Domain names are now the standard on the web. No respectable company can hope to carve out a niche online without one. For the new comer to the web they can be a little confusing. This article will teach you the basics, covering what domain names are, the different domain name extensions and moving on to how to actually register them. Other articles in this series cover Cybersquatting and providing Domain Name Tips which will help you pick the right domain name.
How do I pick a good domain name?
Beauty is always in the eye of the beholder, well in this case its in the eye of the user. A good domain name should be all of the following:
- Easy to type
- Easy to remember
- Linked in someway to your product
Rule number 3 has its exceptions, for example Google or Yahoo!, these are two names that mean nothing, however through branding theyve come to present "search".
Your domain name must be easy to type, for this reason try and keep it short, complicated words or ones that people find hard to spell will only diminish your traffic, and lets face it, more often than not high traffic = more sales.
Its a well known fact that all the single words in the English dictionary have already been registered as domains, so you're not going to be able to register media.com or newspaper.com, so the next level down is to register a combination of two words for example "hotnews.com" (which is gone!). Sites such as Qnom allow you to enter words and get a whole list of possible combinations!
As well as domain names, you should also consider Internet Keywords, there are plenty more of these free and they can be a good source of traffic, depending of course of what you register.
Internet Keyword Registration
