Domain Name - How To Pick One
Picking a domain name should be easy, right? Why, I'll just use my
business name. Not so fast, Sparky. A good bit of thought should be
given to selecting a domain name.
[b]A Cautionary Note[/b]
Picking a domain name is like getting married. You are going to have
to stick with it till the bitter end. People that use your site will
come to know it by the domain name. Repeat visitors will often simply
type in the domain name to get to the site, better known as "type in
traffic". As an example, do you search for "Amazon" when you want to
buy a book or do simply type in amazon.com? If Amazon were to change
its domain name to Desert, there would be a lot of confusion. The same
goes with your domain. Once you pick something, stick with it.
Your Choices
Well, the obvious choice is your business name, but it may not be the
best. There are four significant issues to consider.
First, is there something about your business name that makes using it
as a domain an unwise choice? This situation typically arises if you
have a long business name or have plural words. "Halstatt's Rip'n
Marketing Campaigns, Inc." is going to be a horrible domain name.
Clients are going to find it difficult to type in such a domain name.
Double letter problems are a second issue that is entirely unique to
the Internet. What if Sams Salon wants to use its business name as a
domain? The "s" at the end of first word and beginning of the second
can cause confusion. Is the domain name Samssalon.com or Samsalon.com?
Confusing your users is a bad way to run a site.
The third issue concerns the nature of your site and search engine
optimization. If you are shooting for a particular keyword phrase, you
may be better off using that keyword phrase in your domain name.
Google, for instance, looks at the domain name when evaluating a site.
If the words in your domain name are spaced with dashes, many believe
it will help in the ranking process. This is why you see so many xxx-
xxxx-xxx.com domain names on the net. If your business focuses on a
very specific area, strong consideration should be given to using
relevant keywords in your domain name.
Finally, your domain name should end in ".com" and I don't want to
hear any argument or see any rolling of the eyes. The simple fact is
that when people think of sites, they always type in .com. Yes, there
are other extensions and .us, .net, .biz, etc., may seem unique, but
it kills your traffic. Pavlov and his dog experiments had it right.
People have been mentally conditioned to type in .com. Sometimes, it
isn't a bad idea to register several similar domain names. If you have
"yourname.com", register "yourname.net" so no one else takes it. You
can register your full company name and a shorter, easier to remember
version. Some people even register common misspellings of their
company's name. (You don't need a separate Web page for each. Several
domains can point to the same Website.)
Visit for further info: http://www.domain-name-register-store.com
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