Don't Let Your Ego Interfere With Choosing a Great Domain Name For Your Business

By Ken Devonald

Why is a domain name so important?

The domain name is one of the most honest things on a website - to the search engines that is. Whereas we can create titles on web pages to suit a whim, when we purchase a domain name we are stuck with it - it is not something we can edit and change. The search engines know this, and place a lot of importance on it. Now it is easy to let your ego interfere with your intelligence, and end up buying the domain of your business name or yourself. My first company was registered under the name 'Blendfall Ltd' whatever that meant. Using "blendfall" in a domain name for the search engines to use would be a waste because very few would look for it.

However, using a domain name with programmer, or software, or contractor in it would more closely match the function of the company and the site, but be more difficult for legitimate offline users to find - you try searching for one of these and you would have difficulty finding it amongst the millions of competing sites. However, combined with a couple of other keywords you are likely to attract organic searchers.

What is the solution?

The ideal approach to choosing a domain name is to choose two. One should be used for the search engines, and reflect your main keyword theme. Separate the words with hyphens which helps the search engines extract the words from the name. Use this one online only, because otherwise you will find yourself having to say over the phone 'www dot blah hyphen blah hyphen blah dot com'.

The second domain should reflect your business name or other desirable and memorable name. This should be used offline, and not contain any hyphens or other special characters, including numbers. Otherwise you will find yourself on the phone saying www dot intro 2 software dot com and that is the number 2... no, not spelt tee double you oh, the digit 2...

Do as I say, not as I do!

Ken Devonald is a professional software developer specialising in web site development tools. He is currently redeveloping his intro 2 software site, which you can visit here!

How Do You Buy Domain Names?

By Jason Hobbs

Many people enter the e-commerce industry with no idea where to get started. They know what they want and what they will need to be successful, but they don't know how. One of the first step of creating a website is purchasing a domain name. There are many ways to do this, ranging from cheap to very expensive. As in most things, the more money something costs the better quality it generally is, especially in domain names.

Domain names, when already registered, are sold and priced based on public demand, usually due to an auction format of selling. When people open up an auction they will usually offer a BIN, or buy it now price. This is the price that the seller would be willing to close the auction and give the domain to you immediately. When you choose to buy a domain name from a person, you are usually counting on a very high quality domain name and maybe that the domain has already had some marketing done. However, this comes with a heavy price tag. Do not fear, there is a more economical way to buy your domain name.

You can also buy domain names from domain name registrars, popular ones including namecheap and godaddy. They provide the service of allowing you to register a domain name with the DNS servers that assign the servers to an IP Address. They allow you to register domain names that are currently not in use. This means that for usually less capital than it takes to go out to lunch and eat, you can get yourself a brandable custom domain name.

There are many choices that you need to look into before making your first purchase. You need to make sure that the domain name extension is appropriate to your website, and that the name you are looking into getting isn't already in a market that is flooded with people trying to get into it. You need to be sure that the name you choose is specific enough to your content without being to specific that your business can't grow and change. If you make your choice wisely when buying your domain name, you will have a very well establish domain name in your future.

Take all of these things into consideration when you want to buy domain names, and you will find yourself making a much better decision in the long run.

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The Domain Name Business - A Quick Guide

By Brian Harrison

Domains names are more than just a useful address for storing and showing business or personal information on the internet, they can bee the difference between a successful and non successful business.

Selecting the right domain name, hosting provider and website design, plus website development is not a small job.

The domain name market

A study of internet businesses showed that most of them spend less than 2 hours choosing their domain name, web hosting providers or doing a detailed plan of thier website requirements. This can only lead to problem later on in the website development process and could cost you a lot of money.

The report also said that 45% of those businesses thought that they had chosen the wrong domain name and could increase sale with a better name. No surprise there when they are putting less time into the decision than they do deciding on the venue for the office xmas party. Using domain names that are complex and too long for your customers to remember and you will miss out on traffic and valuable business emails.

Although there is much controversy around the whole domain name business one thing is for sure...can you really afford to let someone else capitalize on your company domain name or names. The number of domain names is increasing with most of them linked to geographical locations such as .nl for Holland, .de for Germany and .FR for France.

These local TLD's or Top Level Domains help to categories the internet and help the customer find a supplier in their own country.

