Choosing a domain name is big decision in your online business. That’s why I thought I better write a blog post on this issue.
When you are choosing a domain name you must ask yourself first, do I really want to brand my business?, or is it simply a keyword targeted site I am interested in.
For example you can’t think of getting a domain for your business brand like www.barking -dogs- consultant.com, but you can certainly build your brand with a domain like www.dogtraining.com.
Here are 10 things to avoid while choosing a domain name:
- Avoid words whose spellings are different in US English and UK English. For example: www.optimizedsites.com or www.optimisedsites.com
- Avoid using words that end and start with similar alphabet. Like www.syedssite.com. Avoid domains names which have multiple interpretations like 24skills.com can be interpreted by others as twentyfourskils.com.Such type of domains can drive traffic to other similar domain name costing you money.
- Never choose any domain name which might restrict you to expand your site in the similar niche.
- For example; www.baglessvacuumcleaners.com will restrict you in future to add many good vacuum cleaners which are not bag less but still profitable. So www.bestvcuumcleaners.com is a better choice to give you room for expansion in similar niche.
- If you have .com available then never go for other option unless for obvious reason. As records show more successful sites are running on .com compared to .info or .org etc. But if you are targeting local business than .uk, .nz may be helpful considering geographical identity.
- Avoid using any trademark words as later on, if somebody after one year forces you not to use that word your entire site will be in mess as you need to change domain then.If you are not sure for a word that you want to include in your domain then you can check with Intellectual property and Trademark office about it.
- From SEO point of view many exact match keyword domains have been penalized by Google recently. So it’s better to avoid this technique now a days and try to get domain name which makes sense to your niche and may not be exact match keyword.For example www.beautytips.com is easier to remember than www.topbeautytipsadvised.com
- While buying an old domain name you must ensure that previous webmaster did not abused domain by stupid ways of back linking. If Google doesn’t like that domain now due to previous webmaster acts you will have to suffer in case you buy such domain now.
- Never include product name of somebody else in your domain.
- It is irrational and stupidity to use hyphens numerals and difficult words in your domain. Records show that such domains did not work well for webmasters.