Domain names are relatively straightforward! Or at least that’s the theory!!

The domain name is also, but technically not quiet correct, known as the website address.

Using an ISP’s domain name can look amateurish in an e-mail addresses, it is much more so with websites, giving the impression of hanging on another’s coat tails. The only exception being when a firm wants to re-inforce a local or professional affiliation by appearing as part of an existing site dedicated to a region or association. Even in such cases autonomy and continuity are better assured by having one’s own domain and merely using a page on the third party’s site to point users toward it.

Domains are classified according to their endings or “suffixes”. As a commercial organisation a company will almost certainly want a domain ending in .com or .co.uk. Other endings such as .biz and .ltd.uk are at least to date, insufficiently familiar to users, meaning the name can be too readily misremembered. Of the two desirable suffixes, .com is preferable for business with international activities, and arguably gives the impression of a bigger organisation, whilst .co.uk helps reassure users on the largely American-dominated web that they are indeed dealing with a UK firm.

The part of the domain name before the suffix will usually by the firms trading name, provided of course that the domain name has not already been registered, (which is increasingly likely these days). If the name is very long an abbreviation may be considered. Domain names are not case sensitive.

The actual registration of a domain name is a straightforward process that can be done online, either through your ISP or better still through a dedicated registration service company such as Discount Domains Ltd (http://www.discountdomainsuk.com). Renewal fees must be paid, typically every two years.

Checking if a domain name is freely available is very straightforward as most domain registration services provide a WHOIS service, as the name suggest, this checks the ownership details of a domain, note however that such services normally run 48 hours behind actual registrations.

Moving ISP’s can save money, however it may take time and incur extra charges. Pricing in the domain name registration industry have fallen considerably over recent years and a domain name typically now costs from $15 for two years registration.

Once your domain name is registered, you can either leave the domain name “parked” awaiting future use, or point it at a website, this is usually achieved by changing the Domain Name Server, or DNS settings on the domain to point at hosting company where your website is located. Almost all registration services offer a free user control panel to change these settings.

Web hosting is the provision of space on a web server to publish a web site. There are numerous hosting companies in the market, and most domain registration services also offer a hosting solution. Prices vary but $100 per annum should be sufficient for most business needs.

(C) Clare Lawrence 11th May 2004

About The Author

Clare Lawrence is CEO of Discount Domains Ltd – A leading UK provider of Domain name registration and Web Hosting services. Please feel free to re-publish this article provided this reference box remains together with a hyperlink to http://www.discountdomainsuk.com Clare can also be contacted on clare@discountdomainsuk.com.

In this article we will cover the basics of what a domain name is, how they work and why you need to have at least one. I am going to try and avoid complicated computer terms and stick to explanations that should be easily understood by someone without a computer science degree.

What is a Domain Name? Before we can go into what a domain name is I’m going to tell you why we need them as the answers compliment each other. The Internet is just a really big collection of connected computers (a network). For the purpose of explaining domain names you can think of the Internet a bit like the phone system and just like the phone system every computer on the Internet has it’s own phone number except an Internet phone number is called an IP addresses. This address is made up of up to 12 digits in the form 123.123.123.123, computers use these IP addresses to send information to each other over the Internet.

When the Internet was first created it quickly became clear that these IP addresses were not easy to remember and another method was need to make these addresses more human friendly. The solution to this was the Domain Name System (DNS). Basically the DNS is a really really big phone book for computers. When you type a web site address into your web browser it checks the DNS for that website name and finds the IP address. Once it has the IP address it can then send a message to that computer and ask it for the web page you wanted.

Ok so you know a domain name is part of a web site address but which part? Lets look at a website address so we can identify and discuss what bit of it is a domain name.

http://www.itxcel.com/index.html

The above address is the home page of the itXcel web site. It can be split into 3 main parts. The first part is http:// this just tells your web browser what kind of information it is going to get and how to get it. The last part is /index.html this is name of the files on the remote computer that you want your browser to get. The bit in the middle www.itxcel.com is a domain name. This is the name that your computer sends to the DNS to get back the IP address.

