Marketing-Rich Domain Names

Your domain name is one of the most important aspects — if not the most important aspect — of your web site and your branding efforts.

“Your domain name goes on your letterhead, business card, printed materials; it must be spoken verbally over the phone, presented in email communications, and appears in the search results when your site ranks well on important keyword searches.”

It sums up your entire on-line presence, and it needs to be great. Don’t just buy the first thing that comes to mind — give your name a lot of thought. Here are some tips:

1. Get a business name domain
…if your business name is not already taken by another business or a squatter.

2. Get a Keyword domain
…this will bring in more traffic.

3. Make the name short and memorable, and avoid hyphens
“Long domain names or domains with hyphens are often just too cumbersome for someone to remember or even pass along to others.”

4. Make sure the name is spelled correctly
“The exception to this rule is if you have secured both the correctly spelled and incorrectly spelled URLs” and you then use “redirects to send visitors from the correctly spelled URL to your main (misspelled) address.”

5. Secure a ‘.com’ domain
These “domain names are by far the most common and most remembered.”

(See isedb for more)