Archive for February, 2003

When choosing a domain name or any web address for your website it is important that you get a memorable and snappy domain so people can remember it. There are also some things which you should not do.

Make it flow

One thing I think should never be included in domains is an “-“. They should not be put in. Take a look at these two examples:

www.bigcats.com
www.big-cats.com

Try saying them. The first one is simply “bigcats .com.” Whereas the second one is “big dash cats .com.” Much more complex and so much harder to remember. Domains are far more snappy if the words follow on without being broken up with dots and dashes. Why do you thing nobody has bought a .name domain?

Words not letters

Many people are going on about how they are selling rare 3 letter domains. The problem is that these domains are usually a mix of random numbers and letters. It’s much easier to remember a name than some random initials. Don’t just get the initials of your domain when its more complex. Get the full name.

Simple words

Not everyone is a great speller. Try to keep the words in your domain simple and try not to use words which are often spelt wrong. If you really must do this then you should buy up alternative spellings to your domain and set them to redirect to the correct domain name.

Back in the old days you could pick between all 3 domain extensions, .com, .net and .org. And each one would cost you £100 a year or over. Now you can pick between 100’s of domain extensions from .cc to .sk. And you can register domains from as little as £3 per year.

This causes problems though. Back in the 90s if you were looking for a website you hardy had to guess at the web site address because they were all .com’s. Now-a-days there are so many you may never find the correct site.

For instance, Worfolk Online uses 5 different domain extensions including .biz, .tk and .us. Guessing the address of M World if you didn’t know the address could take a while. How many extensions would you go through before guessing .us?

The trick is getting the compromise right. New extensions allow you to get a better domain name but you have a not so good extension. Whereas if you go for the classic .com, most of the good domains are taken but when you are looking for a website .com is and I’m guessing always will be the first extension people go to.

Buying expired domains can get you valuable visitors and an already strong standing in search engines and website directories. However if you pick the wrong domain you can lose traffic, popularity and reputation.

Search Engine Bans

Everyone hates those sites that occupy domains and have sites with one a homepage covered in Spam and paid for search listings links. And so search engines have various methods to counter the Spam pages with spoil results and annoy searchers.

One system that many search engines use, including Google, is to permanently ban Spam addresses. The ban can be appealed but this takes time and effort, which you really don’t want to be wasting. The key is to find out before you buy.

Research the owner

Does the previous owner, own one domain or one hundred domains? If they own loads of domains, the chances are that they will all be part of an interconnected Spam network set up to fool search engine spiders and generally annoy people.

Research the site

Check out the Way Back Internet Achieves (http://webdev.achieves.com) who spiders many sites and keeps records of how the website used to look since 1996.

Conclusion

Before registering an expired domain, make sure that you have researched it first. If you do you are likely to end up with a great domain bringing your visitors and search engine listings.