So you know what a domain name is and that there is a phone book called the DNS to change your easy to remember domain name into an IP address that you computer can understand. The Internet phone book (DNS) is special in that everyone on the Internet needs to be able to use it. This makes the DNS very very big (100+ million addresses big). Due to the size of this phone book it needed to have a carefully organised and managed structure.

Domain names themselves are split into different levels like a hierarchy. The DNS system uses this hierarchy to search the DNS for the IP address of the domain name it is trying to find. The last bit of a domain, in the previous example the com part is called the top level domain. There are a large selection of top level domains like com, net, org and info. There are also very similar endings called country level domains like uk and de. Each of the top level and country level domains are managed by a different organization, sometimes these are companies or non profit organizations and sometimes governments. In the domain business these organisations are referred to as the registries. Each registry looks after it’s own part of the domain name system.

If you decide you want to use a domain name in the top level domain com, like mycompany.com you would have to have this name assigned by the registry that manages that top level domain (for .com a US company called VeriSign). The process of being assigned a domain name is called domain registration.

Domain registration is more like a lease than a purchase. You are renting the second level domain (the mycompany bit) from Verisign for a specific amount of time normally between 1 and 10 years at a time. Most of the organizations that allow you to register a second level domain charge a fee for each year that you register the domain for. With almost all domain names you are also given the option to renew your registration (lease) when it is close to running out (expiring).

Once you have registered a second level domain you are free to create as many third level domains (sometimes called sub domains) as you like. In our previous example the www is a sub domain of itxcel.com.

Most of the registries that manage these top level domain names do not allow individuals or businesses to register domains directly with them. To register a domain you need to use a company like itXcel. We act as a registrar and send all the required information and the registration fee to the registry. Registrars are useful as they hide the differences that exist in each of the registries from the customer and provide a simple step by step process for registering a domain. A registrar also allows you to manage and track all your domains from one place rather than having to deal with a different company for each top level domain.

OK so I know what a domain name is, Why do need one? Can you image what a nightmare it would be if you had an email address like myname@123.246.128.255 or a web site address http://123.246.128.255/? These addresses are possible but not very easy to remember. Now if you register a domain name you could create an email address like myname@mycompany.com and a web site address like mycompany.com. These are much easier to remember and look 100 times more professional.

One of the important points about registering a domain is that once done you have an exclusive right to use that domain for as long as you keep the domain registered in your name. If you do not renew a domain at the end of it’s registration period it will again become available for registration by someone else. For this reason even if you don’t want or need a web site at the moment, it’s still a good idea to register a domain as soon as possible. Just imagine if your competition registered the domain name of your company or product. Although there is a process in place to retrieve these domain it can be long and complicated. It is definitely simpler to spend a little money up front to secure your chosen domain names.

About The Author

Ewan Bain is the general manager at itXcel Internet Limited - Based in the UK itXcel provide Internet services, including domain name registration and web site hosting to small to medium sized businesses and home users.

To find out what domains are available and to quickly and cheaply register them visit http://www.itxcel.com now and enter your desired name in the domain search box.

For further information please visit our website.

The domain name is one of the most important decisions you will make when trying to win over the search engine dilemma. Try using at least one of your best keywords within your domain name.

The search engine and the directories give higher preference when your domain name is relevant to your site content or theme.

Let me give you an example of three different ways you could look at your domain name and how the major search engines will view them for indexing.

www.trafficnmore.com

www.trafficNmore.com

www.traffic-N-more.com

Which one would you have chosen?

www.trafficNmore.com, Right!

The search engines may not necessarily see it that way.

Even though trafficNmore.com is easily understood by the eye of the visitor, the search engine will not see the difference between trafficnmore.com and trafficNmore.com.

Both are good ranking for a site dealing with traffic issues.Even though you have the approval of your visitor looking for your information, you could get a higher ranking with the search engines by using www.traffic-N-more.com and still keep the eye appeal for your visitor.

Here is why.

