Buying Domain Names - Tips and Guidance

Domain Name Registration - Tips and Guidance

by Chance Hoggan
of http://www.blackberryseo.com/

Last updated: 17 Sep 2007

Know your target audience / visitors and how they might relate to your web site. Choose domain names that you think clearly and concisely express your company (depending on the Impression you are trying to convey about your web site and your company). Think about how you might search for your web site and see how companies in a similar line are using their domain names.

Short domain names are simply more memorable. People may misspell or misstype your domain if it's too long and complicated. Registration of different permutations of the domain name including alternative spellings and common mistakes may catch wayward visitors who have tried an otherwise incorrect spelling of your domain.

The domain name is another great place to use your Keywords if you are pursuing good search rankings. If your domain contains more than one keyword, add a hyphen '-' between the words to make the separation more obvious - it's easier for visitors to remember a domain if they can recognise the individual words which make up the domain. Avoid the use of the underscore '_' character when you consider the search engines. Acronyms are generally not a good idea - particularly if they are complex like xwprn.com - but if they have little meaning as a phrase memorability suffers as does an opportunity for SEO.

if your company name is already well established , then try to make the domain name as similar as possible. Many visitors may try to guess your domain name based on your company name (e.g. www.yourcompanyname.com), and by increasing the possibility of their finding it without having to resort to search engines, you can increase your traffic. Of course, this relates to the last point too; having your company name as your domain name should assist Rankings for that particular phrase.

Try to register domain names with different extensions (e.g. .com and .co.uk). Particularly if you are aiming at a regional audience as well as a global one. If you are a UK based company then a .co.uk domain will give your UK based audience the confidence that they are dealing with a company 'close' to them as well as ensuring International audiences are aware of the fact that you are a UK based company, while a .com will ensure that you will attract casual visitors as much as provide your site with an International profile. With SEO in mind, a .co.uk adds weight to your results for 'pages from the UK'-type searches. Be sure to seek advice about redirection between the domains to be sure that the search engines handle your configuration correctly.

Use strong words in your domain names, words which can represent an idea and can be visualised. You want someone to remember your domains above all others and words like red, hot, etc. can prove to be more memorable than simpler names, but there is the danger of over-doing it and names like easythis.com and easythat.com can become tedious - adding to a negative reflection of your site from the first visit.

The correct domain names are vitally important to your branding and profile on the Internet. Don't overlook the fact that you are likely to use your domain names for email as well as other marketing so you need to be sure that they are memorable.