Practical Domain Tips

Brainstorm ideas

Brainstorming will make way for creative ideas and back-ups if your first choice isn’t available. I’ve found it very helpful to create a list words that could be potentially included in your domain and then combine them to find the perfect fit. Don’t be afraid to use a thesaurus to help you too.

Keep it short & easy to remember

As a rule, short domains are much easier to remember than long ones. The exception is acronyms. For example, let’s pretend your company’s name is “Bill’s Sports Bar and Billiards”. It would be hard to remember (or easy to misspell) the domain bsbb.com; something like bills.com or billsbar.com would be much easier. Unless the acronym is well known (NASA, FDA), avoid using it for your domain.

Use a .com

“.com” is the oldest and most common extension and when in doubt, people will use this extension. Of course there has been success in using alternate extensions to provide a creative twist (del.icio.us), but that adds a lot more risk to people not finding and visiting your site (or not thinking its legit).

Avoid trademarked names

First, it’s unethical to buy domains that use trademarked names. Second, it’s illegal. Don’t be mistaken and think that companies will come to you to purchase the domain for thousands; they will be more likely to introduce you to their legal department.

Register as soon as possible

Even if you aren’t sure that’s what you want to use, better to spend $10 for a year and not end up using the domain then to decide you want to use it only to realize it’s already been sold to someone else. (When you’re ready to register, view Jerry’s hosting reviews.)

Buy similar domains and use as a redirect

As stated earlier, the .com should be your main site. But, it doesn’t hurt to buy the .org, .net. and/or the .biz extensions and set them as a redirect to your site. Also, if your name is easily misspelled, buy the frequent misspellings and redirect them as well.

Don’t be afraid to make up a word or use a compound word

Think Google, Facebook, YouTube, Mashable, and LinkedIn. Just make sure it’s easy to remember!

Avoid punctuation and numbers

These both can cause confusion, increase the difficulty of remembering the URL, and make it harder to share. Keep it alpha if at all possible.

Auctions

Don’t settle on just domains that haven’t been registered, many domains owners are willing to negotiate the sale of the name and others are up for sale through domain auctions.

Industry jargon

If your site is meant only for a specific niche and not the general public, don’t be afraid to use industry jargon.

Useful Domain Name Selection Tools

Dot-o-mator

This is a great tool to assist in brainstorming. Add a beginning and an ending word, click combine, sort through the ones you like, then check the availability. Easy as pie.

Visit online: http://www.dotomator.com/

Domainr

Domainr will add a unique element of creativity to your domain name by suggesting alternate extensions. Like I stated earlier, a .com is usually the way to go, but some sites have seen incredible success with this technique (del.icio.us for example).

Visit online: http://domai.nr/

Domain Tools

Domain Tools is actually a suite of helpful tools. The top two are the “Who Is” tool which will uncover who owns the domain and “Suggestions” which will spin domain names to help you find an available domain.

Visit online: http://www.domaintools.com/

dnScoop

If you are looking to purchase a domain from an individual (either through an auction or personal transaction) this site can be a great help. It provides some statistics on the domain so you know just what you are purchasing.

Visit online: http://www.dnscoop.com/

StuckDomains

Do you have a domain that your heart is set on but it’s not available? Check this site and maybe you’ll be lucky and find it expired. At the very least it can serve as inspiration for you.

Visit online: http://www.stuckdomains.com/

What other tools do you use to help in your domain name search? Any other tips to share?

Ready, set, blog! Wait! Have you registered your domain name yet? Of course, you have to register that domain name but before you do, there is one question you have to deal with: to private or to go public? As required by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the domain owners must make their e-mail address, mailing address and phone numbers available on WHOIS directories.

Security Concerns

Yes, you read it right: all those data that are supposed to be private have to be listed on WHOIS Web sites. This way, if someone wants to know who owns a Web site, all they to do is run a quick WHOIS search, type the domain name and voila, they have access to the Web site registration details.

