Avoid Hyphens And Numbers In Your Domain Name
When choosing a domain name for SEO, its always better to avoid hyphens and numbers.
Hyphens and numbers make it harder to pronounce.
Lets take Apple.com as an example.
Apple.com is a very short domain name and is easy to pronounce. More than that Apple.com sounds like a brand.
What if there were any hyphens or numbers in the name like App-le.com or Number1Apple.com, of course, the company could not have spread so promptly if that was the case.
So, if you are finding a domain name for your new website, always keep it simple and avoid hyphens and numbers.
History Of Top Level Domains
In 1971, Ray Tomlinson was the man who developed email. He, however, needed to separate the idea of a user name from a computer name, so in order to do this, he used the @ symbol. Eleven years later and in a similar vein, computers switched to using TCP/IP formats. This is where youve likely come across the idea of IP addresses.
This background is important because now that web pages could resolve at an IP address, the idea of remembering IP addresses was going to be a very difficult one. People were just never going to remember a string of numbers let along pass them on to others to visit. So people needed a much easier way of connecting to particular IP addresses.
We still use IPs, they are an essential part of connectivity for the internet, but a more user-friendly system was needed. Thats when the idea of Domain Name Servers was invented. Now, users could simply enter a domain name and it would connect them to the IP address they were looking for.
In late 1984, RFC 920 created seven core TLDs, the original top-level domains released were:-
- .com
- .gov
- .mil
The oldest and still the most widely used and respected is .com, some are industry-specific like .edu, .gov and .mil, while some were commercially focused such as .int, .net and .com.
Now, the market for domain names has become even broader, there are a huge variety of new TLDs, you can even get a .christmas domain name!
Pick A Trustworthy Domain Registrar
The domain registrar is a company that registers a domain name on your behalf, and then gives you full access to that domain name.
The key with registrars is to only use respectable and trustworthy companies. You really dont want to run into any domain problems further down the line when your websites brand is already established and losing the domain would mean trouble.
The registrars we always recommend are:
- SiteGround our top recommended hosting company that also sells domain names.
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What Is Web Hosting
Web hosting is the generic name given to the business of, well, hosting a website for organizations or individuals. Truth is that it can be done by individuals or by businesses. But that’s just the beginning: selecting a truly reliable, affordable, scalable web hosting provider is a daunting and overwhelming task, as there are so many options out there.
Many packages include a wealth of features that you may or may not place value upon, including a mailing list, a control panel, the ability to create online stores easily, simple web building tools, and varying levels of support .
Whether you’re looking to build a website for yourself, a website for your small business now or for the future, or a simple online store, or you just want to save money by moving to a cheaper web hosting provider, we’ve got you covered.
Choosing a host is very much a case of ‘horses for courses’ it’s a question of getting the best and most appropriate solution that you can afford. There’s no need to hamstring yourself financially, though. If you’re just starting out, or you’re a relatively small business and you know your way around a server, you might like to consider a Virtual Private Server , for example these provide the flexibility of a dedicated server, but at a reduced cost.
How To Explain Web Hosting In Very Simple Terms
Think of web hosting providers as landlords and servers as properties.
VPS is a step above shared hosting. You get your own private virtual server but you still share some amenities with others tenants that live in the same block like the garden or the doorway.
Dedicated hosting is the equivalent of a house an entire server just for one customer. Expensive but worth it if you are ambitious. There are still limitations though but dedicated hosting allows for more flexibility.
The building analogy applies to the other variations/categories: eco-house, retail stores, art displays, houses in India, land developers etc.
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How Do I Choose The Best Domain Name
Great question! Here’s a few core things to consider when choosing your new domain name:
How Much Does A Domain Name Cost
The exact cost of your new domain name will vary based on the registrar, the specific top-level domain you’ve chosen, and the quality of the domain name. Domain.com is proud to offer more than 300 unique TLDs to help your new website stand out. Some domains may be pricier due to their intrinsic benefits, like being short and memorable, or the use of very competitive keywords such as cars.com. Browse our premium domains to jumpstart your website performance.
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Picking A Domain Name: Keep It Short
Think about how you will want to market your website in the future. Choosing a domain name on which you build a business is a long-term investment. Think about how you might use this domain name months or even years from now. In looking at many of the big name brands, youll find that the shorter your name, the better. The shorter your name, the more memorable. The shorter your name, the less it costs to print it on material. There are a lot of benefits to a short name, some difficult to even predict.
How do you whittle down the character count, then, especially if your brand name is something like The Best Bunches of Botanicals? You remove all unnecessary verbiage. For the most part, this includes words like the and my. Ideally, youd produce a site domain like this: www.bunchesofbotanicals.com. You domain name can be up to 67 characters. Try to keep it below 20.
Note: Many stores also buy common extensions of their domain to protect the brand, including the .net, .biz and .co versions of their .com domain. Also, think through potential misspellings and buy those domains, too. You can then redirect those links to your homepage. This is especially recommended if you brand has an uncommon spelling.
Check The Domain History Via Wayback Machine
Note: This one is worth checking even if youre getting a new domain name. In some cases, the domain name youre trying to register may have been registered in the past but then abandoned by the owner. Its still good to have a look at what was on it.
There are a couple of ways in which you can look up a domain names history. One of the more popular ones, and one thats also within anyones reach , involves Wayback Machine.
