10 Quick Tips About Choosing the Perfect Domain Name

Choosing a perfect domain name for your business can be challenging. It is not less than to choosing a company name — it requires a lot of research and consideration. You should make sure that your chosen domain name not only fulfills your business needs, but it is also easy to remember and to promote.

In today’s world, a competitive online presence is essential for any business. Your website is the face of your business and a premium domain will boost your web presence as it generates interest and drives traffic to your site.

When do you need a domain name? Well, it can be one of the many circumstances. It could be you’ve decided to start a new brand. It could be an existing brand and you want to re-brand it. It might be one of your clients who wants to put their brand on the internet. Love entrepreneurship? You may have decided to start a new company all the way along. In any of these situations, you’re going to need a domain name to put the website online.

The purpose of writing this post is to help you find the most short, memorable, and vital domain name for your business. Follow the below tips to pick the perfect domain name:

1. Make it Pronounceable

The pronounceable, the better! Pronounceability helps remember and drives more positive associations towards things we can easily say and easily think about. It could be different depending on the language that you’re focusing on and the demographic you’re targeting. It is obvious, if you can’t easily pronounce the name and others are also not able to guess how to say the name, you’re going to lose the fluency & memorability and ultimately the brandability you have created.

Lets have an example of domain name StreetShopB70.com. Although, it is unique and might be good for branding but it is clearly very difficult to pronounce and to recall. When you look at the name, you don’t really get whether it is zero or O at the end. Certainly, it is not going to help you in long run in term of remembrance and brandability.

A domain name – which is pronounceable and easy to type – is essential for your online business success. If you use slang (such as u instead of you or wid instead of with) or words with multiple spellings (express vs xpress), it might be harder for visitors to find your website.

2. Keep it Short but not Shorter

If your domain name is long and complex, you potentially risk traffic leakage due to customers mistyping and misspelling it. The length matters! The fewer the characters a domain name has, the easier it is to pronounce, the easier it is to type, to share on social media platforms, and less chances of getting shortened on social media and in search results.

Therefore, short and simple is the way to go! But too much shorter is not good either. I would prefer to go for something short but meaningful like MyInsurance.com instead of MyInsur.com. With MyInsur, I not only lost the prounceability but also a little bit of memorability as well. It is good for branding but a little awkward.

3. Use Business Keywords

Try to use keywords that describe your business and the services you offer. For instance, if you’re a web design agency, you may want to register WebsiteDesign.com or WebDesign.com. Similarly, TravelInurance.com is something more suitable to any travel insurance company which describes the nature of services they offer.

Include the keywords in domain name that people use when searching for your business products and services.

It also helps improve your search engines visibility and is very easy to rank at top against selected keywords.

4. Target the Local Community

If you are operating a local business, consider including the name of your city, state or town in your domain name to make it easier for local customers to find your shop or company. It will also help them remember. For example, if you own a pizza shop in local town of Vienna, it is more suitable to go for TastyPizzaVienna.com or ViennaTastyPizza.com instead of TastyPizza.com. No doubt, TastyPizza.com is great keyword domain name but too generic for a local Vienna pizza shop.

5. Avoid Numbers & Hyphens

Avoid use of numbers and hyphens in your domain name as much as possible. Numbers and hyphens are often misleading — people who listen the name of your domain may get confused. For example, it is not easier for people to distinguish between numeric (7) or spelled out (seven) if they don’t know the domain name beforehand. Similarly, dashes are also difficult to remember. People usually forget to add the dash or misplace it.

If your desired domain name is already registered, it is better to register another variant of domain name instead of registering with hyphens and numbers. You may even want to go for other extensions like .net or .org etc. if you really need exact keywords domain name.

6. Make it Catchy & Memorable

There are millions of domain names registered already and thousands of new domains are registered daily. With the storm of new gTLDs, the registration has increased many fold. This makes essential to have a catchy and memorable domain name for your business. Once you’ve found the exact domain name or something very near to what you’re looking for, don’t hesitate to share it with your close friends and colleagues to make sure it sounds intuitive and appealing to others.

7. Avoid Trademark Infringement Domain Names

Make sure the domain name – you’ve chosen – is not trademarked, copyrighted or being used by another company or organization. Trademarked domain names are those which are protected by law and are being used by single company or organization exclusively. Registering a similar domain name – which is either exact trademarked keyword or something that can be confused with that trademark – can involve you in a potential lawsuit. It can result in a big legal mess that could cost you money as well as domain name.

8. Go for .COM (But really?)

There is no doubt about .com popularity and accessibility. It is the most recognized and most easily accessible TLD (top-level domain). It’s been around since 31 years (first .com was registered in 1985) and it’s been the first choice for any company or organization. Since it is far most popular, there are millions of websites which are using .com domain name. But this has narrow down the choices to get a short and memorable .com domain name as well.

All the short and single keywords .com domain names are already registered by end users or domain investors — in hope to sell them to end users later on. Acquiring a premium .com domain name from any domain investor can cost you a huge amount of money. Usually, startups have limited budget at the beginning. But if you’ve enough money to get the .com domain name, don’t wait! Go for it.

However, if .com is unavailable or you failed to acquire from existing domain owner, I’d suggest to go with .net, .co, .org or any well known ccTLD. It is very rare all of the major TLDs and ccTLDs are registered for any domain name.  But if so, Hey! Don’t worry! It is 2016! A bunch of new generic top-level domains (gTLDs) – like .design, .tech, .guru, .top – are available for registration. This offers a great opportunity to register short, catchy and highly relevant domain names.

Don’t like gTLDs? Still you’ve got a lot of country code top-level domains (ccTLDs) to choose from. There are few well known ccTLDs like .de in Germany, .ca in Canada, .it in Italy, .fr in France etc. You can opt for any of them.

9. Make it Brandable – Protect & Build Your Brand

What is brandable? Brandable is something which does not sound like a generic or something which can be marketed as individual brand. A brandable domain name sounds like a brand and not generic. Hyphens and numbers can be a real problem in brandability. They make it sound generic or even strange sometimes.

Instead of generic keyword strings, I’d advise to go for short strings which can be easy to remember and can easily be branded. Generic keyword domain names are really difficult to remember.

Moreover, to protect your brand, you should buy various popular domain extensions as well as misspelled versions of your domain name. This keeps away your competitors from registering other versions and ensures that your visitors are directed to your website even if they mistype it.

10. Beware of Promotional Offers

Don’t fall prey to seasonal promotional discounts of domain registrars. Many domain registrars offer overwhelmingly low prices for new registrations especially for new gTLDs just to increase the registration counters. After the promotion ends and when your domain expires, they will bill you with the real price which can range from $50 to $$$$ if the domain is considered premium by the registrars.

Conclusion

Since your domain name is your identity on the web — choose wisely! Above are the few rules which come in handy while making domain name decision. Good domain names sell quickly. Don’t settle, act fast! Grab your memorable and short domain name now from GoDaddy or Domain.com before someone else does. Domain names are inexpensive when they are registered but acquiring a domain name from someone else can cost you a lot.

Keeping in mind these rules, I’d love to hear from all of you about what domain choices you’ve made in comments. If you have any question or concern, feel free to post in comments or write us your query.

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