I'm a 'NOW' person. When I say I'll do something I do it, or if I get excited about something I start working on it immediately. Not tomorrow or next week, but NOW.
Nah, I'm just kidding... but its sounds cool when I say it, doesn't it? I won't lie, I do try, but I still have quite a long way to go when it comes to self mastery and discipline.
One thing I've mastered though, is to cover as much ground whenever I can. I do this for a number of reasons. The first one is that I know I won't always feel fired up. I work in bursts of superhuman energy- so much that at times I amaze myself, but at the same time I also have my off days (not sure what the opposite of superhuman is). So I try to cover as much ground during my ON days. The second reason is that I believe everything happens for a reason. So I take that inspiration and use it as a compass, to guide me towards my dream. While it may not always makes sense most of the time, I believe it will all come full circle at some point. So I take it as my responsibility to act and make sure I position those ends to meet.
Now with that said, I made somewhat of a blunder. As I build my company, one of the things I have to take into consideration is the brand I'm building. That starts with the name of my company. My first App was called the Business Builder- Small Business Management Suite. While I like the name- it doesn't work best when people are searching online. There are multiple other organisations which use "business Builder" in their name or tagline. Plus everyone's talking about business, and the word builder alone is associated more with construction than business.
That's the reason why I set out to come up with a new name for my current app. I wrote hundreds of names on pieces of paper, used online name search tools, and had numerous brainstorming sessions with friends and family. However almost all the good names are taken. Think of any cool name... and I can bet there's a dot com domain already registered with it.
When I say "a cool name," I'm talking of something with about 8 or less characters. Something short, catchy and easy to spell. Think of words like Über, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Oracle, Amazon and so on. My goal was to get something that could match those.
Not sure how, but by some stroke of luck I stumbled on the word Asaqè. I took a Ndebele word Asakhe, which means "let's build" and put my own spin to it. It was short, catchy and I believed it would catch on. So I tried it out on different fonts, created a simple logo and fell even more in love with it. More importantly... I did a search and it was available. No one was using it, save a handful of people on twitter and facebook. That was like 4 months ago. The next logical thing to do would be to register the name right?
Which brings us to my first major mistake. After coming up with the name, I knew very well I was supposed to register it immediately. For some strange reason, I did not. I think part of the reason was that I didn't think it was urgent. The other reason was probably because I figured I could use my $13 for something 'more productive'. Convinced it was available, even without acquiring the domain, I started using the logo and tagging all my pictures with it. I even displayed the unregistered website on my app. Big mistake.
The months went by and everything seemed to be going well, and then this past week I finally decided to officially register the name. I went through the whole process and everything seemed to have gone well... but for some strange reason the registrar took way too long to approve it. So I immediately got in touch with the registrar, and that's when they told me the name was taken. Someone got the name and parked it.
I had searched for the name prior to registering, but my initial search didn't lead to any website... but then after some hours or days I found that the domain had been redirected to some NSFW site. Now I'm stuck with an app, with over a hundred users and its bearing a website linked to some dodgy site. What that means is that for me to acquire the domain name, I need to get in touch with whoever owns it and negotiate to purchase it from them. With a brand already centred around it... how much do you think that would cost me? Domain names can go up to hundreds of thousands of dollars, and in some cases even millions. Even if it were to cost me say a thousand bucks, that's still way more than the 13 bucks I didn't want to spend. Right?
Disheartened, I gathered the family for an emergency brainstorming session. Most African names are either too long, hard to spell or the nice and catchy ones are already taken. Take my name for instance. Most people misspell Likhwa as Likwa. Meaning some people would search and not find the site simply because they left out a single letter.
After hours of brainstorming we came to some conclusion and I eventually decided to register a variation of the same name, slightly longer but with the same meaning. (I was about to write that its still not my first choice but a small part of me thought, that would jinx it or hurt the name's feelings... but hey it is, what it is.)
My most important takeaway from all this, is that the early bird catches the worm. We miss out on so many opportunities when we procrastinate. Foregoing a small $13 dollar expense could cost you thousands more in the future. The second thing I noted was that I'm not as obscure as I think I am. I didn't register the name ages ago because I figured no one would be paying attention. The truth is that they are. So as I posted about my products and software on various platforms, someone decided to either google me and find out more. Then they simply realized that my site wasn't registered and they took advantage. I may be wrong... it could have been just coincidence. After all, there's really nothing new under the sun, but the fact remains- I missed out on a good name.
I'm not bitter though... I actually find it amusing. Actually ridiculous that I spent 4 or so months promoting an unregistered domain. What on earth was I thinking🤦🏻♂️
However, I'm also grateful it happened, because its taught me a lesson and even given me something to write about this week- my first blunder. Which made me think- instead of just talking it, it's time I start living it. I AM A NOW PERSON!!! (From this moment onwards)
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