How to Pick a Domain Name

Discussion in 'Domain Names' started by -Achilles-, Nov 23, 2006.

  1. #1
    From webmaster blog.


    Domain names can be a very important thing in creating your webmaster empire. A domain name will do a lot of things for you, including

    -describe what your company name is
    -give them something to remember
    -keywords for search engines


    There are a few things that you should take into consideration when choosing a domain name, and I'll talk a little bit about a few of them.

    Length

    The shorter the better, still using a good key word that is. Something like www .dkeh.com is hard to remember, and won't do squat for search engines, because nobody searches "dkeh" unless they're looking for drunk kings entering houses (yeah totally random).

    Shorter domain names are harder to come across on your own, because a lot of them have been taken up. A longer one won't hurt you, but you don't want www. visitmysitebecauseitsawesome.com.

    "Stickiness"

    You want to pick a name that will "stick" into someone's mind. You should ask yourself, if someone was walking through their workplace for example, and they see a bulletin with your domain name on it, will they remember the name when they get home later and log onto their computer? ProfitGeek.com is a solid domain name because it's easy for people to remember, because there's a little bit of humor thrown into it, and gets it apart from makemoneybiz.com.

    Key Words

    The domain name is crawled by search engines for it's key words, and may help increase your ranking a tad.

    Extension

    Go for the .com. If you don't put a link up to your site, but write something like "Check out the Profit Geek website for webmaster tips!", and a person is interested enough to go home and check out the site, there's a 95% chance they'll first type www.profitgeek.com. Say you've never been to Google, but your friend tells you "hey check out Google, it's a huge site", you're not going to go home and type in www. google.co.uk.

    Easy to Spell and Understand

    You want a name that you can actually say to people, and they don't have a problem getting to the site. You tell your friend "hey check out Profit Geek.com", they can go home and type in ProfitGeek.com no problem. If you say "hey check out contentiouscurriculum.com", they're going to say "...what?!" You want your domain name so easy to spell, even a cave man could do it (ok there's my Geico plug for the day).

    Descriptive

    Your domain name should be short, but also descriptive. ProfitGeek.com isn't that long of a domain name, but it does a good job of describing a little bit about the site. You can tell it's about money, and some kind of connection to being a nerd. So people connect smart+money=how to make money. Something like www. tbhs.com (The Best Hockey Site) wouldn't be good, because nobody knows what it stands for. Remember not to keep it too long, because something like www. thissiteshowshowtomakemoney.com is terribly long.


    Wrap Up

    Well hopefully you learned a thing or two from this little domain lesson that you can put to use next time you're searching for a name. Just keep it short, simple, descriptive, and you'll be set and on your way to the start of a great site. For any questions visit The Profit Geek forums.
     
    -Achilles-, Nov 23, 2006 IP
    KC TAN likes this.
  2. Freewebspace

    Freewebspace Notable Member

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    #2
    Good post for newbies for how to buy a domain.I appreciate the way ypu have told this information
     
    Freewebspace, Nov 23, 2006 IP
  3. bon300187

    bon300187 Peon

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    #3
    good post, made it alot clearer on ways to tackle the domain name :D
     
    bon300187, Nov 24, 2006 IP
  4. KC TAN

    KC TAN Well-Known Member

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    #4
    Thanks for the article :)

    I would like to add that the number of queries that the keywords in the domain name receives is also important. For example, although kctan.com is short but few people search for this keyword. On the other hand, FreeTemplates.com is a better domain as it receives tons of queries per month :)

    Overture tool can be used to gather these brief statistics (Free):
    http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/
     
    KC TAN, Nov 24, 2006 IP
  5. bentong

    bentong Banned

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    #5
    nice read and a good way to promote your site. ;)
     
    bentong, Nov 24, 2006 IP
  6. mirturk

    mirturk Active Member

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    #6
    Thanks for info.It's ver useful.
     
    mirturk, Nov 25, 2006 IP
  7. Scriptona

    Scriptona Notable Member

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    #7
    Good tips you have there

    there is a tool you can use to get domain suggestions, write a keayword and get the available domain suggestions

    DomainTools.com - Suggestions
     
    Scriptona, Nov 25, 2006 IP
  8. -Achilles-

    -Achilles- Banned

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    #8
    Thanks for the comments :).
     
    -Achilles-, Nov 25, 2006 IP
  9. -Achilles-

    -Achilles- Banned

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    #9

    Just wanted to renforce that Overture is a great tool for picking out keywords. Don't go for the high keywords that get 50,000 hits a day, it'll be too hard to rank high in them. Go for the mid range ones around 7,000 or so hits a day.
     
    -Achilles-, Nov 27, 2006 IP
  10. nada

    nada Well-Known Member

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    #10
    Thank you for these tips. This made me help picking domains.
     
    nada, Nov 28, 2006 IP
  11. asapcorp

    asapcorp Banned

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    #11
    Thanks for the information
     
    asapcorp, Nov 29, 2006 IP
  12. -Achilles-

    -Achilles- Banned

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    #12
    ^^Thanks guys.

    I released another article about Forums in the Marketing forum, check it out.
     
    -Achilles-, Nov 30, 2006 IP