4 tips for you to choose a web domain name
No matter if you want to start an eCommerce or you want to make a website for your company when you are going to start with an online page you have to choose a web domain, this is the first of many steps to make your site successful and today we are going to tell you everything you need to know before choosing a domain.
Choosing a good web domain is one of the first steps to design a site with high traffic and conversion, so you should strive to choose the best, that’s why in today’s post we will give you 4 tips so you can choose the perfect domain for your website. But first let’s review what is a domain.
What is a web domain?
There are several ways in which we can define a web domain, but in simple terms we can say that it is the way your customers will find your website, it is like the address of a physical business. It is easy to distinguish the domain because it is the address that we type or appears in the search bar of our browser when we want to enter a web page, for example www.youtube.com.
The domains are formed by two parts, the first one refers to the name, this element is chosen by you and it is convenient that it is related to your brand. The second part is composed by the domain extensions, they are easy to distinguish because they appear after the name and are followed by a dot, surely you already know them .com, .mx, .edu, .gob. These extensions can indicate two things: the geolocation of the web and the business of the site.
In short, in addition to the name of the website, you will have to choose one or a couple of extensions that characterize it, but do not worry because we are going to explain which ones are the most suitable for your website.
1 Check the availability
For many people this is the last step, but the truth is that there is nothing more frustrating than spending a lot of time designing and thinking about the best domain name and when you try to register it, it turns out that someone else has already registered it, so you have to start the creative process all over again.
The best thing to do is to start writing a list with several domains, no matter the extensions, thinking about the different possibilities for your web address, highlighting mainly the name of your company.
In the list put at least the combination of domain names with extensions like .com and .mx. Once you have this list go to a domain checker like Hostinger or from the Google search engine and enter each domain from the list, if it is already registered you will see the legend of not available, so cross it off your list.
Select several addresses that are available and with the following tips you can improve these options until you get the ideal domain.
2 Select the domain name
This is one of the most important parts of the domain, since it is basically the way in which Internet users will know you, the easiest thing to do is to match your company or business name. However, this is not always so simple, because the domain may already be reserved, and there are some characteristics that it has to meet to make it easier to position.
Easy to pronounce and easy to remember, remember that your domain is basically your name on the Internet, so think that it is always better to have a catchy name that is easily pronounced, so that it can be passed from mouth to mouth without many complications.
It is also important that your name is very easy to remember, because the best thing to do is to promote it in different media, such as business cards and billboards, so people who know you through them should be able to easily remember your domain name and then search for you on the Internet, without complications.
If you plan to expand your market outside Mexico, it is a great idea to check if your domain name does not have a negative connotation or double meaning in another language or in another country.
It must be short, another of the characteristics that make a domain name simple is that it must be short, besides registrars do not admit more than 64 characters, so forget about it if your domain name is a phrase. However, it is not convenient to put only a couple of letters that the public does not say anything, because they can forget the address very easily, this type of domain can only work for brands that are already well known.
Forget about special characters, characters or symbols such as hyphens, commas, apostrophes do not work in the domain name, besides they are not so easy to write.
3 Select the best domain extension
The next part of the domain that you must choose is the exemption, these small acronyms that go right after the name, preceded by a dot, you can imagine that we are talking about the famous .com. However, you should know that there are many more of them and that each one fulfills a different function.
Domain extensions basically define the nature of each site and the geographical location of each website. The best known are .com, .net, .gob, .edu or .mx to mention a few, however each extension can give you certain benefits, here are some tips to choose the one that suits you best.
The nature or generic extensions: these are important because they explain to Google what your site is about, for example .gob refers to a governmental page, .edu refers to educational pages, the problem with these extensions is that when you register your domain you have to prove that your page has this nature.
The most famous of all is .com, it seems to refer only to companies, however this is not the case because this extension has become a generic domain used by most websites. If you want to register your domain with this extension there are no conditions, besides it is free, however this extension does not say much about you to search engines, that is why it is increasingly in disuse, but you can combine it with a location extension.
The geographic location extensions are the extensions that tell search engines the country of the website, for example: .mx for Mexico, .es, for Spain or .col for Colombia.
Each country has an institution in charge of administering them, as these have a cost, in the case of Mexico, who does this work in Mexico is Nic.
It seems a disadvantage to pay an extra for having the .mx extension, however, it is not, because having this extension helps you to position yourself in local search results. For example, if you have a shoe store, it will be easier for you to appear when someone in Mexico is searching for shoes on the Internet, because you compete with local businesses, while if you do not have it you would end up competing with the rest of pages worldwide, so consider this expense as an investment for SEO positioning.
4 Short URL
Once you have both the domain name and the extensions defined you only have to make one last consideration, check that the URL, ie the entire web address from the www, is short, this is a very important point because firstly the domains can not have more than 64 characters and secondly the longer it is the more difficult to remember. So ideally the total number of characters between the name and the extensions should be between 10 and 30 characters.
How to register a domain name?
Once you have your domain name well established with the extensions you need, check once again if it is available. It may happen that the domain is registered, but there is no website using it, in this case you can rent this domain if you consider it is the ideal one for your company.
The next and last step is to register your domain, this can be done directly with your hosting provider or you can do it with any other registrar, you can check our list of recommended registrars.
Choosing a good domain is a fundamental part in your SEO strategy and in the marketing of your site, that’s why you should take it as seriously as possible and think about everything from the name to the extensions that your site needs. Tell us, do you know another tip to choose the best web domain?
