Domain Names
Unlocking the Potential of Your Online Brand: The Importance of Choosing the Right Domain Name
Get Your Domain Name In Cheltenham
Our advice when choosing domain name:
We recommend starting with the correct TLD domain extension (.co.uk, .com, .uk, etc..)
Always think of your branding rather than the overall generic name.
A short name is always better than a long name.
We recommend it’s easy to spell, easy to write, easy to read.
When choosing a name consider using targeted keyword in your domain name.
Always think of a period of time Long Term or Short Term
Its always good to check if your domain name is trademark registered.
Choose the right domain name extension (.com, .co.uk, .uk)
According to research overall all “.com” domain extensions are still showing as the most used in the world.
You might ask why the .com extension ? Research says that .com is the most familiar and easiest to remember.
There are successful websites that start with other domain extensions like .net .org etc. Research suggests that it is always better to use .com as it represents a commercial.
Our advice: Use domain extension .com if that is taken or you can afford to always buy to your local geographical location. For example UK .co.uk or .uk you can use both and redirect to each other. Try to avoid fancy endings like: .london .city .live
Choose a Brandable name over Generic
Why choose a brandable name over generic one?
Because how visitors will remember you, how they search your brand. Share your brand with their friends. Branding is the foundation of your company.
The difference between branded name and generic one:
A branded domain name will stand out and is unique compared to your competitors. While on the other hand generic is the domain name most likely filled with keywords and not easy to remember.
For example: insurance.com great name ? not really you would say but why its short and has keywords that can be great for SEO. While there is some truth to that. But if we look at branding only this would not stand out of the crowd and it will definitely be copy cats that will add other words to create their domains and the domain name insurence.com will just be lost in the vast insurance companies that offer just that.
Our advice on how to brand your domain name:
Use words that don’t exist: Try to invent your own words, new words just like Bing, Yahoo or Google did.
Use words that do exist: Using existing words can be done to to describe a company mission or words that represent you in your unique way DominusRex.
Short name is always better then Long name
If we look at the research conducted by Domain registration.com the most used domain names are around 12 characters long. This was based on the most traffic received. If we use this data to analyse it and the conclusion would be use the domain name within 12 characters or less. If you can try to achieve 5-15 characters long domain name.
Always remember if you can aquire shor domain name is the better. Try to think of several domain names and search there availability, but if you cant get a desired short domain name you can use other solutions.
Buy a long name for example with extension of .com that you like that will redirect to a short name like .co.uk that you use.
Our website name WebLevelUp is 10 characters long.
Easy to Spell, Easy to Write, Easy to Read
It’s all about three easy ones: Spell, Write, Read.
Think of any biggest companies in the world right now. Amazon, Tesla, Google, Facebook. What do all of them have in common ? It’s easy to Spell, Write, Read.
When you choose the right domain name, always invest time and ask your family what do they think of it ? Was it easy to spell ? Was it easy for them to write it down? Was it easy to read back ? Because in the end you want your audience to share your company name with their family and friends. Always try to work on your three easy ones.
Avoid Hyphens and Numbers
Remember your domain three easy ones ? It needs to be easy to spell, write and read.
If you use pets4homes.com for example and if someone just tells you that you would not 100% know do they use number 4 ? Or another one face-book you don’t see them using hyphens because that would be a tedious to market and brand for people to remember. Keep it simple if you can’t find a domain name without numbers or hyphens don’t use it, go back to the drawing board and have another think about it. Because in the end it’s all about long term goals.
Using Targeted keyword in your Domain name.
Our domain name Web Level Up is mainly about website design and digital marketing while we wanted to be unique and stay within 12 characters we used other words to describe on what we do. Digital marketing is all about increase leveling up. That is why we choose using web level up brand to represent to what we do. Using keywords can help you on improving your ranking and SEO.
Be careful stuffing keywords, it can make your domain name and branding appear generic at will suffer the side effects. If you decide to use keywords inside your domain name try to use them at the beginning of your name. These tend to be more powerful and descriptive to what you do. You can always use google keyword planner.
Long term or Short Term
Once you choose your name for your business and website you want. Its time to tie the knot and plan the future. You cannot build long term goals on short term thinking. This will be one of the biggest elements that will define your business and your brand for many years to come. If you decide to change your name, branding, domain name. It will cost you a lot of money for all of it, it’s almost like starting fresh from nothing.
Your rankings for SEO will start from scratch. Informing all the customers and potential new customers will take time. Its expensive and always try to avoid it if you can. But sometimes you have to rebrand because it’s not always the start you had was the right one to begin with.
When branding your domain name if it’s specific to the industry, think about if you ever need to expand and add other services that will not be covered by the name. Do you need to use different keywords or other words to describe you better? Example plumbing services in your area and now you offer electrical services but it’s not in your name and would not come up in search as your prime service you do.
So think, plan and then get the domain that represents you and your future.
Check if your domain is Trademark Registred already
A good place to start is to check if your domain name is trademark registered and if other social media sites already used such a name try using the tool Justia.
Ideal would be to have your branding across all social platforms that are available this will allow continuity of familiarity and branding flow.
Avoiding issues with your branded name and already trademark registered will save you on legal costs in future.
Is there a way to check your name over social networks and trademarks for your domain name you wish to register ?
It’s easy to use one of the tools like knowem. It searches your domain name and shows you if it’s available through over 25 most popular social networks and will display if your name was already used.
If the domain name you really want is already taken by all or by many consider to change it slightly and check again
Where to register your Domain Name ?
There are many domain registrars that would offer you many different services. We are not biassed and it is your choice how, and who to register with. You can always find deals that usually start with a free domain or £1 for the first year but then they charge a lot more for consecutive years to come. We do offer domain registration service please contact us so we can provide you the price for your chosen domain name. We auto renew unless you do not wish to.
Fully manage your domain name server records, we can change anything you need for your emails, hosting and other domain server relations. You can use CDN. We use cloudflare so you can access your DNS records if you need to. This can be also achieved via your CPanel that we provided if you choose our hosting.
