Buy URLs you want to use AND ones you don’t want your opponent to use against you. Buy theirs too!

Summary: <br> Here’s today’s tip: Buy URLs you want to use AND ones you don’t want your opponent to use against you. Buy theirs too!<br> I bought RazShafer.com when I was about 18 years old and that started a URL buying binge. As the internet was coming of age and I learned more about search engine optimization, it became clear to me that having the right URL is important to someone’s ability to find you online. <br> That idea is important enough if you’re talking about your personal website or small business, but in politics it’s critical. Hard to remember URLs that are made of slogans or hard to remember aren’t going to get the organic traffic that you want. You want someone to hear your web address and remember it so they can check you out later. Repetition is key (think about the way Ted Cruz would say his website name three times whenever he mentioned it) but the name itself should be easy. <br> When I started training candidates, buying the URL that corresponded to their name was always one of my first recommendations. We’re talking about online real estate so buying it before someone else sees value is important.<br> Not only have I bought <a href="https://wiseintro.co/razshafer" target="_blank" rel="noopener">RazShafer.com</a>, <a href="https://wiseintro.co/razshafer" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Raz.us</a> and a bunch of other variations of my name so that I could potentially use them, but I also don’t want anybody else to use them against me. The cost isn’t significant, especially when weighed against the potential harm to NOT having control over them. <br> On the other side, I buy URLs that I don’t want my opponents to use. Once, a few years ago, someone who was considering a campaign against a friend of mine mentioned his intentions to me, without knowing how close I was with his potential opponent. Before I was even to my car in the parking lot, I was on the GoDaddy app, checking to see if he owned his URL. As it turned out, the .com variant of his name was available, so I bought it for a couple bucks. While he didn’t end up running against my friend, if he had, we would have used that website quite powerfully. <br> There are a lot of different top-level-domains out there to consider. .com, .us, .net, .org etc. Getting your name as a .com is arguably your best bet, but this can be difficult for the John Smiths of the world. I highly recommend checking out the .vote suffix. It’s specifically connected to the idea of an election and is a relatively unique way to market your campaign. I bought Raz.vote as soon as the new top-level domain was announced. <br> Websites are real estate, and as in war, you want to take the high-ground. Buy the URLs you might want to use AND those you’d like to deny your opponents. <br> To find out more about what it takes to win a political campaign, go to <a href="http://mycampaigncoach.com/">MyCampaignCoach.com</a>. You can also check out our interviews with Candidates, Elected Officials, Consultants and Campaign Staff on the How to Run for Office Podcast! On Facebook, you can find our campaign mastermind group by searching for the <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/MCCmastermind/">Elite Campaign Mastermind</a> and our page under <a href="https://www.facebook.com/mycampaigncoach/">My Campaign Coach</a>. If you want to help support our efforts, you can do that with <a href="https://www.patreon.com/mycampaigncoach">financial support</a> via Patreon.com/mycampaigncoach or by giving us a nice rating on <a href="https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/my-campaign-coach/id1172865710?ls=1">iTunes</a>!<br> <br> Here’s today’s tip: Buy URLs you want to use AND ones you don’t want your opponent to use against you. Buy theirs too!<br> I bought RazShafer.com when I was about 18 years old and that started a URL buying binge. As the internet was coming of age and I learned more about search engine optimization, it became clear to me that having the right URL is important to some...