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Choosing a great domain name for your web address will help in marketing your website. If you buy the right website name, people will find your site with increased ease. More traffic gives your website a higher potential of meeting the goals you’ve set for your site whether they be revenue, lead generation, or awareness goals. Some considerations to help you choose a great domain name are followed by clues to how you can leverage Google to pick your web address: Get the .com - A domain that ends in .com is preferable as it’s the most intuitive. In fact, some people even call domain names “.com addresses”. Most Web users automatically type in .com when they're not sure of a domain extension. This makes sense as around half of the roughly 125 million domain names that have been registered are .com extensions. So, if your domain name is yournewbusiness.net, users might remember "yournewbusiness" but may type in .com at the end rather than .net. Exceptions to the .com rule can include non profits or other non-commercial enterprises. An .org extension, short for organization, can work in this instance. Another exception is country codes. In some countries, especially in Europe, the use of the country code is more predominant than .com. If this is the case in your country and your target customers also resides within your country then definitely target acquiring a domain with your country code rather than a .com extension. Absolutely do not use a .info domain. Multiple domain registrars have had .99 cent or even one year free .info offers. Unfortunately spammers registered a significant number of .info domains and build fraudulent websites. It appears Google has subsequently scrubbed all .info domains out of their natural search results to facilitate their "no evil" policy. Put your innovative marketing hat on - It’s a fact: All the one word and most of the two word domain names are already owned. Also, all three and four letter domains are also already registered. URLs such as Rent.com or Hotels.com are really cool and marketable, but they were registered soon after the internet was invented. You can buy “premium domains”, or domains that someone else has registered. But this can be expensive. If the domain you want is taken, try adding a common ending to the name you’d like. Try adding a generic company description such as: Partners; Team; Group; Agency; or Inc. Also try adding your city or state. Geo-targeted domain names are great for local search purposes. For example, the domain name DUIattorney.com is taken. However, DUIattorneyAlaska.com was available for purchase when this blog was written. You may also have luck with adding an industry description term to your desired URL like: Dentist; Medical; Media; or IT; etc. You can also go a step further and create a truly unique domain name. Try a memorable phrase that’s related to your business. A crab restaurant has the domain name ILoveCrabs.com as an example. You could also just make up a name. Yahoo.com really didn’t mean anything until the search engine and web portal branded and marketed the domain name. Be careful here as branding a brand new name can be more expensive than you planned for. Avoid numbers - Domains that contain numbers may cause problems for folks as well. People may remember your website name that contains a number, but they may not recall if the number is spelled out of not. For example, say your website name was “high5.com”. Some folks will remember your name, but type it in the browser address bar as “highfive.com” and be taken somewhere else besides your website. Therefore, in general a domain that includes numbers should be avoided. Avoid incorrect spelling - Don't fool around when it comes to spelling! Some people try to play games in this area, but domains like Starzz.net just won't cut it - they'll only confuse people. Don't try to spell something phonetically (the way it sounds when spoken). And whatever you do, don't substitute the number zero for the letter “o” -- for instance y0urname.com – as they look similar and it'll only hurt the chances that your site will be found. Using correctly spelled words in your domain name will make it easier to find your web site. Spell it right and move on. Shorter is better - Keep your domain as short as possible, while maintaining a memorable name. The longer the domain name, the more difficult it will be for someone to remember the web address name. Also, the longer the URL the more likely someone will make a typing mistake while trying to visit your site. Try to keep your domain at 3-4 words together maximum. Let Google help you find your best web address - A recent study found that over 50% of web surfers will at times bypass search engines and directly type in the keywords they’re looking for right into their browsers. So what does this have to do with finding a great domain name? Well, if you can purchase the main keywords a customer would use to find a business like yours as a domain, you will be able to score free traffic. Here’s how Google can help you find a great domain name for your website. Go to Google’s free keyword tool. Type in a search term, or keyword, you believe a customer would use when trying to find a site like yours. Now look at the number of searches for that term as well as other similar search terms that Google has suggested. What terms have the highest search results that are relevant to your business? Take those keywords to your favorite domain registrar and search to see if they’re available as a .com. If they are, buy ‘em. The term with the highest number of searches should be considered as a contender for your website name. The balance of terms will still be useful. You can redirect the other keyword domains to your main site. The worth of the traffic they generate should be higher than the small cost to register them per year. Another benefit to keyword terms is it may help in natural search rankings. No one is 100% for sure (except for Google’s code writers), but it appears Google rankings favor websites with search terms within their domain. Domain names are cheap. If you’re not sure what name works best, then buy your top contenders and test them. It’s easier than it sounds. Build your site using one domain name. Point the other domains to the domain your site is build on so when you type in the domain name it redirects to your main site. Redirection happens so fast a person won’t be able to tell it was redirected based on load time. Now, advertise your website with Google’s adwords (pay per click advertising). Set up a search ad copy test using the exact same copy, but have the website address different on each ad. Let it run a couple of days, or enough time to gain a statistically significant result. Which domain had the highest click through rate? If you’ve got a clear winner, you’ve let the market tell you what domain name it prefers rather than you guessing! Congratulations, by following these tips and letting Google help you, you’ve found your great website address. Author: This Article was written by a web hosting expert at http://www.website-hosting-reviews.net.Website-Hosting-Reviews.net reviews website hosting providers to help you find the best host to meet your website needs. 
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