Every country in the world has been supplied with a Top Level Domain and so you can imagine the choice of TLD's is vast. There are also continental TLD's that are now available such as .eu and .asia, again this allows you to have a presence in a specific area of the globe.

There are other TLD's that are Global such as .com and .net and these tend to bee used by people or businesses who require a global presence. Of course this will also make them very sort after and extremely valuable.

There are constantly new TLD's coming online all the time for example we now have .mobi domain that are primarily for mobile devices .xxx for the adult industry.

Many other domain names are in the pipeline and I'm sure will eventually cover most categories from .clothes to .cars. This idea is generally to help make addresses more relevant.

How Domain Names Work

Domain names are a shortcut to a designated Internet address. The internet works by giving every device that is connected to it a unique identification number called an IP address and packets of data sent to and from that device are marked with that ip address.

IP addresses are not the most friendly of address to remember and can bee up to 12 digits long so the number is converted into something we all understand, "domain names" They are used as direct links to web and e-mail servers. If you Type 216.109.112.135 into your browser you will find that this takes you to yahoo.com as a good example.

The domain names and IP Addresses that are relevant to your searches are stored in a domain name server or (DNS). So when you type the URL you want to find into your web browser, your computer sends a request to the DNS at your Internet service provider in order to find the IP address of the web server.

Once it has the correct address it can talk directly to the web server and you can search the site for as requested. I quick way to find the ip address of any web site is to use the ping command. Go to Start - Run and type, for example ping yahoo.com into the box.

A small window will appear with the IP address of the web server. There are also many great domains that supply this service and more, try ip-adress.com and see what I mean. Knowing this can help you understand why you will get delays when you register a new domain name and web site or any changes you make to an existing web sites dns settings.

The DNS information need to propagate correctly and this can take up to 24 hours for all the DNS servers globally to update and list your new domain setting that hold your website.

Who Controls Domain Names?

Domain Names are controlled by an organization called the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers or ICANN. They are responsible for deciding how the internet TLD structure should look and what TLD's should be used.

ICANN is a non-profit organization acting under the authority of the US Government, Department of Commerce.

Although ICANN make the big decisions on what TLDs are available, each TLD or country has its own domain registry.

Nominet for instants looks after all .uk domains and decides on the structure and release of the UK's second level domains. Second level domains can be useful for a country and can include many variables such as .co.uk, .sch.uk and .me.uk.

Registering A Domain Name?

To register a domain name, there a few thing you need to know. First need to check that the domain name you want is still available.

The easiest way to do this is to just go to the top of this page and use the domain name search box supplied. Anyone can register a domain name within the framework of allowed suffixes provided it isn't already taken.

There are some restrictions on TLD's such as .eu, .us and .Asia requiring to registrar to reside within a specific geographical location. But be careful in your choice of domain name, although there a few restriction on registering a domain name this does now mean that someone may not consider they hold title of the name.

This could result in a person or company taking action against you through the disputes tribuneral in order to protect their names and trademarks or worse still take over your domain name. This is known as cyber squatting - where an individual as registered a domain name purely in the hope they can sell it on or cause disruption or brand damage to the rightful owner.

Domain Auctions

If the domain name you want is not available it's still possible you may bee able to buy it. If the domain name does not have a web site you can find out who owns it and contact them about the possibility of purchasing the name from them. There is nothing stopping you doing this and it is perfectly legal to do so as long as both parties are in agreement.

To find out who owns a domain name you can do a search on websites like whois.net A search with Whois will show you details on who registered that domain, their name, address and contact details. Once you have decided on your domain name or names you need to contact a domain registrar. Domain registrars are approved companies that can register domains on your behalf.

It pays to shop around when choosing your domain registrar and often several are needed depending on amount and type of TLD's you wish to purchase. Prices can vary widely due to the global nature of the web. It doesn't really matter where the domain company is based and big saving can be found by selecting a registrar based overseas.

Once you have successfully acquired your domain name you will want to setup your web site, before you can do this you need to research web hosting providers. They will supply you with a web hosting and email hosting package. This basically means that you have hired web space on that companies web servers.

The beauty of owning your own domain and setting up a web hosting account is that it will give you full control of how you want you domain structure and control over the email for that web site and domain name.

Web hosting providers and the services they supply could be a whole article in itself but I will not go into to much detail here. Basic web hosting packages supply you with about 50MB of space and usually there will bee bandwidth restriction on the amount of data you can downloaded per month.