The hyphen breaks up a longer domain name to reveal the major keywords that describe your website content or theme. This makes it easier for the visitor to understand and most importantly allows the search engine to detect your keyword for indexing right off the bat. Cool, huh?

Moral of the story, give your visitor a break, be nice to the search engines and they’ll be nice to you and give you lots of reoccurring traffic for free.

Debra Gravelle
Free Traffic. Free Download.
http://www.traffic-n-more.com/toolbox.htm
admin@traffic-n-more.com

About The Author

Debra Gravelle has been a business consultant and planner for 22 years.

As the editor of DomainNameWire.com, I’m frequently e-mailed by people asking for domain name advice. Specifically, what should they look for when registering a domain name for their company? This may be basic for some of you, but I hope some of my readers gain value from this.

Let me start with the things to avoid when registering a domain name that will be used for your main company web site.

1. Never use a hyphen. If your domain is some-name.com, many people will forget the hyphen when typing your name into the browser or sending e-mail to you. This can result in lost business.

2. Avoid digits if possible. Using digits requires you to spell the domain name out to people. For example2.com, you need to tell people it’s the digit “2” rather than the word “two” or even “to”.

Here are the positive things to look for in a domain name.

1. .Com extension. It’s imperative that your domain name be available with a .com extension. I’ve seen businesses and major web sites try to get away with .net or .org, and perhaps half of their intended visitors land on someone else’s web site. Or worse, confidential e-mails are sent to the wrong domain.

2. Easy to spell. Keep in mind that your spelling might be better than most people!

3. Short. Try to keep it to 2 words, 3 maximum and 20 characters or fewer.

These are general guidelines applicable to your main company domain name. There are instances where hyphens, numbers, and non-.com domain extensions are fine for secondary sites and search engine-optimized sites. But your company’s main domain should follow these general guidelines. Good luck!

Andrew Allemann is editor of Domain Name Wire, a news and opinions site for the domain name industry.

So you want to be an Internet superstar, work from home and earn six figures cool we are working on doing just that. In previous articles we have discussed figuring out what you want to do for your home business another term for this is finding your niche.

We then discussed a few different programs available to help you if you are a Veteran, or Single mother. (There is a lot more of this to come)

We will now discuss step three in designing your income producing website.

Proper domain name selection.

When selecting a domain name there are a couple of key questions you should ask.

Is my domain name easy to remember?

When purchasing a domain you want to keep it as short as possible and avoid hyphens whenever possible. For example H-B-S.biz is much easier to remember then Home-Business-Success.biz. In this case we bought both names. We use the shorter domain to put on business cards, flyers, and brochures. When a person types in H-B-S.biz they are automatically forwarded to our long domain website. The long domain URL has two of our keywords in it, which should help with the search engines. The bottom line is the shorter and more memorable the domain the better. It is suggested to put keywords into your domain name wherever logically possible. Try to keep the domain short and use a maximum of three words. If you want to brand your company you can insert your company name in the domain. Be as specific as possible, for example if my company was called: XYZ marketing and one of my websites was about Home business I could purchase the domain XYZHomebusiness.com.

In, this example we have both our company name and keywords, so this would be a good domain name to choose. With some niches such as Home business the competition is tough so as in our case you might have to settle for a domain name with hyphens in it. Try to avoid it but it is not the end of the world.

Has anyone owned the domain prior to me?

When I was first looking for a domain name for H-B-S, I was happy to discover that Home-business-xxxxx.com was available so I bought it. Big mistake. We proceeded to build the page and gather incoming links as well as doing some manual submissions to directories. After a few weeks we noticed that our site was not getting crawled by the search engines. We also noticed that any emails I sent to Jeff using the new domain got blocked by his email spam program “Spam Cop”. We both wondered what the heck was going on. It was then I started to do some investigation to find out if someone else had owned the domain name prior. There are a number of ways you can check this. The first way is to go to Alexa.com and use the Wayback machine. Check to see if the site has ever been published on the net before. If the site is about Gambling, or a Pill store I suggest you look for another name.

