Buying the Right Domain Name for Your Organization
A domain name is the string of characters used to identify your online space giving you an online identity for your website and email addresses. At Branding Arc our domain name is “brandingarc.com”.
Your domain name is the foundation of your organization’s digital communications and is one of the most important marketing decisions you will make. When we develop an identity for an organization or product we always have the GoDaddy.com domain search tool handy to make sure a suitable domain is available.
Through our years of experience we have seen some simple (and some more complicated) problems with companies selecting their domain name. We wanted to share some of our tips finding the right domain for your organization.
Keep Your Domain Name Simple
When it comes to your organization’s domain name keep as simple as possible. Using your organization’s full name can often be a little too long, so you should always consider shorter variations of your organization’s full name to be your primary marketing focus. That doesn’t mean that for $20/year you should not buy a variety of domain names to point at your website and splash pages, but you are going to want to select one primary domain to use in your marketing efforts.
Easy to Say
Make sure your new domain name is easy to say and for people to understand. I constantly find myself giving people either my website domain or email address over the phone and with the name “Branding Arc” I constantly have to spell the domain name verbally to make sure people are going to find me when they look for me. If your domain is not easily told to someone else verbally, you may need to consider a different domain name for your business.
Avoid Hyphens
In order to get their company’s exact name I have seen a number of businesses that include a “-” in their name where spaces would normally be. I normally advise our clients to avoid using a hyphen when selecting their domain name because ultimately it is going to cause confusion with customers, vendors and other people that are looking your organization up by name. Often, it makes sense to find a shortened or abbreviated version of your business name. For example United Debt Holdings, LLC might use a shorter domain like udhllc.com instead of the much longer uniteddebtholdings.com.
Choosing Registrar
Not all domain registrars are created equal! Some companies are just better to work with than others and since once you choose a domain registrar it can be a major pain to move, you want to make the right decision from the very beginning. Personally my preference is GoDaddy.com because they have the most flexible platform to work with. Other registrars like Network Solutions may charge additional fees for basic services like domain forwarding. Through our experience GoDaddy has provided the most reliable service and the most attentive customer support of all the hosts we have dealt with.
When registering your domain with GoDaddy keep in mind that domain registration and web hosting are very different things. Your domain registration is purchasing the right to your domain name and does not include a web server for you to host your actual website files. GoDaddy does offer web hosting services, but I would not purchase web hosting services until you have your website developed and ready to deploy.
Conclusion
Selecting the right domain for your organization or product is the most important marketing decision you will make. Take some time to consider your options and once you have made up your mind, give it one more day just to be sure. Say the name out loud and tell your friends the prospective domain over the phone and see if they can understand it verbally. Remember, this is an important enough decision to take your time and do it right the first time.