This is one reason why you should register your domain name privately. Imagine what could happen if spammers, identity thieves, direct marketers and even stalkers get hold of your telephone number and mailing address. The least that could happen is you get an influx of marketing letters in your mailbox; the worst that could happen is someone stealing your identity. And if you had someone obsessed with your Web site or you get someone peeved with your Web site content, you may have someone stalking you from the virtual world to the real world.

Scary, you might say.

But these things do happen and can happen to anyone, including you and me. In the virtual world, we all are vulnerable to becoming a prey to predators lurking on the internet. So, if you do not want your registration details being put up on those WHOIS registries, you might as well opt to register your domain name privately.

Opt for private registration

So, have you made up your mind yet? I say you opt for privacy. And if you still do not know how to do it, there are many domain servers out there that offer you such option. Although it would mean paying an extra, about $10 or so, for a year, I think it is the best way to keep your details secured. Think of the cost that you have to shoulder should your domain registration details fall into the wrong hands. Check with your domain server.

Keeping your details secure

If you opt register your domain name in private, your details will be blocked by your domain registrar. When people check on your domain registration on any WHOIS registry, they will not see your name, e-mail address, home address, and phone number. They will see the name of your domain host as the registrar and not your name. Is that a good idea or not? You get to keep your private details for an additional but affordable cost.

Keep in mind that there are domain extensions that would let you keep your details private and there are some domain extensions that would not allow you. If you choose .us as your domain extension that you will not have the option to keep your registration details private. Why is this so? This is because the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) requires all domain names with such .us extension must keep their registration details available to public. On the other hand, domain names with .ca extensions are assured that their registration details are keep in private as the Canadian Internet Registration Authority has stopped posting individual registrar’s details. Domain extensions like .co.uk, .me.uk, and .org.uk give you the option to keep your details private. And there are other companies online that will give you the option to register your domain name in private for an additional charge.

Picking up the right private registrar

Beware though of some domain registrars or companies offering domain registration privacy. Do not be fooled by what you read on their advertisement pages or on what these domain registrars are promising. Make a lot of researches before you decide on which company you will register your domain names. There are many forums online (my fav: Web Hosting Talk and Webmaster World) that will give you an idea whether on company can be trusted or is able to deliver their promises.

There are also news article online chronicling the experiences of individuals who have opted to register their domain name privately with domain registrars and ended up disappointed. The key in domain name registration privacy is to do it with a reputable company that has a good reputation in keeping registrar’s details private. Some companies will promise you everything but will give in to pressure. One domain name registration company allegedly gave the private details of one of its clients after receiving a phone call requesting for it. This and other related incidence should be avoided and prevented from happening. In the end, if you do opt for private registration, make sure that your blog will not earn annoy or displease people who would do everything and anything possible to track you down.

Multi Domain Hosting

Multiple domain hosting means hosting multiple websites (or domain names) in the same hosting account. Most web hosting services nowadays provides you with at least six domain names – this means you get to host one primary domain names and five addon domains in your account.

Subdomains

In the Domain Name System (DNS) hierarchy, a subdomain is a domain that is part of a larger domain. Sometimes, a subdomain is also known as a third level domain. For example, http://webhostingsecretrevealed.com is a regular URL; while http://review.webhostingsecretrevealed.com is an URL with subdomain with “.com” as the first level domain, “webhostingsecretrevealed” as the second level; and finally “review” as the third level.

Some would says subdomains are ‘third level’ domains in the sense that they are simply “sub folders” under the root directory, normally used to organize your website content in different languages or different categories. However this is not the case to many SEOs as subdomains are often treated as a different domain independent from the primary domain.

Domain Parking

A parked domain is a domain name that has not been associated with any website or e-mail services. Domain parking refers to the act of reserving the domain name for future development. Generally, all web host will have an option for ‘Domain Parking’ in your web host where visitors of the domain will be redirected to a specified webpage.

WhoIs

WhoIs is a domain name program/database where Internet users can query for domain registration information. By performing a WhoIs search you can determine who/when/where a domain name was registered. Searching WhoIs also reveals information on a website’s numerical IP address as well as DNS records.

Searching WhoIs info nowadays is very easy as there are plenty of web tools available online. DomainTools.com for example, is a website I often visit to retrive WhoIs information.