Should I only buy a .com URL? Two years ago I would have said yes, however, today a .biz URL is fine. A majority of people who surf the net are aware of the .biz extension and your customers should also be able to remember it easily. As with the hyphen example above if you can get the .com and a spammer has not used it in the past go ahead and get both the .biz and .com versions.

Should I buy all the extensions available? In a nut shell yes! With the cost of a domain name starting at around $7.00 each I suggest for peace of mind and future growth you buy the .com, .biz and .org variations of your domain name. I know of a case where a person put up their site and built it for six months very successfully. Well about three months later the person discovered someone had bought the .biz version of their URL and was trying to steal traffic. Listen you are investing in your future success, spend a few extra dollars now to avoid a potentially major headache in the future.

Should I buy a domain name from a Domain auction? You should save your money. There are thousands of combinations of domain names that will fit your business. Take that money and invest it into your website promotion perhaps through Pay per click or pay for submission to a few of the upper level directories.

I hope this article has helped you and will make your domain name selection easier and more profitable.

Steve is a partner in the writers shack. http://thewritersshack.blogspot.com/

So you finally decided you want your very own home on the World Wide Web. Many people use free services like Geocities or AngelFire for their first home on the Internet. Others jump in and get their very own domain and then set up a hosting account.

Here is a very simple 3 step process to find that perfect domain name using some free online tools

Step 1 Decide on a Theme.

It is very important that you decide on a Theme for your web page. Once you decide on a theme you should pick a Name that works well with your Theme. If your theme is about Pets you wouldn’t want your Domain Name to be All-About-Plants. For this example we will choose Debt Reduction and Bill consolidation as our theme

Step 2 Find a Domain Name

Most Internet Guru’s recommend that you get a ‘.com’ for your Domain. It is also best to choose a Domain with Keywords that are Popular for your Theme. Again if your domain is about Pets you probably wouldn’t want plants as part of your Domain Name unless you are Selling a Vegetarian Pet Cook Book.

If You already have a Domain name in Mind then you can skip to step 3 to see if your Domain is available. If Not keep reading step 2 for helpful hints on finding that Perfect domain Name

If you do not have a Domain Name yet and if you are at a Loss at what name to use don’t despair their are a few free online tools you can use. If your web site theme is Debt Reduction and Bill consolidation then you would probably want a Domain Name with one or more of those words in it. If you need help finding Keywords to include in your Domain Name here is a free Keyword Suggestion Tool you can use http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/

Now that you have some Keywords Picked out you can use either of these free Online Tools to help you find that perfect Domain Name

http://www.nameboy.com/ http://www.domaininformer.com/tools/

Some suggestions for our Debt Reduction theme is

• DebtDispatch.com

Step 3 Register Your Domain

Before you can Register your Domain name you need to make sure it is still available. You can go to the following Whois Server to see if your domain is taken: http://www.internic.net/whois.html You would simply type in one of the names from step 2 like DebtDispatch.com and see if it’s available.

Once you have found that Perfect Domain Name and verified it is indeed available Internic has a List of approved Internet Registrars Here:http://www.internic.net/regist.html

You will notice that the List of Registrars is Long and confusing, A very Popular one is Goddaddy.com Their Pricing is very reasonable and they have a great reputation. Nameboy and Domaininformer from step 2 will also register your Domains.

Host Your Domain

Now All that is left is to host your Domain. There are hundreds of Web Hosts available some good and some not so good. It is really hard to know which ones to use. Findmyhosting.com has a Web Hosting rating service where users rate Web Hosts. They also Tell you the Up time History of your Web Hosts. Pick your Host Carefully. You may want to ask some of your friends and Associates which Hosts They use.

Now anytime you want a New Home on the Web Just follow this simple 3 Step System.

About the Author:
Mike Makler has been Marketing Online Since 2001 When he Built an Organization of over 100,000 Members

Mike uses and recommends Kiosk Web Hosting
http://ewguru.com/kiosk

Get Mike’s Newsletter:
http://ewguru.com/newsletter

More Articles by Mike:
http://ewguru.com/tips

Copyright © 2005-2006 Mike Makler the Coolest Guy in the Universe

In the world of 21st century, it is no longer surprising to find that most business had already establishes a web presence to support their brick-and-mortar businesses. There are many advantages of establishing a web presence on the Internet such as selling globally to prospective customers and disseminating information to the public.

