Tips for selecting domain names

Selecting domain names is one of the challenges faced when you build a website.

There has been plenty written about this subject on the Internet already, but here are three simple tips for selecting domain names . . .

It doesn’t matter whether you are building a new website or re-designing an existing website, it is always a good time to consider what the best name to use.

Your business name and variations

The most obvious URL to select is your business name.

e.g. www.HotpinkWebsites.com.au

Many business names are regularly spelled incorrectly.

So it can be a good idea to register domain names for the most common incorrect spellings of your business name and point them to your main website.

You can find this information from Google, because they track and record all domain names and keyword searches.

This will ensure that you capture the traffic for your website that might otherwise go to a Page Not Found, or worse still, that might go to a competitor’s website.

Country specific domains

The country specific domains will always get better results for a local business than the generic .com URL, e.g.

.com.au
.co.nz
.co.uk

You should secure the domain name in every country in which you operate, or intend to operate in the future.

Keyword or promotional domains

A great SEO strategy in the past has been to use domain names based on keywords for your business.

e.g. www.BuildAMoneyMakingWebsite.com.au

Recent changes in the way Google ranks domain names has had some impact on the desirability or necessity for these types of domain names.

However, promotional domain names can have great value purely from a marketing perspective.

For example, if you are running a special promotion or a competition, (e.g. to guess the number of Smarties in a jar), you could set up a page in your website for that purpose.

e.g. www.HotpinkWebsites.com.au/smartiescompetition

Or you could go right ahead and register a new domain name specifically for this purpose.

e.g. www.smartiescompetition.com.au

The main benefit here being that it is much easier for the public to remember the domain name when they see it in your advertising.

The new domain might point to a completely new website, or it might just point to a page on your existing website.

Well, that is quite simple really!

What should you do now?

If you are thinking about a new website, then also consider which domain going to use.
Want some help or ideas? Just contact us at Hotpink Websites now.