VeriSign’s Domain Name Industry Brief

Despite global economy crisis, the number of registered domain names increased by double digits (merely 16%) in year 2008, reaching an all time high 177 million domain names across all top-level domains; according to VeriSign’s quarterly report (Domain Name Industry Brief).

The report draws on a variety of analytical research including DNS intelligence, user studies and independent registrar surveys and offer detail understanding of evolving trends in the domain name market.

As conclusion for year 2008, here are some key observations by VeriSign.

• There are 177 million top level domains registered.
• 40.2% (nearly 71.1 million) of these domains are country code domains
• Generic top level domains grew by 14% (11 millions) in year 2008.
• Country code domains grew by 22% (23 millions) in year 2008.
• Largest top level domains in order are: .com, .cn, .de, .net.

In case you’re interested to read further, check out Pingdom’s blog post. They’ve dug out VeriSign’s quarterly reports for the past few years and made some interesting comparisons.

Why am I telling you this?

I want you to know that more and more people are getting their piece of share on the World Wide Web. Things that couldn’t exist a few years back have now become humdrum. People on Internet have created jobs and entire industries that couldn’t existed a decade ago. Internet world is expanding fast, regardless of our economy status.

The questions is, are you keeping up quick enough? In case you have a website (or a blog) idea that yet to be put in action, don’t wait. Register your domain, get a web host and start working on it.

New to web hosting and development? You might want to start reading at Web Hosting 101 Classroom.

Picking up a good domain name for business is never an easy job.

First you need to be creative enough to come up with something brandable; secondly, with the SEO and marketing factor kick in, your domain name has to be business relevant; and last but not least, even you have passed thru the first two stages, you’ll still have the world to compete with – your specially-crafted domain name might be registered by someone else!

Quick tips for domain name searchers

So, in case you’re troubled by words and undecided for a domain names, here are the tips you might find handy.

• Name your website using your association name. Example: Sony.com, DishNetwork.com, and HushPuppies.com.
• Generic names are cool but most of them are reserved by domain registrant. So unless you have a fat wallet and willing to spend thousands for just a domain name, you can forget about registering single word (or phrases) as your domain name. Example: HostingServiceWeb.com in GoDaddy’s stock cost $2,088 at the time of writing.
• Avoid hyphenated domain names. They look spammy most of the time in Search Engine’s eyes and hard to be remembered by users.
• Consider varies TLDs when the “.com” and “.net” if your desired domain names are taken. Example: WebHostingSecretRevealed.com is taken; try WebHostingSecretRevealed.biz.
• Both short and long domain names have their pros and cons. Short domains are easier to remember and easier to be ‘branded’; long domain names on the other hand may consist of more keywords. Search engines will use the keywords of a domain as part of their ranking factor -thus benefiting keyword-riched long domain names.
• Using domain name tools help sometimes – try MakeWords, Dot-o-mator, and NameBoy.
• Think ‘FUN’ and think outside the box. Sometimes, your sense of humor is your best friend when if comes to picking up the right domain name – remember D-E-F-I-N-I-T-E-L-Y.com?

Well, choosing a domain may not be as simple as perceived but it doesn’t have to be such a grueling challenge either. I hope things are easier when you apply tips above.

Search for an domain name

To check wether if your desired domain name is already taken, try search:

.com .net .org .info biz. .us .mobi .tv .ws .name .cc .de .jp .be .at .co.uk .me.uk .org.uk .co.nz .net.nz .org.nz .cn .com.cn .org.cn .net.cn .tw .com.tw .org.tw .idv.tw .jobs .eu .fm .ms .nu .tc .tk .vg

An add-on domain is a new domain name that’s added on top of your main domain in your hosting account. An add-on domain do not have its own control panel page (cPanel for example); rather, it’s squatting below the main domain where a sub directory is added in your main hosting root directory (normally in ‘public_html’ folder). The add-on domain will have it’s own index files (the homepage of the add-on domain) and cgi bin folder.

