The first step in building a website is in the
choice of a domain name. Whether you are a
doctor, lawyer, plumber, aluminium siding
salesman, or if you want to start up a website
to feature your family dog, the entire endeavour
begins with the choice of a domain name.
The next logical question you might ask, is
“What is a good domain name?”. The answer is, it
depends. For example, if you are the person
above who wants to build a website devoted to
Spot, the family dog, then the answer is that
the choice of a domain name really doesn’t
matter. Why? Because you probably don’t really
care about gaining a lot of traffic to your
website, your site is probably only something
you are going to produce for family and friends,
to let them know about the latest goings on in
Spot’s life. In a case like this, it does not
matter whatsoever if you find a domain name like
“ourdogspot.com” or not, since most likely you
will only be giving out the website address to a
few friends and family and maybe Aunt Tilly in
Toledo.
In fact, in a case like the above, you could
call the site anything you wanted to,
“dogdiary.com” or even “catsdontlikespot.com” or
something even as silly as “lookatthis.com”,
which really has nothing at all to do with the
subject matter of the website itself. The point
is that in a case like this, there is no real
concern with getting a lot of visitors to the
website other than friends and family and Aunt
Tilly in Toledo, so there is no real harm in
naming the website ANYTHING, because you will be
giving out the website address to a select few
people. BUT……
What if the website is for business? What if I
do want it to attract attention?
The simple answer is, it pays to have a domain
name that reflects your site or business. If
your website is about car parts for example, do
you really expect the average web surfer to
remember how to get to your website if it is
named "bobsthingsforsale.com" or some other
unrelated name? The best strategy is to find a
domain name that directly relates to your
business, whether it is the business name itself
or related to the category of business. For
example, a car parts website should have a
domain name like carparts.com or
bobsautoparts.com, something that immediately
associates the domain name with the theme of the
site. It’s all about branding, and making a
lasting impression on the target audience or
customers.
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