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Domain Names and Strategies |
Registering Your Domain |
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Before you choose or buy your domain name, be sure that you are going to be the actual owner of your domain. Don’t let anyone else buy it for you. Don’t let your webmaster or someone else not directly associated with you or your company buy the domain. Be sure that you always have access to the username and password to the registrar account that holds the domain.
The best situation is that you are the account holder at the registrar. So I would suggest that when you do pick your domain name, that you are logged in as the owner of the account, and that’s when you buy the domain.
All too many times I have run across people that want me to help them with their website but they have no way of getting to their files on the server or to even have the ability to point their domain to a new host or server. And this is because they have allowed their webmaster or marketing person to buy their domain, which is then held in the buyer’s own account.
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Now as time goes on, sometimes these people feel like THEY own the domain. Especially as you get working on it and get further into it, they feel like they own the website like it’s some kind of intellectual property or creation that they own.
I have run into numerous situations where we have been put into extremely difficult and awkward situations when a webmaster will not release a website to the owner. This can get to be very ugly. Or what if something happens to your webmaster, like they drop out sight or if the worst happens, that they pass away. You will be left with no access to your own website.
What if the domain name is your own name and you can’t even access it or even say that you own it because you didn’t register it yourself.
This is extremely important. We don’t have a crystal ball. We don’t know what’s going to happen in the future. Relationships change. You need to own your domain.
For my clients, I insist on them having their own registrar account. When they’re building a new website, I tell them to go open their own account at the registrar and buy the domain. Because I believe it’s theirs and they should always be able to have access to it so if something happened to me, or they got upset with me, they could just leave me in the night. They need to have complete control. |
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What registrar do I recommend? |
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The only registrar I’ve ever recommended is GoDaddy.com, and this is because of their user interface. They allow complete access for a webmaster to do whatever they need to do.
I have seen registrars where you have to beg and plead the tech support department to make changes for you, and then you’re on their timeline. Sometimes they don’t even answer your emails.
So I have seen the best access through GoDaddy.com, and they also happen to have very good prices for their domains and easy renewal process. GoDaddy.com is the best registrar company that I’ve ever used.
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Choosing a Domain Name |
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There are many things to taken to consideration when choosing a domain name. What I recommend for people who don’t have a domain and don’t have a website is to select a domain name that has the most important keywords to their business or what they’re trying to accomplish. And that is where the website files should be hosted permanently.
Then choose - what I call - the business card domain. This is the domain name that’s real pretty and simple. It needs to be very easy to say. Ideally, you should not have to explain how to enter your domain name into a browser.
Your business card domain simply gets forwarded to your keyword domain. Your keyword domain should be based on keyword analysis. It is acceptable to have hyphens in your keyword domain.
Real Life Example: I have a client that is a holistic doctor, and he‘s located in Los Angeles. We bought the domain holisticdoctorlosangeles.com because that is a really good search term for his type of medical practice. People that are searching for a holistic doctor will type into the search engine “holistic doctor”. Also, we included a geographic reference because that type of business will always be a “local business.” However, the doctor’s business cards say drjosephmd.com. His business card domain points to holisticdoctorlosangeles.com
By the way, he also bought his domain spelled both ways: doctorjosephmd.com and drjosephmd.com. The office staff never needs to spell it over the phone.
If you use the keyword domain strategy, then that also leaves you more flexible to change the website name if the business name changes, or if you want multiple domains to assist in marketing results tracking. That has been an extremely successful strategy, and I highly recommend it. |
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