How important is a domain name to your business?
Oh, it’s not especially important if you are expecting all your traffic to come from search engines and you have a site that has used Search Engine Optimization (SEO) effectively.
But what happens when you want to post a link and the full URL is listed? For some businesses that have chosen to operate their online business as a subdomain of an existing site service this URL can be especially long and may only refer to your business toward the end of the link.
If you can adapt your web address through html coding you can make your link say something like “Click here for the best in leather shoes”, however the website address is still problematic which is likely why you feel inclined to hide it under a link code.
This scenario can also be problematic if you want to advertise your website in off site advertising. For instance if you want to invite a radio audience to visit your site wouldn’t it be much better to say something like, “Visit us online at www.thestoreofchoice.com ” or do you have extra funds to pay for an advertisement that includes all the dashes and hyphens, domain and subdomain names that come with a poor domain name selection.
This same scenario is true when talking about print advertising. You would either have to have extremely small print or purchase a larger ad to accommodate the lengthy web address. Neither option seems especially appealing.
If you have promotional products like pens, key chains or Frisbees you may also find that it may not make much sense to try to include a web address that is longer than the Gettysburg Address. There’s always too much room for error when typing in long web addresses.
Most online sellers for domains can provide a very reasonable price for existing domains and you can direct your site to be found using the domain name you’ve chosen – even if you still choose to remain part of a subdomain setting.
Online domain name sellers can also provide alternate names if the one you selected is already in use. This means you might be able to keep the name you’ve chosen, but with a different end tag. For instance you might have a name in mind, but it is taken as a .com – you might find the same name available as a .net or .biz.
Review all your options before making your decision, but do try to keep your domain name short and easy to remember. This will aid in both online as well as offline marketing strategies.
Do you think Amazon.com would be as successful if their domain name was Amazonbooksellerstotheworldandyourhometoo.com? Maybe not. You see what they and other businesses have done is chosen a word that they then market as synonymous with their product. For instance Yahoo and Google are not words we may have recognized in the past, but they are now synonymous with search engines, Starbucks for coffee and Amazon for books.
When direct business names are used up in domain name options it may be time to look at a domain name that centers on a singular word in your company title – then begin promoting that word as identifiable with your business product.
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