How Your Domain Name Attracts Customers
One of the fastest ways of getting attention for your business in today’s world is to have a good online presence. And the first step to getting your business online is a good domain name.
Somehow, there hasn’t been enough emphasis placed on choosing a domain name that attracts the right customers, so allow me to expound on this subject with some tips you can put to immediate use for your next website or blog.
1. Choose A Descriptive Domain
Your domain name should make it clear to your visitors what your website is about, even before they land on the site. Don’t make them guess what you’re offering.
For example, if your name happens to be Sue Brown and you own a hair salon called Sue’s Hair Salon, get a domain name like, www.sueshairsalon.com instead of www.suebrown.com. Seems pretty obvious, but you’ll be amazed at how many business owners use their personal names as domain names instead of choosing one that specifically describes their business.
Keep it as short as possible as well. It’s easier for your customers to remember and they’re less likely to make typing errors when they enter it in their web browser.
2. Get A Domain That Includes Your Keywords
Most websites rely on the search engines to a certain degree for getting visitors. If you use your keywords in your domain name, it can help with getting ranked higher in the search results.
If you’d done the research and used these customer-specific keyword phrases in your domain name, more than likely your website will be listed on the very first page of the search engines, outranking your competitors because you had exercised due diligence where keyword-rich domain names were concerned.
There are other things you can and should do to get better rankings in the search results, but starting with a good domain sets a strong foundation. Avoid using hyphens in your domain name as well since it’s believed they can hurt your rankings. Take the time to find a good domain rather than taking a shortcut and using a couple of dashes.
3. Do You Really Need .com?
Yes and no. You could use other extensions like .net, .biz or .info but it’s not the best choice. Everybody knows .com but if your site uses something else, you’re going to have to market it a lot harder to get the correct extension in people’s minds. And if someone else already has the .com version, they’ll probably get a lot of traffic from people looking for you.
How would you feel if you spend time and money marketing your website and some of those people wound up on your competitor’s customer list instead?
In some cases it makes sense to use a different extension, such as a non-profit society using .org, but generally you should stick with .com.
Don’t rush into picking a domain name. Take the time to research your market and find keyword phrases that people actually search for. Websites such as Wordtracker.com and GoodKeywords.com can help you with this. Taking the time to plan correctly in the beginning will pay off well in the long term.
