Choosing a domain name and extension - .com, .net, .org, .mobi,.us, .me, .co.uk, .biz, .info. Which domain name is right for your website? |
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Picking a domain name for your new website can sometimes be the hardest part of the starting your website process. I am very particular when it comes to choosing a domain name. I will spend days brain storming random words related to my websites niche in order to come up with a catchy and unique domain name. It’s not the cost of the domain name that I am worried about, rather how well I can brand the domain name that I want.
I will first start out with the domain name extension. This is VERY important. If you choose the wrong extension, you could end up advertising your competitor instead of your own website. Years ago these two website started - rent.com and rent.net. Both of them completely different companies. Anyway, rent.net spent all this money advertising and trying to brand their domain name yet they still went out of business. The website rent.com reaped all the branding and advertising from rent.net because most people automatically think/remember .com before .net or .org. By rule of thumb, if you want a domain name and the .com is taken but the .net is not, chances are it is not a good idea to go for the .net.
If you are trying to make a country specific website, it is sometimes better to go with that countries tld over the .com. For instance, If I wanted to start a web hosting business in the UK I would want to buy a .co.uk instead of .com. Reason being is search engines rank websites geographically and they use the domain extension to help determine its origin.
Picking a lesser used extension can sometimes create a unique web url. For example the website del.icio.us has become very popular even though it still uses the .us extension. This is because they were able to create a unique web URL that stood out from the rest of the related websites. However, recently del.icio.us purchased delicious.com because it was pretty easy to mess up typing/saying del.icio.us. If you want to take the route of a unique domain name, you should try and get the .com spelling of it if possible.
Coming up with your root domain name
The root part of your domain name would be makingwebsites if your web URL was www.makingwebsites.com. Making a catchy root domain takes a bit of creativity and patients. For me, this is always the most annoying part of starting a new website. Mainly because the first 100 ideas you come up with are bound to be registered already. All I can recommend you do is keep with it until you eventually find something you like.
You should avoid domain names with:
- hyphens in them - www.making-websites.com
- meaningless domain names - www.WoodenWebHosting.com
- Long URLs - www.iliketobuildstartanddesignwebsiteshourly.com
Sometimes it is wise to put the niche of your website in your domain URL. For example, if your website is about ‘blue cars’ you would want to register a domain like www.BlueCarsAreCool.com. Search engines often give a ranking boost to words that are in your domain name.
Keep in mind that you can always change your domain name but…
Whenever you change the domain name of your website you are going to lose all the backlinks you built up over the life of your domain name. It’s almost like starting from ground zero when you change your website URL. If you absolutely need to change it, change it. If you just want to change it because you thought of something cooler, I wouldn’t recommend it.
Posts
Sep 11th, 2008 at 5:14 pm
I spent the better part of a year using a wordpress blog at anotherguy.wordpress.com (now non-existent). It was a good place for me to get an idea on what I wanted to do with my website, and allowed me to really brainstorm about the name. So, I guess I did that part right.
What I did wrong though was register a domain name at co.cc, so when it finally came time for me to have a real domain name, it was anotherguy.co.cc… a free domain registration.
That proved to be problematic and seemed unprofessional to many who saw it. So, after about 4 months of writing for anotherguy.co.cc, I switched over to my current domain; anotherguy.us
Now, when I go to Google and search for my site, I still find results for both anotherguy.wordpress.com and anotherguy.co.cc, both of which are no longer active. I guess I’ve learned the hard way - brainstorm a lot, pick out every detail, and once you go with something try not to look back.
Sep 12th, 2008 at 12:58 am
Good article. Can I get your opinion on this?
i started a web site dedicated to visual poetry. Becaus i was mainly asking filmmaker to produce / visualize poetry I came up with PoetryVisualized.com. However I hear form here and there that it’s to long and hard to spell (typing errors). Now I came up with an additional name which redirects to PoetryVisualiozed.com
polumi = POetryLUMIère
http://www.polumi.com
More detail’s can be read here: http://www.poetryvisualized.com/profile_blogs/Admin/&action=view&id=100
Sep 12th, 2008 at 5:42 pm
Hello,
Here are some alternatives that are unregistered.
POETVIS.com
POETVIZ.com
PoetryVisual.com
Also, a thesaurus is a great way to find alternatives to your words.
I agree that PoetryVisualized.com is a little bit too hard to type out. You would think that people would be able to spell those two words correctly…its just that there is too much opportunity for mis types.
Sep 18th, 2008 at 4:10 am
Great! Thanks.
Do you think it would help much to register all this names:
POETVIS.com
POETVIZ.com
PoetryVisual.com
I have now:
PoetryVisualized.com
and
polumi.com
Is there an advantage in having more sites registered if there is no marketing activity behind them?
Thanks for your feedback
Sep 18th, 2008 at 3:55 pm
It depends. If you were to register poetvis.com, you should probably get poetviz.com, or vice versa.
I own a domain name 0bones.com, so I registered zerobones.com just incase someone thought the 0 was spelled out. It would be helpful to register the alternative in that situation. As far as registering a bunch of domain names, if there is no marketing behind it you will get no benefits. Unless of course you get an expired domain name and it has traffic from its previous owner.
Sep 23rd, 2008 at 12:51 pm
Great article!
I know that from seo point of view .com is the best solution. When people see a name they will write it as .com. or eventualy with their country code.
If come is not avialible try .net or .org, then even .biz or .info. And at the far end there are domains like .tv and stuff.
Oct 15th, 2008 at 5:40 pm
How important is it for the domain name to be your business name?
I have a behavioral coaching practice named “Insight Out Coaching.” http://www.insightoutcoaching.com is taken, but .net is available. I was thinking i could list my domain as http://www.outcomesthroughinsight.com. Even though it is different from my company name, it speaks to the process that I am involved with. Is it too long/cumbersome?
Also, in the case of http://www.insideoutcoaching.com, it is for a soccer coaching site that would not be a competitor. in this case would a .net extension be a good idea?
Next, I like the sound of .biz better than .net. Are there any pros or cons of using one vs. the other?
Thank you in advance for your feedback!
Mar 7th, 2009 at 6:42 am
I would say that it is best to select the trustable domain extensions or which are well-known and have credibility like .com, .net, .biz, .org, .us. Most sites with a .cn contain viruses so that somehow ruins the image of your site as well!
Mar 10th, 2009 at 6:56 am
Naming your site after your domain may seem obvious to some of you, but you’ll be surprised to learn that not every website is named after the domain name even when the webmaster owns that domain name. Naming a site after its domain name is important, for the simple reason that when people think of your website, they’ll think of it by name. If your name is also your URL, they’ll automatically know where to go.I also learned naming the domain frombonus 4 absolute poker