This is one of the first tools of its kind. Quite simply, it lets you enter a time machine, so to speak, and have a look at how any website used to look in the past.
When I say any website, its not actually any website. But you can expect to find most websites that had any noticeable traffic at any point in time. In our case, doing a check via Wayback Machine allows us to see whether the domain were interested in has ever been used for anything significant, and, if so, whether it was all kosher or not.
For example, if you look up this site, youll get records dating back to 2013:
Its safe to assume that this site didnt exist before then . When you click on any of the records, you get a snapshot of the site back then. Quite handy, isnt it?
If youre buying an existing domain name, it would be a good idea to go to Wayback Machine and browse through every month of the domains history, just to make sure there wasnt anything shady going on at any point.
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Choose A Brandable Domain Name Over A Generic One
Your website domain name is how visitors will find and remember your business online.
A domain name is the foundation of your brands digital presence. A specific, brandable domain name stands out among your competitors, unlike a forgettable generic name.
A brandable name doesnt have to have a specific meaning think Google or YouTube but it should be easy to pronounce and memorize and be unique.
The main goal here is to create a potential for the domain name to build brand value and recognition over time.
To come up with a brandable domain name:
- Make up new, catchy words that often prove successful, as Yahoo, Facebook, TikTok and Instagram can testify.
- Create combinations of existing words and random suffixes. A brandable domain name should be fun to say out loud and catchy so that it stays on peoples minds.
- Check out a thesaurus and use interesting, existing words that fit your business.
- Use domain name generators to create a unique name from initial domain ideas and keywords.
Domain Value Com Vs Biz
Any veteran to the online world, whether it is SEO, hosting or anything else, already knows which is the better choice between .com vs .biz. However, if youre not familiar with these two domain extension, other than surfing the net in your spare time or at work, you may not know which is the best choice.
Whenever possible, its always best to get the .com, if youre a business. Even though the .biz sounds like it should be perfect for a business, its not the first choice for many reasons.
The Value
The first reason you want to choose a .com extension whenever possible is the value. A .com is worth far more than a .biz, even if they are the same. Many experts have stated, if the .com is worth $1,000 or more, the same .biz domain name is only worth about $20.
Recognition
The second reason a .com is far better than a .biz domain name is recognition. Since this was the first very popular domain extension, most internet users are trained to default to the .com. If you do any offline advertising at all, the .com is a better choice than a .biz.
Trust
When people seek a domain extension other than .com, .org, .net or a country extension, they dont always trust it. The .info domain extension is known to be associated with scams. The .biz may not be in the same category as the .info, but its not far off. Some internet users wont trust any domain extension outside of .com, .org and .net.
Which is Better for SEO?
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Keep It Short Simple And Predictable
So, we already talked about brandability , but there are also some other, more general, characteristics of a quality domain name. The big four being:
- short preferably with fewer than 15 characters, excluding the TLD
- simple no hyphens, no underscores, no complicated words as part of the domain, or any other punctuation
- just words avoid using numbers unless absolutely necessary
- predictable no weird spellings (for example, if your name is Myke and you want to make it part of your domain such as MykeBlogs.com every single time people will mistype it as MikeBlogs.com.
Also, you can:
Be Careful When Buying Existing Domain Names
As I mentioned a couple of points above, buying an existing domain name is a bit different from buying a new one. First of all, since its not new, this means it already has a history. And you can never be entirely sure what that history is.
- On the bright side, the domains history may give you a boost in Google since youre not starting from scratch Google already knows the domain.
- But, on the flip side, if the domain has featured any kind of non-kosher stuff , then it may be banned from Google entirely.
Buying your domain from a marketplace such as Flippa gives you some safety, since every domain is validated at least in the most basic way. However, to make things a bit safer, you should also perform checks of your own.
First, do a manual check by going to Google and searching for:
site:YOURDOMAIN.com
This will tell you whether Google has any pages indexed from that domain. Finding anything is a good sign. It means the domain isnt banned. Not finding anything doesnt have to be a deal-breaker, though.
- If the domain is blank no website then theres nothing for Google to find in the first place.
- However, if there is a website but Google cant see it , this is a red flag.
You can also do checks via tools such as bannedcheck.com and ismywebsitepenalized.com. But also keep in mind that these things are not foolproof. Consider them helpers.
But we can still do more:
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Dont Sweat It Too Much If Your Perfect Domain Name Is Taken And Cant Be Obtained
Okay, so as much as domain names do matter, and having the right one can mean the world to you, if you cant get your hands on what you want , dont sweat it too much.
First of all, something thats more important than anything else even than the domain name itself is to actually get the idea behind your website or business right. If you dedicate yourself to executing that idea and do it deliberately, the lack of that perfect domain name wont hold you back.
Secondly, domain names can be changed later on. Even if you dont have the right domain today, you can always get it later, and then just redirect your website to it.
For example, that is what Sumo a suite of online marketing tools did not that long ago. The domain name they started with was sumome.com, but then, after a while, when they got enough funding, they bought the domain they really wanted sumo.com. In their case, that domain switch was kind of expensive. Their new sumo.com domain actually cost $1.5 million. But dont worry, yours doesnt have to be this expensive. Sumo has actually turned out to be the 83rd most expensive domain name ever.