You need to spend a little time working out exactly what your site will be doing and what kind of services you require. It's no use paying $100 a month for a dedicated server just to run a word blog that's updated once a month.

New category-based TLDs are coming online all the time and available for the general public to register. When a new TLD becomes available, there is a period of time where businesses get the chance to apply for domains to register that they consider as their trademarks ahead of the general public.

The .asia TLD is going through this process now. During this 'Sunrise' period, companies and individuals have the chance to apply for specific names or trademarks before the general public. The sunrise period lasts for four months and names that are not allocated in this period are opened up to the general public on a first come first serve basis.

There is now an entire industry setup to help you get your name from these situation and it is called the pre-registration scheme. For an extra fee you can be top of that companies attempt to secure your name. Depending on the name and amount of interest this process can be a good way of ensuring your domain name or names.

Some companies use a slightly different approach and start a pre or post auction on the domain name they manage to acquire. Great business when you think of it, if they manage to register hosting.eu or hosting.asia for $15 then auction it to the highest bidder they can make themselves a lot of money for very little work.

This in itself is a very contentious issue but until the different governing bodies get their act together you have little choice to play the game. If you do find a company that will pre-register your domain name for a fee make sure they ensure a full refund of all fees if they are not successful in registering your chosen name.

The pre-registration service is not officially recognized by the domain registration organizations and so you have no rights to that name until it is fully registered.

Brian Harrison is a writer for Bee Ltd a domain acquisition and development company that has many years experience in the domain name and internet market. You will find many useful articles and advice on all manner of subjects associated with domains names, SEO and web development at our site: Bee.eu

Buying Yourself a Domain? Choose Your Domain Name Wisely

By Adam N Jones

Choosing a domain name is one of the most important aspects of setting up your online business. The domain name you choose will be what your website is known as and remembered as. This will become your identity online and offline hopefully. You need to buy your domain name based on what you are offering or the product you are promoting.

Doing research is one of the most important aspects of choosing a truly memorable domain name. You want choose one that has the ability to become a household name. It needs to be related to your product or niche. Most people think that they need the company name or product name in the URL. That isn't the case.

Always choose a .com domain name. There have been a lot of different type of domain names coming available in the last year but none of them carry the weight that a .com domain name does. One thing you can do when you purchase your domain name is to see if other forms of your domain name are available and buy them as well. If you buy yoursite.com you can also buy yoursite.net and yoursite.org and then just link them back to your .com domain.

Your goal when choosing a domain name is to choose one that is short and also very memorable. You want to choose a domain name that can be said on a radio commercial and remembered by the audience until they get around to visiting it. Short and sweet is the name of the game. The only exception to this is if adding a descriptive adjective will help your domain name become more memorable.

These are just a few of the basics that you will need to keep in mind when choosing a domain name. Don't rush this step because you are choosing your online identity. This is the name your company or product will be remembered as across the world.

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There is Money to Be Made From Dead Domain Names

By Michael Gooden

Each and every day there are lots of domain names going up for sale because the purchase who initially purchased them has forgot about them and the ownership of them has expired. However a savvy domain name investor will quickly snap these types of domains up and have the same amount of traffic going to it even though it is actually considered to be a brand new site. So unfortunately those who forget about their domains are losing out and those that are searching for and investing in them are making money.

All websites only survive if they have regular amounts of traffic being directed towards their site each day. So often when a site which has a memorable domain name and constant traffic going to it becomes available they will quickly be snapped up by some of the more savvy domain name investors around. Then often within a matter of days they have sold the domain name on for a profit.

Say for example you find a site that was selling bridal goods (gowns and tuxedos) and yet it wasn't doing as well as the website owner had expected so they have forgotten about it and their ownership has expired.

Yet one day the domain name on this site expires. A smart person who is investing in domain names will use a domain watchdog service, which will provide them with instant notification of the bridal site's domain becoming available. They will then have the chance to be able to grab this domain up for a renewal cost of as little as $6.95.

Within a matter of minutes you could find yourself being the owner of a site that has plenty of traffic being directed towards it. But what you will then need to do in order to generate cash flow for it is to build a new website page with a number of related ad links placed upon it. Doing this will help to better monetize any existing traffic that is being directed towards the site.

As time passes the investor then has the choice of either building up the site further in order to monetize the traffic that is visiting, or they can simply resell (flip) it to another site owner or domain name investor or broker.

