Choosing A Domain Name
Some people choose a domain name to help with their rankings for their main keyphrase. The company I sound engineer for use theatre-for-training.com as their domain, even though their company name is Theatre Universal. Unsurprisingly they are ranked top for the search term "theatre for training".
Using your own name, or any other information that isn’t relevant to your products should be avoided. The domain "david-spencer-pottery.com" won’t perform as well as "hand-made-pottery.com". Although, If David Spencer is already famous for pottery, the first option could be a good choice.
I think it is worth including at least a word from your main keyphrase in your domain.
From a marketing perspective it is better choosing a domain that is reasonably short. A domain like "beautiful-hand-made-garden-rakes.com" isn’t the easiest thing in the world for your users to remember. If you ever have to say the domain in a phone conversation, reading it out and saying "dash" four times is a bit of a mouthful.
Generally .com domains perform better than other types, they receive the largest total visitor numbers. If you don’t live in the U.S and are selling predominantly to a local market a domain extension for your country will get more targeted traffic. A .co.uk domain will rank higher in Geolocation searches from the U.K. Many shoppers will look at the domain extension in search results on click on the ones based in their country.
Posted by Tom on Mon 8th Dec 2008
Comments about Choosing a Domain for Ecommerce
Mo
Hey Tom,
I agree with both the post and Linda, Big companies such as Orange probably spend alot of money trying to get closer to the top of search engines as thier names do not really reflect on what they do. Just to think the thousands they must had spent to get thier name to reflect on thier services.
Orange = colour - fruit - mobile phone is what strikes me when I say orange
Posted on Sun, 28 Dec 2008 06:22:24
Tom
Hi Mo!
Thanks for your comment. I suppose the branding of ecommerces sites could be covered in a seperate topic.
As you say, thousands or even millions can be spent on branding a company such as Orange. Without TV and print advertising no one would ever have searched the net for 'orange' when looking for a phone company.
Without a large marketing budget I think using a domain name that includes relevant search terms is a good way to increase visitors.
Posted on Tue, 06 Jan 2009 14:31:00
Linda
Some good advice here. I agree entirely with the shorter the better. Think of top company names like Orange or the Body Shop. They are instantly memorable.
Posted on Mon, 15 Dec 2008 23:18:13