|
Home>Domain
Name>
Domain Name
One of the first important steps for
your website is to get a domain name. It is absolutely imperative
that you do get a domain name, sites without their own domain look
unprofessional right from the start. Domains are cheaper in the last
few years, although they never were that expensive. Nowadays you can
get a domain for under $5 a year, if you're not willing to spend
that much on your website then you should reconsider making one
altogether.
This next step is perhaps the most important decision to make in the
site creation process. A domain name is not just your address on the
web, it also often doubles as a name and can be as important or more
important as what title you give your site.
We can discuss both at the same time because your domain name most
often reflects your site name.
Pretend you're a gardener named Shirley and you want to build a
gardening information website. You have you choice for a domain
narrowed down to the following three:
Shirleen.com
Gardenice.com
Gardening-Manual.com
Number one is a horrible choice. Above all else your domain name
needs to convey what your site is about. If you choose a meaningless
domain that has no association with your site's subject then you've
already handicapped your site and you haven't even started building
it yet. Shirleen.com may mean something to you because it
incorporates your first name, but it will not mean anything to the
people searching for gardening. Always make sure your domain name
has some association with your subject, the more association the
better.
Number two is definitely an improvement over number one. Initially
you may have even thought that number two was the best one on that
list. I bet right now you're wondering why it's not so let me
explain.
Branding refers to the process of getting your name associated with
your product. The value of a well branded product are immense,
Kleenex, Q-Tips, Band-Aids, Trapper Keeper, Roller Blade, these are
all brands, but they have been branded so well that we refer to the
product by the brand name. Now many people will suggest getting a
unique name for the purposes of branding, and believe me
Gardenice.com would be great for that. Its unique, its cool, its
hip, it would be the ideal domain name if you were going to run a
branding campaign. However I'm not one of those people who recommend
branding, in fact I advise against it. Not that branding doesn't
work or that it isn't a valuable promotional tool, on the contrary
branding is a viable way to build product awareness. The problem
with branding is not that it doesn't work, the problem is that it
costs money, a lot of money. You cannot simply buy a unique domain
name and consider yourself branded. Companies spend millions of
dollars on brand awareness and it doesn't even always work, E-trade
spent 2 million dollars on one ad during the Super Bowl just for the
purposes of branding, and yet when you think of online brokers
others, such as Ameritrade, come to mind. Most people are too over
concerned with branding their website, they fail to think
practically. Branding is not for small or independent webmasters,
unless you plan on spending money on heavy advertising you will
never effectively brand your website. Instead of worrying about
branding, which will likely never happen, concentrate instead of
building traffic.
Number 3 is actually the best domain for building traffic because it
has the best use of keywords in the domain. Also, before you
actually buy your domain you should do some keyword research to make
sure the keywords you are targeting are the best ones to target. |