Most business owner would have already understood the importance of a web presence to their business. What most of them had failed to understand is that the domain name in their website can contribute significantly to their online marketing strategy.

First, we look at a few rules of a good domain name. Most would agree that a good domain name should:

1) be able to describe your business when people first look it.

2) include hyphen in between the words to make it easier to read.

3) have an appropriate .com, .net, .biz, .info, .org to reflect the nature of the business.

What I differ in opinion is that a long domain name "mysuperduperbrandflyingsite.com" can be as effective as a short domain name "superduper.com" depending on the context where the domain name is used. Many people would definitely disagree with me on this point as they believe that a short domain name is easier to remember. However, a long domain name can be just as effective depending on the context where it is use.

Having a catchy long domain name such as http://www.dont-miss-a-thing.com or http://www.once-in-a-lifetime.com/ would definitely helps to draw attention to your business promotion rather than promoting your website name http://www.yourcompanyname.com which is mundane.

When people reach http://www.dont-miss-a-thing.com or http://www.once-in-a-lifetime.com, you can communicate a short sales message before driving them to the appropriate web page.

Thus, depending on the context where the domain name is used, a domain name can actually help to make or break your overall marketing performance.

Justin Koh is a freelance writer whose articles have appear in most major ezines. You can find more of these at: http://www.domainnamecenter.info

You have permission to publish this article electronically or in print, free of charge, as long as the bylines are included. A courtesy copy of your publication would be appreciated.

So, what is a domain name, or simply a domain? Well, the answer is also very simple: it`s your website`s name.

Let`s get straight to the point: you can`t name your website however you like. Actually, you can, but you won`t have any profits from it.

Search engines simply love when you have some of your main keywords in your website URL (Uniform Resource Locator), and you will get a higher ranking just for having some of them in your domain.

Not to mention the impact this will have on your visitors. For example, lets say someone searches for "truck accessories" . How would they react to find your website there, in the search engine results, named www.truck-accessories.com? Just look at the address and ask yourself: does it realy have an impact on me ? You bet it does. You can get a lot of customers just by the first impression.

Also, be sure not to fall on the trick of creating brand names such as "Whipssy", "Gecko" or similar. You`re the "small fish" remember? You don`t have enough money to boost your brand and make it strong. Start realisticly, it`ll pay off later.

Well, now that we`ve settled this, it`s time to pick some of the domain name providers.

This is how it works: you choose your registration service and register your desired domain name. Then you can choose (in most companies) 2 plans : a half year, and a full year registration. If you`re sure you`ll stay in businees for quite a time ( remember the rule: Never Quit! ) take the one-year registration. In some cases, it even saves you some money. Otherwise, e.g experimenting, take the half-year one.

Prices vary from 6,7 to about 10, 14 dollars per year. Not to mention that domain reselling has become one hell of a job. Recently, some guy bought a domain for $10, and sold it for $17000. There are thousands of such examples. So, if you`re smart, figure out a name, buy it (pray it`s not already taken) and sell it. You can sell your domains on some of these sites: www.thedomainnameaftermarket.com, www.domainmart.com, www.dnforum.com

When buying a domain name, make sure that the service you buy from offers great support. You don`t want any complications. It could cost your business. The service has to have 24/7 support, and has to provide you with Domain forwarding (..its when you register another domain e.g .net, .org, forwarding automatically forwards those addresses to your original site..)

Here are some of the great domain name providers:

www.domaindirect.com
www.godaddy.com
www.register.com

Well that`s about it about domain names. If you liked the article, feel free to distribute it on your website as long as you provide this site a link-back and leave all the links intact. Next article will be about web hosting, another very important factor when starting a new website.

