Online Business L(a)unch™ > Setting Up a Website: Register Domain

register your domain name

Domain name is your address on the Web: this is what people type into their browsers when they want to visit  your web site. For example, www.yourinternetstore.com is a domain.

If you are serious about your business, if you want to look professional avoid using free Web address. In order to sell on the Net, you need to build up your credibility. Having your own domain name is the first step in that process.

Besides, if your free website provider goes out of business or you decide to change your web hosting service, you can easily move your www.yourinternetstore.com from one hosting company to another without losing your customers and your marketing efforts.

When selecting your domain name it's important to keep in mind both: your customers AND search engines. Descriptive domain names containing targeted search keywords can significantly boost your Search Engine rankings. On the other hand, if you make your domain name too long, people may have troubles to remember it. Try to keep the balance between Search Engine Optimization and your visitors.

Let's say you own a hypothetical flower shop and sell cheap tulips and roses. You may start with registering cheaptulipsandroses.com. It contains your main search keywords and still easy enough to remember.

You may benefit by registering cheaprosesandtulips.com also  (in case your customers forget which flower comes first).

If you already have a company with established business name, it may benefit from registering several domain names: one with your actual business name for your customers who may look for you online by typing your company name,  and another for people looking for your product.  

So if your hypothetical flower shop called "Lily's Corner", consider registering both: lilyscorner.com (your actual business name) and cheaptulipsandroses.com (your product).

In order to protect your domain name you may also want to purchase the various top level domains (.com, .net, .biz, .us)

Many 'gurus' claim that placing hyphens between the words of your domain name will help search engines distinguish your keywords better. I don't really like hyphenated domain names but this is my personal choice. If you choose a domain containing hyphens (cheap-tulips-and-roses.com) just make sure you register the non-hyphenated version as well (for customers who forget hyphens) and redirect it to domain with the hyphens.

Remember: domain names, especially .com are likely to go fast. Most chances are you'll have to name your business or your Website after your domain so be sure to register your own domain before you even start building your Website. Otherwise by the time you're ready, the name you selected might already be gone.

You can register your own domain name for as low as $8.95 a year at GoDaddy.com By the way, GoDaddy.com offers a very valuable feature:  you can make  your domain private - just like your phone number.

If you don't already know, when you register a domain, your name, address, email address and phone number are immediately made available to anyone who wants to see them. By choosing private registration your make your personal information unlisted and protect yourself from scam, spam and unwanted phone calls.

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