Add-on domain vs Subdomain: The differences

An add-on domain shouldn’t be confused with subdomain as they are different things. An add-on domain has its own stand alone URL, for example www.webhostingsecretrevealed.com; while a subdomain URL are linked with its ‘mother’; mail.webhostingsecretrevealed.com for example is a sub domain.

The biggest differeces that seperate add-on domain with subdomain is that subdomain is free of charge, while adding an add-on domain requires you to register your unique domain name via a domain registrar – which would cost your an annual fees.

The benefits of an add-on domain

The biggest benefits of having an add-on domain is that it helps saving hosting cost.

As the add-on domain shares all the resources on your web hosting (like bandwidth, disk space); it’s much cheaper to maintain multiple websites on the same web host. In the same time, the add-on domain has almost the same features that you get from a major domain in your hosting account. The add-on domain will have its own FTP manager, site stats, as well as cgi bin features.

How to create an add-on domain in your hosting account

1. Search for a favorable unique domain name.
   

   .com .us .net .org .biz .info .ws .com .us .biz .info .net .org .ws .name .tv .cc .de .jp .be .at .uk .nz .cn .tw

   

2. Register the new domain namewith any domain registrar, GoDaddy for example.
3. Point the new domain’s DNS (domain name sever) to your web host’s server.
4. Login to your hosting control panel and look for the “Add-on Domains” features.
5. Fill in the new domain name, the desired folder to install the new domain, as well as your contact email.
6. Click “start” or “addon doman” (depends on the cPanel you’re using) and wait for the system to auto install your new addon domain.
7. Once it completes, your add-on domain name will be ready. You can then log into your account and you should see a sub folder called /SiteB inside of your public_html folder. Simply upload index pages, images and any other information there.

Example of addon domain setup page

Addon Domain page at Lunarpages

Addon Domain page at Bluehost

No matter you’re running your own business or hosting your own weblog, an email contact is indispensible. The best email address to have is not those free account with Yahoo or Hotmail as it makes you look all the same with the others.

We do not be just like the others.

What you need is an email account under your own domain name, for instant example – my email address: jerry@webhostingsecretrevealed.com.

“But can I create an email account under my domain name?” I heard you asking. Adding an email account under your own domain is simple and I’m going to show you how in cPanel.

1. You must own a domain name and a web hosting service.

I expect you are aware that you’ll need your own web hosting as well as a domain name before you can have your own email account setup under your own domain. If you have none of these, you can register your domain at GoDaddy and get your web hosting services at HostMonster.

2. Login to your cPanel and get into “Email Account”

Already got your web host ready? Now time get the work done. As most web hosting use cPanel control panel interface, we’ll show how to do this on cPanel. Login to your hosting account and look for an icon named ‘email account’.

3. Add a new email account

You’ll see a page like below when you get into ‘Email Account’. The following work is simple, all you need to do is to key in an account name for your email, password, the mailbox memory quota and then press the create button.

And there! Your very personal email account on your own domain is created.

In case you’re using mail client like Outlook or Mail.app, you might want to click ‘Yes’ to configure the new email into your mail client. Things’re pretty much automatic from there on and I am sure you smart brains can get it done by seconds.

This helps increasing the efficiency and decreasing the dependability, and can either be done by managing in-house servers or outsourcing the email hosting.

So there’re three possible ways for sending and receiving emails under your own domain name, and they’re:

• Email hosting service offered by your webhost as an additional feature.
• Outsourcing Email hosting to an Email hosting specialist
• Managing in-house servers

The above three options have their own advantages and disadvantages, i.e. managing an inhouse server can work best, but managing it is a big pain. Similarly, outsourcing email hosting solves the issue of in house server management but finding the best one need a careful look.

Necessary Features for a good Email Hosting

Finding a good Email host can become easy if one checks and ensures the availability of following basic features:

Solution For Spam Emails

Sometimes, spammers attack your domain with tons of junk emails that is the main reason for the decrease in efficiency, so make sure that the service provider has good spam assassination/filter, and it’s easy to use.

You May Need Email Forwarding

Email forwarding is also known as email redirect. For instance, you have “career@yoursite.com” and you want all emails on this address to be delivered to “eric@yoursite.com” and “laura@yoursite.com”, you’ll need to set up a redirect here. Don’t forget to check it while selecting an Email host.

