Creating Your Domain Name
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With the Internet now a staple of our society, it seems as if everyone wants a web presence. If you dream of owning your own online business, you need to create a domain name. That's a lot more complicated now than it used to be, but you can still craft a winner if you keep a few points in mind.
I nearly titled this article “It's the Brand, Stupid,” because most of the articles I read on domain name selection focused on that point. If you're already selling a particular product or service – or you want to, and that's why you're starting your web site – you should include its name in your domain name. Obviously, if someone else owns the trademark, you can't use it without permission (don't even think of including Coca-Cola in your domain name!). But if you own it, by all means go for it.
Say your name is Sam Goldstein, and you make really gorgeous outdoor fountains. You could try for a number of different domain names, depending on which one was most evocative of your business and most likely to appeal to your customers: goldsteinfountains.com, thatfountainguy.com, fantasyfountains.com, and I could easily go on. Brainstorm and see what works.
In fact, if you're known for a particular product, but your company's name is something else, you might want to register two domain names: one for your company (mycompanyname.com) and one for your product (myproductname.com). You may have to watch out for duplicate content issues; in this case, I'd suggest having the two sites link to each other for the specific information each contains. For example, you might have a link from mycompanyname.com with the name of your product going to myproductname.com, and a link from myproductname.com labeled “Our Company” or some such going back to mycompanyname.com. This way, you're covered whether your visitors remember your company name or your product name.
I've also seen a recommendation that individuals who run their own businesses should register their own names as domain names. Whether this is important probably depends on the type of business. If you're an artist trying to get your name out there, it may be a good idea. But don't let that keep you from coming up with something really imaginative to attract customers.
Like brand names, domain names should stick in a site visitor's mind, so they'll be able to navigate directly to your site. For example, Michael Devine, an artist who uses polymer clay to create really cool sculptures of people and fantasy creatures, keeps a photo gallery of his work at makemyclay.com. He could have gone with devinesculpture.com, perhaps, but that would convey the wrong attitude as far as the kind of work he does (and would be too likely to be misspelled as divinesculpture.com). Besides, what could be a better name for a site featuring clay sculpture from an artist who got into it as a way to unwind from his stressful “day” job on the midnight shift in NYC?
Next: Making it Memorable >>
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