I came across Enhance.com about two weeks back and immediately stopped scrolling. Not because I knew what the company did , I honestly didn't, but because the domain itself grabbed me. Enhance. Single dictionary word. Strong, positive meaning. The kind of premium domain that makes you wonder: who owns this, and how did they get it?
Turns out it's Adam Smith, co-founder and CEO of the company behind it. Adam built his reputation in the UK hosting industry as a founder of Paragon Internet Group before launching Enhance, which (as I've now learned) helps web hosting companies move away from older systems like cPanel and build modern, scalable hosting platforms. He's using a killer domain to build a real business in a competitive space.
So I reached out. I wanted to know how he ended up with Enhance.com and whether the domain actually mattered in building the company. Because here's the thing, premium domains like this one aren't just nice to have. They're trust signals. They're marketing leverage. They're the kind of assets that can make or break a brand in the early days.
Mike: Let's start with the obvious one: How did you acquire Enhance.com, and what did you pay for it?
Adam: The domain was purchased directly from a private domain investor. I can’t disclose the exact amount but it was a considerable investment. We were fortunate to acquire the .net at roughly the same time.
Mike: Did you consider other names before landing on Enhance, or was this always the one?
Enhance.com was always the one - it’s a dictionary word, it’s phonetic and it encapsulates our mission - to help our hosting partners Enhance their product offering.
Mike: How important has the domain been in building credibility or getting customers?
Adam: Hugely important. We operate all over the world so having a memorable, phonetically spelled domain helps potential customers to find us more easily. Having an obviously “premium” domain helped establish trust with potential partners in the early days of Enhancewhen the product was still unproven.
Mike: If you had to launch this business on EnhanceHosting.com or GetEnhance.io instead, how different would things be?
Adam: In the long term, probably not much different. But we would be taking the risk that a competitor might acquire enhance.com or enhance.net.
Mike: When you started Enhance, what scared you the most?
Adam: Honestly there was no fear. I have an amazing co-founder, wonderful investors, an excellent team and a clear mission.
Sully's Note: Hey, I'm days away from launching my new monthly newsletter. If you want what no one else is learning about domains, then sign up now.
Mike: What's the hardest part of competing against cPanel and Plesk when they've been around forever?
Adam: The biggest challenge for Enhance is helping our larger partners to mass migrate from legacy panels. Where a hosting company is forcing customers to migrate, the process has to be perfectly seamless. Any attrition due to the migration would wipe out the cost savings instantly.
Mike: What feature or capability are you most proud of that your competitors don't have?
Adam: Enhance has clustering - you can choose to run Enhancemonolithically like the legacy panels or you can build a multi server cluster of almost limitless size behind a single control panel, migrating websites/emails between the servers at will.
Enhance also integrates advanced containerisation and hard resource limiting so you don’t need expensive 3rd party addons to achieve this functionality.
Mike: How important is branding in a technical, B2B industry like hosting?
Adam: It’s of much lesser importance than it would be to a B2C, especially at the stage we are at now. Everyone in the industry knows about Enhance, the only question is whether or not to make the switch.
Mike: What advice would you give to someone trying to build a tech company in a crowded market?
Adam: You don’t need to reinvent the wheel to enter a crowded market, you just need to be better or cheaper than your competitors - ideally both.
Mike: Is there a book, video, or conversation that you've had that you feel has had a major impact on you as an entrepreneur and leader? Can you share the details?
Adam:
Honestly I don’t think I’ve ever read a book on leadership or entrepreneurship, my reading genres lean more towards history, sci-fi or fantasy. My biggest source of inspiration has always been my business partners and co-founders.