You May Need Autoresponders

Before going to select an Email host, you also need to know about autoresponders. This option basically allows you to send a prewritten message as a reply of some specific queries asked by users, i.e. a user contacts you from contact page and checks the “Prices” category, and then he’ll be replied with an automatic message stating prices and other details.

You May Need Creating Mailing Lists

Availability of mailing lists option is a must for organizations with multiple departments. It allows you to deliver a message to multiple users using a single email address, i.e. there is business@yoursite.com and it contains the list of all employees in Business Development Department. While making a decision for Email host, must ensure that you can create and edit email lists on your domain.

Where can I get the best email hosting?

Well I can’t really tell you who’s the best as many web hosts did pretty good job in handling email hosting. For the ease of review, I’ll hand you a list of recommended web hosts that offer unlimited autoresponder and email forwarding features.

Related readings

In case you are interested to learn more, check out “How to create an e-mail account with on your domain nameHow to add an e-mail account under your own domain name?”

Have a look on the list…

• Google
• Ebay
• WordPress
• Myspace
• FaceBook

You know them all very well, for sure! Was it name that you remembered or a brand? It’s name of course, and name is converted into a brand later. The question is, does it really matter to have best domain name. Yes it does!

Domain names matter, why?

A lousy domain name can be quite a nightmare. For example www.dicksonweb.com – I bet manufacturer of instruments for monitoring temperature, humidity and pressure Dickson wasn’t aware that www.DicksonWeb.com can be also read as www.DicksOnWeb.com! :D (the company website had been changed to http://www.dicksondata.com ever since, all traffics to DicksonWeb are now divert to the new website).

Now why a name matter a lot has several reasons. Here they go:

• If your domain name is short yet meaningful, it means it can be remembered by people at once, and will cover the targeted market as well.
• Long URLs have greater probability of getting misspelled by users.
• Long URLs if separated by [-] can resolve the issue of misspelling, and can also help search engines to index a site for the keywords in the URL.
• If your domain name contains a keyword in it, chances of getting in top pages of SERP results are much higher.

Well, domain names though play a vital role in websites’ popularity, but cannot be considered as the only factor, as there’re many other things that make up a good site. Quality of services stands first among all, i.e. your visitors rate and spread word about your site only when they find value in it. And, the other major factor that contributes towards the popularity is right marketing at right time, but this is very much relevant to the first one, i.e. highly satisfied visitors do half of your marketing themselves.

Be choosy while selecting domain name, as it represents the core essence of your site, but do not stick to the name only.

As in my previous posting on domain names, every website name ends in a top level domain (TLD), which is always either one of a small list of generic names based on ISO-3166.

Top-level domains are sometimes also called first-level domains.

Country code in top level domain names

You might be aware as well that certain extensions in TLD are used to describe the ‘characteristics’ of the website - like .biz for business organisation, .edu for websites related to education, .org for public organisation; while certain top level domain names are meant to show its location. Registration of country code top level domains  (like .co.uk and .co.jp) are restricted for the citizens of the corresponding country; and the activities with such domains website are ruled by local regulations and cyber laws.

List of country code top-level domains

The country code top-level domain (ccTLD) extensions are (in alphabet order):

