Charles Lau dot Com

A domain name acts as the very first action you can take to start your new business. It builds a reputation of your business whereby the public can refer you as. Making a wrong choice of your domain will lead you to a long term regret because it is not easy to make changes to the world’s mindset who already knows you as. It may even take marketing effort to re-educate the world of your new domain name!

A domain name is usually made up of letters, keywords, brand name or the business owner’s name. Whichever way you choose, it has to do with your marketing method. Let’s see how…

Letters
A domain name such as “spr.com” doesn’t mean anything to anyone of us. But it can be effective if you use the right marketing effort. It may hurt your new business if your business is marketed through internet marketing and search engine marketing. That’s because the public does not know what SPR stands for and they wouldn’t purposely search for such word unless they are informed of this kind of words to search for. (It hurts! Isn’t it?)

The Good
However, lettered domain names are useful to verbal communication such as telephone marketing especially. Try talking on the phone with your prospects and start introducing your domain name here. “Hello sir, our website is www.spr.com, we are a reputable company doing this business.” That’s cool! Easy to remember, easy to express your website address effectively!

The Bad
Now on the other hand for marketing using verbal communication, try this “Hello sir, our website is www.superpowerrealisation.com, it is w-w-w-dot-s-u-p-e-r-for-super-p-o-w-e-r-for-power-r-e-a-l-i-s-a-t-i-o-n-for-realisation-and-realisation-is-s-not-z-in-it, we are a reputable company doing this business.” Now that domain name really hurts your business in telephone marketing!

Keywords
Keyword domain names are names that contain all the keywords that an Internet user is likely to search for. Examples will be “YouAreTheBest.com”, “MakeYourVeryOwnMoneyMachineNow.com” and “ControlYourDestinyNow.com”. This is effective for internet marketing and search engine marketing especially. It helps the search engines to index your website effectively when you use keywords in your domain name as well as your contents inside. It makes your site more searchable by search engines, and readable by Internet users.

The Good
Just imagine this domain name is as effective as it is on almost different occasions. When you are on the phone, you can say “Just go to www.mybestproduct.com and you will see all the best things in life!”… Or the search engine will also identify the keywords in your domain name which signifies how important that word can be! Search engines don’t really able to interpret all the brand names in the world… Maybe “thebest.com” is the brand for “The Best”? Or maybe it’s not a brand? Search engine sees the word as a keyword only… Or when you do marketing to the mass, the keyword in the domain immediately tells the whole world who you are!

The Bad
Well, it can hurt your business when keywords stick together in the wrong way… When you meant the domain name to contain keywords in this way, it can turn out another way! Let’s say your domain name is “HeIsTheReachingStar.com”… People and search engine might mistaken it as “HeIsThereAchingStar.com”! From “He Is The Reaching Star” to “He Is There Aching Star”… It has a tremendous effect if interpreted wrongly.

Brand Name
It is always good to have your own brand. Because as you build your brand to be reliable to your customers, this brand will stay reliable for as long as you want… And most importantly, this name is transferable to another person who wishes to take over and continue to be reliable! It needs a lot of marketing education, unlike the keyword-domains. But the difference is that keywords sometimes tend to become part of a category which people might not know what you mean… For example, can “car.com” mean a car magazine? Or a car agent? Or a car fan club? Whereas, the brand name builds a trust and a firm understanding of what it represents by its own name… Go for brand name if you are going long term with your business…

The Good
A brand is a name which is unique and people will be able to recognize it for the rest of their lives if you build it up properly. You will enjoy a brand which can sell when the business is ready. A good domain name is as good as a physical business for its brand… For example, “Google.com”, “Amazon.com”, “Ebay.com”, “Yahoo.com” and “Msn.com”…

The Bad
Because it’s a new business, you need a lot of supporting words with the brand name in order to let people know what your brand is all about. For example, “Machale Private Limited, your reliable printing company for your publishing needs…” If people were to look for Machale, they may think of it as just a person’s name… As a startup company, nobody will know your brand to search for you unless you let them know in one way or another… Hence, search engine optimization for that brand name is almost out of your choice even if it eventually becomes your top position in search results.

Your Own Name dot Com
Having your own name as the domain is not a bad idea. It builds yourself up as an expert in the business, and it can bring in lots of potential opportunities because you are the actual person to be approached! It gives people an idea that you are really serious in business because you are going to build or destroy your own name for life on the Internet!

The Good
Having your own name, a lot of people will respect you for your seriousness in business. People will look at what you have to say about yourself for the world to hear. It builds up a recognition of yourself almost instantly. People who are into their own profession such as lawyers, doctors, singers, actors, consultants, speakers and even entrepreneurs can have their part of having their very own name website for people to look at. It is an official website of yourself! Welcome to You Inc!

The Bad
When you are known, every movement that you do will be magnified for the world to see… For example, Paris Hilton is jailed for a short period… If she is not your friend or relative, why are you so concerned about her? Her life wouldn’t affect you anyway… It might be true that people will start to come to you in mass… People might go away in mass as well…

Conclusion
Whatever your choice will be for your domain name selection, I would suggest a keyword domain for possible short term of 5 years business… brand name domain for more than 5 years… YourName domain for a start if you are a professional… Lettered domain for all businesses which require verbal communication with the customers…