I was doing a little digging today about recent product unveils and I wanted to see how many of the companies purchased the matching .com domain name to the products name before launching.

As many of us know, for whatever reason many companies big and small launch products nearly everyday but miss the vital fact that it is very important to own the matching .com domain name of the product due to the amount of people searching for this now vital keyword on the net. Many consumers just assume the company owns the exact match name of the product in a .com and simply visit it (Direct Navigation).

Not owning the exact match .com domain name often leads into missed customers and not owning the domain before launching often leads into a more expensive purchase down the road once this mistake is brought to light and the domain finally purchased.

Here are some recent stories that I found of new product launches and if the company owns the matching .com domain name or not:

~ GE unveils a new hand held ultrasound machine that looks like a flip phone and iPod all mixed into one. It is a great looking little device that will likely be a hit. GE has named this new ultrasound machine Vscan. Vscan.com is NOT currently owned by GE and is a virus scan type site.

~ Barnes & Noble unveils it’s new electronic book reader to fight against Amazons Kindle. B&N has named their electronic book, Nook. B&N gets Props for owning the exact match product name Nook.com!

~ Apple unveils a new stylish and functional computer mouse called Magic Mouse that functions very similar to it’s touchpad. The mouse has no buttons or scroll wheel and functions based on your touch on the mouse as you normally would, just without the buttons. Pretty slick. MagicMouse.com is NOT owned by Apple and is currently owned by Magic Mouse Productions.

~ Toyota unveils a new hybrid sedan called Sai. This is the second hybrid model Toyota has launched since it’s popular Prius hybrid model. Sai.com is NOT owned by Toyota and is currently owned by Dendrite International Inc. Toyota does own and uses Prius.com .

Another Toyota launch is of a Super Car made by Lexus with the car name being LFA . Only 500 of these cars will be sold and hold a price tag of $375,000. LFA.com is NOT owned by Toyota but it can be by you! LFA.com is currently on a No Reserve Auction!

~ The Kia motor company unveils it’s newest sedan to be launched called the Cadenza. This entry level luxury sedan will be replacing the Amanti. Kia does NOT own Cadenza.com and is currently owned by a David Fulton according to whois.

I think it is pretty clear with just the couple examples above that I posted, that many companies fail when it comes to owning the exact match domain name before launching their product. Another thing that I saw while researching for this, are a lot of companies use "silly" names for their products that people will likely not remember anyway.

Well, if you really call them names that is. They are more like product codes and often look like the XZ12-HD or the PP96TR. Some of these terms become easy to remember like the PS3 but often times it makes it a nightmare for consumers to find the product or even remember the name given!

Personally, I like a Name to make sense and not be like a secret code.

It is always nice when companies like Barnes & Noble understand the power of a domain name and own the matching one to their product like the Nook! This can greatly help with branding efforts as well, advertising makes more sense seeing the Nook and then providing customers with Nook.com to easily find it and purchase it all in one place!