You can visit my site at http://www.construct-a-site.com to learn how to make your own fully functional, money making website. You can also read interesting articles that contain website design and marketing tips and find out about hundreds of webmaster resources..Site is updated daily

A domain can leave an imprint on the mind of a prospective client. Just like a catchy phone number, it is easy to remember and can be send out loud in a rhythm. Whenever someone sees your domain name for your company it must be able to stick with them throughout the day so they can easily check out your site when they get a chance. Sometimes this may not be till the end of a long day at work, so having a domain name that stays in the mind of a client is very important.

What makes a good domain you might ask? Is it the length, how it is spelled or is there something that I missing?

Well the length is important, something short and sweet can do the trick, but if your domain names is something like "INeedATunaFishSandwhich.com" that may work as well. Yes it is a bit on the long side, but it is very easy to remember and so there fore, easy for a person to type in at the end of a busy day. It stays in the mind and can be thought of in a second.

Unusual domains can work as well, as they can catch the viewers attention allowing them to also remember them without much problem. Such domains as eBay, Paypal and others have only a few letters, but you will never forget them when you go to type them in. A site I like to visit to find out about updates on currency and other information is XE.com . Yes, just two simple letters to represent their site, but to type it in, is just like second nature to me because it is so simple.

Another important part is to watch how you spell words for your domain. Yes it may sound like one word, but people may here it as something else. Allot of people like using "Nex" or "Nx" because it sounds like the word "Next", but when you say to someone "go to my website at NexInformation.com"(just an example site) do they really go to your site or NextInformation.com(not the extra "T"), totalling missing your site all together because of one letter. This also happens even if they see it in plain view, as we all have mistyped a domain name before.

Also make sure your domain name says what your company does or is your company name. If people can connect the domain with your business, then you are already one step ahead.

—————————————————-
Anthony Jewell has over 6 Years experience in the Web & Graphics World. You can visit my business at http://www.logo2d.com

©Copyright 2005 Logo2D.com : Feel free to use this article freely but please keep in the copyright

I have been asked many times by new clients how to select a business domain name. I’ve answered some commonly asked questions to assist you with one of the most important purchases you will make for your online business.

1. Should Your Business Name Be Your Domain Name?
99.9% of the time, the answer to this question is Yes. We are living in the Internet age, and consumers are becoming savvier at purchasing goods and services online. When people think of your product (or service) they’ll connect it with your website, which makes repeated visits to your site easier for your customers.

What if the domain name is already taken? All is not lost. You have some options:
• Offer To Purchase - If you are connected with a brand name then you may want to pursue purchasing this name from its current owner. The domain contact information can be obtained in the form of a “Whois” lookup. Inquire as to whether they are open to selling the domain name, but be aware they’ll likely charge a higher fee for it than you would normally pay.
• Back Order – This is becoming a very popular trend. Domains can now be “back ordered”; meaning simply that when the current owner’s domain registration expires, should they not renew, the domain will become available for you to purchase. This may also carry a higher fee than a normal registration.
• Alternate Ideas – If your business is relatively new, it may be wise to consider alternative extensions. For example, mybusiness.com may not be available, but “mybusiness.net” or “mybussines.biz” might be. The Internet has exploded in the last year with alternate extensions and there are plenty to choose from.

2. Should My Domain Name Include Keywords?
This is an excellent idea! Consider for a moment that you are a candle maker whose business name is “Amy’s Jar Candles”. Your business name already uses “jar candles” as key product branding. Registering “amysjarcandles.com” is a terrific way to target your incoming audience which results in a better chance for sales. For example, chances are that anyone shopping for candles would have a general idea of what type of candle they need, such as a jar candle, or pillar candle. Buyers are far more likely to try out phrases like “jar candles” or “pillar candles” in the search engine rather than just “candles” because it will produce relevant results quicker. Having a domain name that matches your product or service branding is crucial because the easier it is to remember, the more likely it will be tried in a browser and/or search engines.

