Our Perspective

PremiumBrands.com exists because I care about the name a founder chooses before the first real launch. As its founder, Michael Santiago, I select domains by asking whether I would be willing to build on them myself. Simplistically.com brings that question into a particularly interesting area: making complicated work usable. OnlineBusiness.com is the strategy and development studio behind my broader work, while this collection gives founders a way to acquire names I have selected and have not built on yet.

A decision that stayed with me

I acquired the press release distribution business running on i-Newswire.com in 2007. In 2013, I secured iNewswire.com. Then, after more than a year of negotiation and consultation with SEO professionals, the business moved to Newswire.com in February 2015. That sequence matters to me because choosing the better name was a business decision made while there was already a team, a service and daily work to protect.

On the morning of the change, a prospect told one of the sales agents, “Oh yeah, Newswire.com. I’ve heard of you guys.” That was impossible, but it was the response he gave. I remember it because the business had not become a different operation overnight. The new name gave that first introduction a different starting point. A short, pronounceable, category-defining name gave the work a clearer way to present itself.

In 2022, the business I helped build was acquired by Issuer Direct for about $44 million. Issuer Direct reported the business acquisition and its transaction value. That was a purchase of the business and the team’s work, not a sale price for the domain. That experience made me pay closer attention to the name decision before the next launch.

Choosing before the plan is complete

I bought PremiumBrands.com before I had a plan for it. Premium names mattered to me, and waiting would probably have meant losing the chance to build on that one. By now it could have belonged to someone already using it for a business. That decision is part of why I do not treat a good name as a detail to postpone until every other part of the plan is settled.

The fix-it-later mindset sounds reasonable when a founder has a long launch list. Use something temporary, get going and upgrade after the business has made it. But a later change includes email addresses, proposals, customer instructions and the name people already know. It also depends on the preferred name being available at that point. I would rather consider those changes before the first launch than discover them in the middle of a growing operation.

Why this name interests me

Simplistically.com asks for a founder with a point of view. There is a meaningful distinction between reducing the burden of a task and stripping out information somebody needs. The literal word leans toward oversimplification, which makes the response in the work especially important. For the right founder, that is a useful standard to come back to when deciding what a product shows first, what a service explains and what a lesson leaves for the next page.

That is the kind of standard I would want to make practical in the business. The name can lead a focused offer without describing a narrow feature that the founder will outgrow. It gives a team a shared question when ideas start accumulating: does this addition make the customer’s job clearer? That question has substance in product planning, in service operations and in teaching. It can help a founder explain why one request belongs now and another needs to wait.

AI also interests me because it gives more people a way to try building something useful. A working prototype or a first draft is becoming easier to produce. My view is that this makes a recognizable identity more important to choose with care. The work can change rapidly; the name can remain the place where a founder builds a consistent history. A great name will not save a bad business, and the quality of what gets built remains the real test.

Start with the name you want

If Simplistically.com fits the business you want to build, the next step is a conversation with PremiumBrands.com about acquiring it. If another name is the one you keep coming back to, say so. Helping a founder acquire a name outside the collection is part of the same work. I want that choice to feel considered before it appears on the first proposal, the first product and every introduction that follows. A premium .com is a trust shortcut.