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Franchisors, Don’t Pull a Jeb Bush and Let Trump Get Your Website
JebBush.com redirects viewers to Donald Trump's website, and it's reminding business owners and politicians alike to register their domain names.
Let this be a lesson, franchisors—don’t forget to register or renew your website’s domain.
It appears that Jeb Bush’s campaign never bothered to register JebBush.com. Fortunately, for the first several months of the campaign, that never seemed to matter—the domain was left benevolently blank, and Jeb2016.com was being used instead.
But sometime last fall, someone appears to have noticed the perfect opportunity to pull a prank. So they swooped in, made a bid and scooped up the domain. Now, if you try typing “JebBush.com” into your URL field, you’ll see a pretty jarring result—it takes you straight to the Republican frontrunner Donald Trump’s website. To dispel speculation, Trump campaign spokeswoman Hope Hicks said that their team is not involved in the redirect, and the actual owner of the domain is unknown, utilizing a privacy domain service to stay unlisted.
How, after immigration reform activists snapped up TedCruz.com and CarlyFiorina.org became a testament to the layoffs Fiorina ordered at Hewlett-Packard, could Bush’s people not lock up JebBush.com? The world may never know. But if there’s any takeaway from this digital misdirection, it’s this—whether you’re a business owner or a politician, make sure you own the rights to domains that carry your name. Otherwise, you might get Trumped.
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About the Author
Nick Powills
FollowNick Powills, CFE, founded No Limit Agency in 2008 and serves as Chief Brand Strategist for the Chicago-based firm. No Limit is a full-service communications agency that establishes and elevates brands by bridging Public Relations, Social Media, Marketing, Advertising, Digital, and a lot of creativity, to best strategize well-rounded and successful campaigns for 50+ global franchise brands. By presenting visionary ideas and building real relationships, No Limit is able to create effective media branding strategies to help companies grow. Nick currently leads a staff of writers, media strategists, designers, social media experts and digital producers in an office think-tank where brands are humanized for strong, compelling media stories. Prior to starting No Limit at the age of 27, Nick spent four years working at a franchise PR agency where he mastered the art of building rapport with media outlets and creating newsworthy pitches for earned media placements. He holds a Bachelor of Journalism from Drake University in Iowa.