.ac .ad .ae .af .ag .ai .al .am .an .ao .aq .ar .as .at .au .aw .ax .az
.ba .bb .bd .be .bf .bg .bh .bi .bj .bm .bn .bo .br .bs .bt .bw .by .bz
.ca .cc .cd .cf .cg .ch .ci .ck .cl .cm .cn .co .cr .cu .cv .cx .cy .cz
.de .dj .dk .dm .do .dz
.ec .ee .eg .er .es .et .eu
.fi .fj .fk .fm .fo .fr
.ga .gd .ge .gf .gg .gh .gi .gl .gm .gn .gp .gq .gr .gs .gt .gu .gw .gy
.hk .hm .hn .hr .ht .hu
.id .ie .il .im .in .io .iq .ir .is .it
.je .jm .jo .jp
.ke .kg .kh .ki .km .kn .kp .kr .kw .ky .kz
.la .lb .lc .li .lk .lr .ls .lt .lu .lv .ly
.ma .mc .md .me .mg .mh .mk .ml .mm .mn .mo .mp .mq .mr .ms .mt .mu .mv .mw .mx .my .mz
.na .nc .ne .nf .ng .ni .nl .no .np .nr .nu .nz .
om
.pa .pe .pf .pg .ph .pk .pl .pn .pr .ps .pt .pw .py
.qa
.re .ro .rs .ru .rw
.sa .sb .sc .sd .se .sg .sh .si .sk .sl .sm .sn .sr .st .sv .sy .sz
.tc .td .tf .tg .th .tj .tk .tl .tm .tn .to .tr .tt .tv .tw .tz
.ua .ug .uk .us .uy .uz
.va .vc .ve .vg .vi .vn .vu
.wf .ws
.ye
.za .zm .zw

Is domain name that important?

One might ask: Does a good domain name matters? Well the direct answer is YES! In fact, a good domain name helps a lot in term of website branding and SEO. Read more: Does a good domain name matters?

Domain Name vs. your house address

Often, Internet newbies can’t seperate the differents between a domain name and web hosting.

While these two things might sounds confusing at the beginning, one shouldn’t mix them up at all as a web domain and a web hosting are referring to two totally different things.

Imagine Internet as the real world that you see/touch/feel all day. A web hosting is like a *space* (house) that you live (aka, a house); and web domain, is like the mailing address of that particular space you live in. One can understand the question ‘What is a domain name’ by referring domain name as an address of a website.

Now here’re some quick examples: Google.com is a domain name; so are Alexa.com, Linux.org, GoLearnForex.net, Billboard.biz, eLearningEuropa.info, as well as Yahoo.co.uk.

Top Level Domains (TLD)

As you might already noted, all of the examples above end with a different ‘extension’ – .com, .org, .net, .biz… etc. The part after the last dot in a domain name is known as top level domain (shortform:TLD). Some other TLDs are like .uk, .ws, .co.jp, .com.sg, .tv, .edu, and so on.

While most of these TLDs are open for public’s registration, there’re strict regulations on certain domain registration. For example the registration of country code top level domains (like .co.uk for United Kingdom) are restricted for the citizens of the corresponding country; and the activities with such domains website are ruled by local regulations and cyber laws.

Do I need to register the “WWW” in my domain as well?

Don’t be silly! WWW stands for world wide web and the existent of the word ‘WWW’ has nothing to do with your domain. So no, you don’t need to register “WWW” at your domain name.

To learn more about WWW, I suggest you to have a quick look on Google.

Domain vs Sub Domain

Take DishNetwork.GoSatelliteDeals.com for example – GoSatelliteDeals.com is the domain, DishNetwork.GoSatelliteDeals.com in this case, is the sub domain. A domain must be unique (for example there can only be one single Google.com) and must be registered with a domain agent (like Godaddy); while for sub domains, users can freely add it on top of the existing domain as long as their web host provide the service.

How can a good web hosting company help in sub domain setup?

A good web hosting company should provide a convenient setup point for your sub domains. In fact, setting up sub domains should be easy, instant, and within a few clicks. Some hosting company like Gate.com don’t bother to provide such service and my suggestion to you as consumer is don’t bother to use their services at all!

There are a few good web hosting companies that offer easy setup for sub domains and in case you’re planning to have one, here are my recommendations: Host Monster, and Hostgator. The reason I’m telling this names to you is because they are reputable, reliable, offer good bargains, and more over in our case here, provide a very convenient function for subdomain installation. All you need to do is just some typing (for the sub domain name) along with a few clicks – and zaaaap~ your subdomain is ready.

Well, that’s all for my guides in domian names. Already can’t wait to have your own website hosted online? Why not check out some of these top rated web hosting companies: Host Monster, Hostgator.

More on domain names!

If you want more readings on related topics: Country code for top level domain, Does a good domain name matters?. Or, you can go back to your class (web hosting) on virtual hosting and dedicated server hosting.