Domain Name Tips (Part 1)

Tips for Picking the Best Domain Name for Your Business (Part 1)

Every business needs an Internet domain name. It does not matter if the company has one employee or 100,000. Nor does not matter if the company sells products online or only in the real world. To be successful every business needs to establish its digital presence and brand; an important part of that is registering a unique online domain name.

Regardless of what your company sells or does, most potential customers will not do business with a company unless they have a website. Most people when looking for a product or a company to provide them a service, will search online and visit the business’ web site before doing anything else. A profile on Facebook or Instagram is not a substitute for a website for most consumers. Every company needs a website, even if it is nothing more than a glorified online business card.

What is a domain name?

A domain name allows people and things like Internet search engines to find a business online. Customers can either connect with a business through a web site or an email account that uses the company’s unique domain name. The domain name becomes an alias for a unique Internet Protocol (IP) address which is how computers find each other online. An IP address is just like a mailing address in the real world. A domain name is an easier way to find a business’ web site instead of having to know and type a long IP address. For example, example.com’s IP address is 2606:2800:220:1:248:1893:25c8:1946. Which is easier for you to remember, example.com or that long string of numbers and colons? Email is no different between sally@2606:2800:220:1:248:1893:25c8:1946 and sally@example.com but one is impossible to remember and to type.

A domain name is part of a business’ brand, marketing, and image. Nowadays it is often how customers think of companies – not the company name but rather as companyname.com.

5 Tips to Help You Pick the Best Domain Name

These are just five of many tips for picking the best domain name. We will provide more tips in other blog posts.

Make the domain name short, easy to say, and easy to spell – if possible. The more difficult it is for a customer to type, the less of a positive experience they will have when reaching out to your business. I say “if possible” because it is better to use an available .com domain over other extensions. So a new domain name might need to be longer than we would like if it uses a .com extension. More on this later.
Do not use hyphens or underscores in your domain names. They are hard to work with when you are spelling a website URL or email address to someone. Customers often will not remember the hyphen or the underscore.
If your company name has two words like Example Electronics, make sure when the names are combined as exampleelectronics.com that they don’t spell something unintentionally like these – itscrap.com (IT Scrap) and expertsexchange.com (Experts Exchange).
The .com top-level domain (TLD) is also considered the best online real estate (think location, location, location). Consumers consciously and subconsciously consider a business with a .com domain to be a better and more trustworthy company. The most popular sites are always .com but you can get creative with some of the other TLDs. For example, if your company is Example Industries than register example.industries. The .industries top-level domain is often more available than trying to register a new .com name. Avoid the other TLDs like .biz, .us, etc. We’ll discuss this more in a future blog.
When thinking about an available domain name, register it. Domain names are relatively inexpensive; it is better to own it than risk losing it to someone else at any moment. You can always let it expire after a year.

The key to success with a domain name is not about creating one that is easy to remember – it is about creating a name that is hard to forget.

When you are ready to register your domain name, visit domain.com, to purchase the right name for your business and brand. Domain.com is an accredited registrar. In the spirit of full disclosure, we get paid a referral commission when you register a domain through the links on our site. It doesn't cost you anything extra.

If all this information about domain names seems complicated, do not worry, we can help. Email us at hello@oviedonetworks.com to ask about our services to get your business online quickly and successfully.