Choosing a Domain Name
Do you think you have a good Domain name in mind for your site?
WAIT!
Before you rush out register it there are a several things you need to consider.
- How many people are searching for your main keywords?
- What other words describe your site?
- How competitive is your market?
- Does the domain name describe your sites contents?
- How easy is the url to remember?
Existing Businesses
If you have an existing business you already have brand name recognition so its important to include your business name.
i.e. www.shopname.com
If that domain is taken then consider how people will search for your site. Most people will google something like (shop name) + (city) so why not name it www.shopnamecity.com or www.shopname-city.com these domain names will almost certainly be available.
Online Businesses
Very Important – Do people want what you’re selling?
Before you rush ahead & spend hours developing a site with no value think of 6 or more words that best describe your idea.
Go to Wordtracker (it’s free) & see how many people are searching those exact words. List the words according to the # of searches.
Now you now know 2 things:
- Is this an idea worth pursuing?
- What words generated the most searches.
Obviously, if very few people are searching for your main keywords then this idea is not worth pursuing as an e-commerce business. Save your money & register for a free blog at www.blogger.com if you are really dedicated to the idea.
If your keywords have significant Google search volume you can move on. Don’t worry about competition at this stage, it is more important that there are a lot of searches.
Armed with your keywords you are now ready to find the perfect domain name for your new business.
Write down some options using the most popular keyword or a mixture of your keywords. It helps if your domain name is descriptive of the site’s content.
A person searching the internet for E-Commerce will click www.E-CommerceNewbie.com before www.mywebsite.com.
TIP – Hyphens as in E-Commerce are not generally a good idea however using Wordtracker you will find that more people search for E-Commerce than eCommerce.