3. What Extension….com, .net, .org?
Domain names have been disappearing at a rapid rate and new extensions have been introduced to keep the pool of available names flowing. What if the “.com” extension for your domain name is not available? In this instance it’s likely that you can register the “.net” or “.org” (or other) variation of your business name. Which do you choose? Should you select a “.net” or “.org” extension, or consider a country specific alternative such as “.ru” or “.co.uk”?

Does your business cater to the local community? If so, then it might be wise to consider searching for a country specific domain extension for your area first. For example, .com is universally regarded as a US or international extension, while .co.uk refers to the United Kingdom. Should a UK buyer be looking for car parts in his neighborhood “mikescarparts.co.uk” is more likely to be a local websites than “mikescarparts.com”.

Businesses with an International audience can benefit from registering their name with the “.net” extension while “.org” can be useful for identifying a non-profit organization. Since the registration restrictions for “.org” have been removed however, this extension is open to anyone.

There are no rules on which extension to register, but should you decide to register a .com alternative, be very sure you market your company using the entire domain name. Most buyers assume a “.com” extension and without specific information may be unable to locate your site.

4. Long Domain Names…Good or Bad?
This is a topic on which you will find wide variation on opinions. Your domain name can be up to 67 characters in length, that’s a lot of space!

The argument for a longer domain name is mainly that it’s easier for the human mind to recall later. If your business name is “I Design and Host Websites” you probably wouldn’t want to register “idahw.com” with the hope that someone would associate this with your company, product or service by remembering what that stands for.

For example, “gacwh.com” is a sequence of unrelated letters that could be difficult to type correctly; whereas if it that is registered as “getacheapwebhost.com” it is more likely to be remembered. Long domain names also have the added advantage of having room for your keywords. For example, if you have a site listed on Google with a domain name like “jansartsupplies” it may do better in a search for “art supplies” than a name such as “mikesartstuff.com.”

The other side of this argument is that shorter names are easier to remember and type, and thus less prone to errors. For example, “websitedesign.com” is less susceptible to typos than “Icanbuildyourwebsiteaffordably.com”

The issue with shorter or more general names is that ones like “candles.com” and “tires.com” are generally not going to be available. If you Sdecide to register a short name, possibly your company’s acronym, be sure it’s a meaningful combination of characters that is easy to remember. I would recommend finding a domain name which represents your products in the shortest and most meaningful way possible. Businesses with long names may need to shorten their domain name down to assist users with remembering and typing long names; shorter names are also easier to fit in the title bar.

5. Should I use Plurals and Hyphenations?
Domain registration engines will usually suggest an alternative if the name you are searching for is taken. Sometimes this will include adding a hyphen or even “my” or “the” to the name.

If you wanted the term “design.com” and it was taken, you may find yourself staring at alternatives such as “mydesign.com”, “thedesign.com” or even “designs.com”. Which should you choose?

My rule of thumb for my clients is not to register “designs.com” if they cannot also register “design.com” The reason is that many times buyers may forget to type the “s” at the end of the name and your sale may go to someone else. There are those who will argue that this theory works in reverse, but why take chances? If you decide to register a name as “my…” or “the…” remember to market using your entire domain name.

Hyphens are another popular way to successfully register your name when the non-hyphenated version is no longer available. An advantage is being able to get the name that you want; however, it’s my opinion that the disadvantages far outweigh this.

Hyphens are easy to forget. Users are comfortable with typing phrases like “jarcandles.com” but may have trouble remembering to include a hyphen if you registered “jar-candles.com”. This may result in a sale for your competitor and translates to lost sales for you.

Hyphens are also an issue with verbal recommendations. Consider a verbal recommendation for a store named “anas-jar-candles.com.” This may translate at some point to: “Wow, I visited Ana’s Jar Candles dot com today and saw some really neat stuff.” Later, you would probably type “anasjarcandles.com” into your browser hoping to visit. Ouch.

Prior to purchasing your domain name it’s important to carefully consider your business community, target market, and keywords. Just ten minutes spent jotting down ideas can mean the world of difference when it comes to success with your online business.

About the Author
Krista Garren is a website design consultant and webmaster who specializes in partnering with clients with building effective websites. Visit her website at http://www.atsirka.com for more details.