10 Things to Consider When Buying a Domain for Business

10 Things to Consider When Buying a Domain for Business

If you are starting a new company, a new website, a new brand or trying to take online an existing brand – then you need a domain name. Domain name is so important as it represents your brand or website.

Domain names have a massive impact all over the web in terms of bounce rate, click rate, search to social media results, to type-in traffic, to referring links, branding, offline advertising etc. There’s many places that your domain name impacts your brand and your online marketing, so it’s very important.

When it comes to buying a domain for business, there are a few things you should consider about domain name and registrar. It’s not all about finding a desired name, it’s all about branding a business.

Things to Consider When Buying a Domain Name

Here are the things to consider when buying domain name. These can help you to make the right decision.

1. Avoid Trademark Infringement

Do not register a name that has already registered as a trademark or can be confusing with well-known brand. Trademark owner may take legal action if the name infringe the rights of the trademark owner.

It is really hard to branding a name that has registered as a trademark or confusing with well-known brand. That’s why you should not register googlee.com or yaahoo.com as a domain name.

To search U.S. trademark visit USPTO website. To search European Union trademark visit EUIPO website. And you can also check Google.com if there anything matched with your desired name.

2. Avoid Black-listed Domains

Your desired domain might have been used before and in some cases, they might have been black-listed by Google or may be listed in spam database. It’s not a right decision to buy a black-listed domain, it really hampers visitors trust. Surely you will suffer if you buy a black-listed domain.

Need help on how can you check this? There are some tools to know if it is black-listed or not, visit IMWP.com to search Google black-list and visit MXToolbox.com to know if it is in spam database.

3. Make it Brandable

Brandable means it hears as a brand, or sounds like a brand. To make it brandable, you should not register names like SoftwareForSale.com or Tech-beast.com for your business. SoftwareForSale does not sound like a brand and Tech-beast is hard to brand, say or remember because it contains a hyphen.

Hyphens are really a problem when establishing a brand, you should go without hyphens. In case, you can consider name like Kleptos.com rather than Tech-beast.com as it is brandable.

You should also check that the domain name does not appear as a username on major social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus, Instagram etc. It really helps a lot when branding a business, it is called complete domination. And you can’t ignore social media on this days.

4. Make it Pronounceable

Pronounceable means easy to spell, easy to type and easy to pronounce. It’s important because human beings care most if is easy to pronounce. For this reason, you shouldn’t go with BeastsSter.com, as it is really hard to pronounce and really hard to remember – and you should ignore this.

Remember that, processing fluency varies with the language and region that you’re targeting! Some domains may seem too hard to pronounce but it can actually be very easy in their targeted area.

5. Target .com Extension

Why you should target .com extension when there are so many TLD extensions? The short answer is, .com is the most recognized and most accessible TLD, human beings care .com most.

Suppose you forgot the extension of a domain name, then what you would assume the extension when you type it in browsers. In most cases, you would probably try .com extension first and that’s human nature to try .com first. So grab the .com extension like well-known brands.

If you already have a business or brand, your domain should match your name. If the .com domain is taken, I recommend you to go with .net, .org, .co or a known ccTLD extensions.

6. Shorter is Better

Keep the domain names as short as you can manage because of processing fluency. If you find single-word domain, it’s really nice have one. The shorter the better. Less than five characters can be a game changer!

The shorter the name is, the easier is to type, remember, say and share. Please don’t ignore processing fluency to make it shorter. You should not pick OneReas.com rather than OneReason.com although it is shorter.

7. Keywords are Not Necessary!

Really it is! You may get 2 to negative score from 100 by targeting keywords in your domain name, so not necessary to have keywords in domain name. Think about Google, Amazon, Twitter – they are the top brand in the world but they don’t have keyword richness in their domain name.

And think about Apple.com – this is not a fruit company, a well-branded tech company. Another great example is Alibaba.com – has no relation what it means. So names that brandable is fine.

Video – Matt Cutts (former head of the web spam team at Google) about keywords in domain name.

Things to Consider about Domain Registrar

You should consider these things about domain registrar. Are they offer these features or not?

8. Cheap Renewal Price

Do not focus only on first year’s registration discount offer, check what is the renewal price after first year. Most domain registrars offer lower prices on first term, but renewal prices are so high.

If you’re planning to keep your domain for longer period, cheap renewal price can save hundreds in the long run. As my concern, NameCheap offers the lowest renewal price compare to other registrars.

9. Ask about Flexibility

Flexible means everything within your control. Flexible means easy to transfer, easy to change DNS settings, easy to make WHOIS data private, easy to change owner details, offer automatic renewal option etc.

There are some situations where you would want these options. There can be hassle when you want to transfer your domain to another registrar. So check the features of the registrar.

10. Available Support

The last thing you should check if it is easy to get support from the provider, at the very least, they should have a library of help documents you can look up for common tasks, look for support that matches your technical knowledge.

Better if they offer live chat support 24/7 or phone call number for their customers. 24/7 live chat support is best when provided phone numbers are outside of your country.

Final Thoughts

It’s your responsibility to choose the best domain for your business. A right domain name can grow your traffic and can improve your web presence. This is particularly important for eCommerce and business websites.

After considering all the factors discussed above, register your domain name from a registrar. I recommend NameCheap domain registrar as they offer lowest price, flexibility and 24/7 live chat support.

That’s all. I would like to hear from you all what you think about buying domain.

5 Comments on this.

    • Both extensions are quite same in SEO perspective. If your domain represents an organisation, then go for .org extension … in all other scenario .net normally fits better.

      Reply
    • No way! If you consider price, Godaddy sometimes offers cheaper prices than Namecheap, but that’s only for the first term, renewal prices are so high in Godaddy.

      A .com domain costs $10.98 per year in Namecheap, but in Godaddy it’s $17.99 !!! That’s huge difference for a domain. That’s why, we recommend Namecheap registrar.

      Reply

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