emailiconHave you ever went to sign up for an email service like Gmail, Yahoo!, or Hotmail only to find that your name or desired name is taken?

It happens all the time, you type in “johndoe” for the username and to no suprise you get a message stating “This email address is already taken, but might we suggest johndoe556984?”

Not very descriptive, professional, or easy to remember, but what are the options?

Many people go the non-sensical “Web 2.0″ route and just make something up like jettbird@… or Inix@… But then again, you might as well just be another number at that point.

So, what are your options at that point?

What a lot of people don’t realize is that most email providers will allow certain characters within the email address.  The most comon of which are the period, dash, and underscore.

So, let’s look at a few examples of what you can come up with, that might be a little more descriptive… and chances are available.  Many of which can be descriptive and often creative… something that can get you noticed.

Here are a few examples:

Prefixes

  • mr.johndoe@
  • mrs.janedoe@
  • ms.janedoe@
  • miss.janedoe@
  • dr.janedoe@
  • sir.johndoe@
  • rev.johndoe@
  • prof.janedoe@
  • capt.johndoe@
  • lt.johndoe@

Suffixes

  • johndoe.sr@
  • johndoe.jr@
  • johndoe.iii@
  • johndoe.3rd@
  • johndoe.2nd@

Degrees

  • janedoe.md@
  • johndoe.phd@
  • johndoe.dds@
  • janedoe.dvm@
  • johndoe.jd@

SplitNames

  • jane.doe@
  • john.c.doe@
  • jane.doe-buck@
  • john-doe@
  • jane_doe@

Creative

  • hello.john@
  • i.am.jane@
  • john.am.i@
  • the.johndoe@
  • hello…johndoe@
  • j.o.h.n@

These are obviously just a few of the options, but ones that many people don’t think about for email names… I bet if you give it a shot, they might be available… Unless of course your name is John or Jane Doe.

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