What to Do if Your Name URL on Facebook is Gone – And Why You Don’t Want One

Everyone is talking about it, and in just a couple hours the doors will open and people will start snatching up their Name URL on Facebook.  I think it is a good idea to get yours if you can.  What if you don’t get it? I have some ideas on variations in this post, but more importantly, is this something you should do anyway?  For some, I think it could be a problem.

What to Do if Your Name URL on Facebook is Gone – And Why You Don’t Want One

It happens shortly, and many who read this will be reading well after it has passed us by.  Facebook opens the doors to us common folk to get our own name url on Facebook.  Here’s how you get it, some thoughts on why it might be a bad idea, and a better alternative.

What’s the Deal

A lot of folks are talking about it. At midnight EST (that’s very soon), you will have the opportunity to get a ‘vanity’ name of sorts on Facebook.

It might currently be something like:
www.facebook.com/people/Your-Name/687451358
(not a valid url, so don’t bother clicking)

Doesn’t www.facebook.com/YourName look much better??  And if someone get’s it before you, time to get a little creative… Add a period, a dash, lastname first, put your city in there?  And if you have a Fan page (for you or your company) with over 1000 fans prior to May 31st, 2009, you can get a name URL for them too.

I like this idea, and I think you should pursue it, but I have a problem with it, and you should too.

What’s the Problem with Having Your Name URL on Facebook?

It isn’t a problem strickly for an individual, but for one wanting to use social networking for business it is a problem.

It is a branding problem, it doesn’t brand you or your company first, it brands Facebook.  It is your brand, but as an afterthought of theirs.

An Alternative

Invest $9 here.  And register your own vanity domain for each social site you engage in. Here are some ideas to search for:
YourFirstnameOnFacebook.com
YourCompanyOnFacebook.com (fan pages)
Need more ideas for domain names?  Go here (required PDF reader).

Then, Forward your Domain. Take the domain you just purchased and forward it to any existing webpage you like.   More information on domain forwarding here (it’s easy, really).

Another Alternative

This is most useful for companies.  Create a directory of your main site, naming the directory the same name of the social media site,  and forward to your profile on that site.
Example:
www.MarketingProfessor.com/twitter
www.MarketingProfessor.com/youtube
www.MarketingProfessor.com/facebook
Using a forwarding HTML code.  It is free, learn more how to do that here.

I use Affiliate Ninja for that (and a whole lot of other things), for this purpose it is overkill.  It is not necessary to purchase anything to get this done.  If you want to know more about what Affiliate Ninja does (or can do) a full review of Affiliate Ninja is here.  There are other tools that can get the job done, this happens to be the one I use.

Bottomline on Facebook Name URLs

Don’t stress.  If you get one great, if you don’t (or didn’t), get creative use the ideas I gave you (and that PDF), and hopefully you’ll get a memorable one.  For branding purposes having the ability to rattle off a domain with your name in it, not only makes an impression, but is good branding (and affordable).  In a day of personal branding marketers need to take the steps to stand out from the crowd.  No Facebook Name URL for you?  You got options :-)

It’s Your Turn: Tell me what you think?  What is your take?  If you have a branded domain, please share it below.