7 Killer Tips on Choosing the Best Domain Name Possible
Purchasing the perfect domain name with search engine optimized keywords can give you an additional boost towards high ranking search results. The days are gone where your domain name will pull your site up to the top solely for the keyword related term however keywords can play a good part in the search algorithms. You’ll also want the shortest name possible for ease of remembrance. Unfortunately there’s nothing but tons of domain name squatters so you’ll have to be creative when choosing your domain name.
1.Where to Start Without a doubt, Google’s
Keyword Suggestion Tool is one of the most powerful ways to find keyword rich domain names. Type in a few keywords related to your subject and the results should show a hundred plus keyword suggestions. Included in the search results are other possible keyword terms at the bottom you can use relevant to your subject.
Also included in the results are columns showing search volume by the most recent month and approximate overall monthly volume averaged over 12 months. Note: This volume is Google and Google’s search partners’ keyword volume only. Expect Yahoo, MSN and other search engines to add additional keyword search volume. In addition to Google’s tools try
WordTracker or
Keyword Discovery to look up additional search volume.
2.
Be Creative When choosing a domain name, a
Thesaurus can do creative wonders to help you get past those pesky domain squat blockers. A variety of subject oriented keywords can help get you the upper hand on finding your domain name. Search for your subject or topic and copy and paste the synonym search results into notepad for your future reference. Once completed drop them back into the Google Keyword Suggestion Tool until you have a decent list to work from.
3.
Use Keyword Suggestion Sites There are a few cool website apps that help you choose a domain name by adding a prefix or suffix to your keyword.
Dot-o-mator is one of them. Type in your root word and choose from the drop down menu on the right and suggest away.
Nameboy is another one where you can add primary and secondary words. Reminder: Use the Thesaurus or the Google Keyword Suggestion tool to find suggested words to add to the root word. Of course
GoDaddy,
Moniker,
DomainsBot and many others offer automated keyword suggested domain names as well. The good thing about GoDaddy and Moniker is they allow for
bulk domain name registration. You can check or register up to 500 domain names at once.
4
.Try Misspells for Branding, Trademarks and the Unique Cuteness Effect Both
Domainr and
DomainTyper help suggest shortened domain names using other country’s domain extensions. For example the famous bookmarking site like
Del.icio.us used a non .com extension. Although it’s a .US extension you get the idea. One could register PetLov.er if they had an address in the State of Eritrea. Keep in mind using a website domain name outside of the country may not show your site in your own countries search results.
5.Dot Com’s vs. Dot Info’s and others Contrary to tip number four, the choice is always yours to register a dot com over a dot net, info, me, org or any other dozens of choices you may have. Remember though, dot com’s were the original website top level domain extensions. Similar to toll free numbers, a toll free 800 number will always be better than a 888 or 877 number.
6.Hyphenating As mentioned earlier, many short domain names are already taken by domain squatters. Choosing to use hyphens in your domain name isn’t the end of the world if all your business is online, however it isn’t suggested to use if for a real offline business when you can avoid it. The usability and accessibility may lower when someone types your domain name into their browser especially if they miss the hyphen and go to a competitor that owns the non-hyphenated domain. If you do need to use hyphens, keep it minimal to one or maybe two at the very most. They really aren’t that desirable.
7.Four More Must Bookmark Domain Name Sites
DomainTools is one of the most powerful domain tools on the net. Services offered vary from basic domain suggestions, reverse look ups to see what other domains an owner has, auctions and more. Many of the services aren’t free though. Check it out and dig around to see everything DomainTools offers.
Whois.org is undeniably simple in nature. Although basic it’s a staple for checking availability of names.
NameCake allows you to buy and sell domain names. Many of the domain registrars listed in this post allow for most of the services listed, some rise to the top. NameCake is one of them.
JustDropped is unique in the fact that it lists all the deleted or soon to be deleted domain names. For instance at the time of this posting, 76,522 domains will expire the next day. Yes many of the domain names aren’t that great, as they were yesterday’s wet dream for someone making money online but you may take advantage of searching for topic oriented domain names and find just what you are looking for. You never know when you might pick up a domain name with a little PageRank or a few back links pointing to it.
