Fine Tuning a Domain Name

Written by Richard James, added 12/8/2007  

Hyphenated Names Sometimes it is a good strategy to just take the same domain name and hyphenate it as in turning bobsautoparts.com into bobs-auto-parts.com. Is it always the best strategy? Yes and no. If you are dealing with an already well known name, generally the answer would be no, as most web surfers would usually just enter the non-hyphenated version in, and end up at your competitors’ website instead. Not a good strategy. Also, the longer the name you have chosen, the more tedious and error prone it becomes for the surfer to type in the name correctly, again foiling the chances that they will end up at your website. Definitely shorter is better. But if the name you have chosen is already taken and there is no chance of getting it from it’s owner, and the owner either has no website or a poorly designed one with little traffic, this can be a good strategy in purchasing a name.

Longer or Shorter Domain names can be up to 67 characters long. At 63 characters, thelongestdomainnameintheworldandthensomeandthensomemoreandmore.com claims to be the longest domain name in the world, and it may very well be. But who would want to type it into a browser? Our website, www.StartMyWebsiteToday.com features a name that in a few words encapsulates the purpose of the site. It is helpful also with search engines. In as few characters as possible the name of the site, the purpose of the site, and the keywords of the site have all been neatly put together in a domain name. Shorter is better here. Nuff said.



Brand Name or Generic The answer here is it depends. If your business is your brand, of course it is the best possible strategy to try to register that domain name. For instance, Nike.com is a well known brand name site, although there is nothing in the domain name to suggest that it is a site about shoes. Still, Nike is such a well known brand name to the public that people automatically know what they will be shopping for when they get there. If your brand name is well known, definitely try to obtain your brand name as a domain name. But if you are Nike or Coca Cola don’t discount the idea of buying shoes.com or soda.com if they are available as well. People often search the web using generic terms, more so even than brand names. A person is more likely to search the internet for shoes or footwear or sneakers than to search by a single brand name, even one as big as Nike. So if possible cover all the bases, but a generic name if your business is new or not yet well known can get better results, if you can find a good one.

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