Tips on choosing a Domain name
FIVE RULES FOR DOMAIN NAMES
1. Protect your Business Name
Using Extensions Effectively
Customers make assumptions about the size, location and nature of your business based on which extension you use.
Which extension should you be promoting?
That depends on what message you want to send to customers. Consider promoting different extensions in different contexts and with different customers.
Here are the traditional associations for domain name extensions:
.ca* Brands your company as home-grown and may encourage customers to "buy Canadian."
.com* Suggests a global-focus and international base.
.net * Traditionally used to designate a network of companies or strategic partners.
Now interchangeable with .com for most web-users to suggest a global company or organization.
.org* Traditionally used to designate a non-profit organization. There are no longer rules barring for-profits to use this extension; however, its traditional significance still holds for most web-users.
2. Only Alphanumeric Characters and Hyphen Allowed
Any combination of letters from the alphabet and roman numerals is acceptable.
Remember
NO spaces between words, you cannot begin or end a domain name with a hyphen (it must be surrounded by alphanumeric characters).
3. Make it Descriptive
The goal is to make it easy for your customers to remember your web site address and associate with your products or services.
4. More Ideas
Use your name - by including your company name in your domain, you help customers find you on the Internet use keywords - these are words that come to mind immediately to describe what you offer your customers. Shorter is Better. It also happens to be harder to obtain short, descriptive domain names that are available for registration.
5. Keep it Simple
A domain name that's easy to remember and spell will increase the number of hits to your site - and more importantly - improve the recall of your web site address among your target customers.