Therefore if you have an old domain name which you are considering either retiring or flipping then the first place you should consider putting it up for sale is on eBay or a popular domain name auction service. Many people are actually pleasantly surprised at how much they have made by selling off a domain name using these particular services. On eBay alone there have been some very unusual domain names go up for sale and which have been sold for more than $500.

But if you are considering become a serious investor in domain names then it may be advisable to utilize the services of a number of paid and free domain name valuation tools and sites. All of which can help you to make a more informed decision as whether this is the right domain name for you to buy or not. Although the actual value of each domain name can vary vastly it is not unusual for each domain to now sell for more than it was originally purchased for.

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Raking Money in Domain Names

By Menno Spijkstra

Domain names are like signposts on the internet. Almost all websites that you have visited or emails that you have composed used them in its addresses. Choosing one is a major step for any individual or any organization because it represents you or your business on the internet. Good domain names are those that are short, easy to remember and meaningful. For personal or business reasons, people register them in order to 'stake a claim' to a particular name. Once you have one registered, it is entirely yours for as long as you continuously pay the yearly renewal fee and abide by the terms of use. Not everyone is aware that they can actually get more money over time.

First, you can earn money by buying and selling domain names. You can make a big profit if you bought one for a low price and sell it a higher price. The difference between the buying price and the selling price is your profit. In domainprofiteer, one man bought a domain name for only $60 but he sold it for $10,000! Imagine the huge spread he got there. Second, you can get popular targeted names as they can be sold quickly at a higher price. If you do not plan to sell it, you can direct more traffic to your site and eventually have more profit.

Third, you can also park your domains in websites and sell them when somebody bids for a good price. DomainProfit methods say that parked domains have a high possibility of becoming a billion-dollar industry for paid search operators and for new breed of internet real estate developers. Parking them in websites is free and this lessens the cost of building your own website. You do not worry about maintenance and traffic. Fourth, you can also get expired domains as they can be popular and have existing traffic already. On the average, there are about 30,000 registered domains that expire everyday since there are many web site owners who fail to continue their web site business.

Fifth, another cheap traffic generating technique is redirecting visitors to your own website. Sixth, you may use them for affiliate marketing. These sites will get more clicks and therefore earn more commission. Unlike in the previous years when many people had a concept of buying in hopes of reselling them in the future, nowadays people purchase domain names to cash in money through online advertising. DomainProfiteer is a training system that reveals secrets on how to rake in cash in this industry. There is a lot undisclosed information on how to find and analyze offers that will help you choose the right one to buy. This business is surely not a fly by night industry.

With famous business tycoons investing millions of dollars in this industry, they are for sure not in this business for nothing. For these people, domains are like virtual real estate. They come with a real value that can be bought, sold, developed or leased. So, just like real estate, the value increase year after year. Eventually, by the time you sell, it may just have increased its value ten folds.

The author of this article Menno Spijkstra is an Internet Marketing specialist who has been successful with several affiliate programs for many years. Menno finally decided to share his knowledge and experience through his website http://www.AffiliateDistrict.com You can sign up for his free newsletter and join his coaching program.

Make Millions With Domain Names

By John Swanhill

Making money on the Internet is a very exciting prospect for many people, trouble is that there are so many different ways to do it that it can be very confusing to find the right one to make your fortune with! One of the best known methods of making money is by investing in domain name real estate, this is quickly increasing in popularity each and every day!

Domain names are continually selling for higher and higher amounts of money, with a particular interest in generic names such as the website datarecovery which recently sold for a staggering $1.7 million.

There are a few different ways to use domain names to make money on the Internet, we'll look at each of these now.

Generic Domain Names

When looking for generic domain names you might have your work cut out for you, most of the single word domains will already be occupied. If you work hard then you will be able to find two and three word generic domain names.

Don't get too creative, try to choose domains that people would actually visit if they were interested in the industry.

Look out for Trends

Try to stay up to date with current trends and language, if there are any new words which are appearing then you might like to register them as soon as possible.

New trends and new phrases are always being created, so you need to be on the lookout!

Local Domains

Another method would be choosing domains which are targeted to a certain area, for example BostonCars.com, and domains like that. Although these sorts of domains are still in their infancy they will almost certainly increase in popularity.

If you're willing to put in plenty of effort then you will be able to make millions by investing in domain names.

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