurance company affectionately named after a co-founder’s grandfather to add a personal connection, HiOscar.com is an interesting choice to brand one’s company and digital presence.
After all, why not use OscarInsurance.com or OscarHealthInsurance.com, right? Both of those seem to make more sense as both are contextually sound.
The good news is the former domain redirects to HiOscar.com while the latter domain is registered, resolving to a parked page with ads displayed on it.
I could also make the case HiOscar.com could stand for Health Insurance Oscar, but that would be a far reaching assumption.
So,we’re left guessing HiOscar.com is a brandable domain that’s inviting and can be used as an interesting conversation starter.
And speaking of conversation starters, I’m missing a good congratulatory speech and toast for our friend’s post graduate milestone.
Gotta run! Cheers and that’s all for now! See you around…
As a domain investor and business consultant, Alvin actively participates in daily domain auctions. Outside of auctions, he passionately shares his views, opinions, and vision for how businesses should and should not use domain names to generate greater customer growth and revenue.
