How to choose a Domain Name for your Bristol Business
When you choose the domain name for your web design, you’re choosing the way that your company will be viewed by millions of web users around the world for years, possibly decades, so it’s important to get it right and choose a good, strong name. Here are some tips on how to make your website name stand out. PS you also need web hosting to make your website work too.
Clear and Concise Domain Name
Many people will turn to the internet as their first choice for finding the information they need, or the service they want, and your domain name will be their first introduction to your company, so make it good.
Conciseness is everything when it comes to names. A long name is hard to read as a web address without spaces or punctuation, so keep it below 15 characters, and ideally no more than three words to make it easily understandable. Don’t use hyphens to split up the name as this could make it harder to find in search results, and if someone has a similar name to yours, people searching for you may be directed to the wrong website.
Don’t forget that you might need to give out your website over the phone, so it needs to be easy to say out loud with having to spell it letter by letter.
Simple and Unique
Make it unique, something that is unlike any other address and won’t be easily confused with any competitors, or even completely unrelated websites.
Make sure that it’s easy to remember, easy to spell and makes sense in relation to your product or service. You might think you’ve got a really good and clever name or pun, but will it be easy to understand and give an indication of what your business does?
Try to stay away from words that are difficult to spell or commonly misspelt, as a typo in the address will lead straight to an error page, which is the last thing you want. Try to avoid words that put three or more of the same letters together, such as missstylish.com, as these are disorientating to read and it’s easy to miss out a letter when typing. For a similar reason, remember how it will look if you include initials in a name, as this could well look totally different as an address.
And on that subject, remember that a domain name is spelt as one word with no spaces, so placing two words together could completely change the meaning of your company, leading to potentially hilarious, or even offensive, results.
SEO Friendly
Your domain name is also a good bit of advertising, as it can be used to announce your company and what they do, making it clear and concise to users will make them more likely to consider visiting your site. Keep it SEO friendly and include words that state clearly your services, such as “plumbing” or “gardening”, particularly if you are a small firm.
As people will often look for services that are close to them, it can be handy to add other features to your name that will help narrow down the choice. For Bristol based businesses, consider adding “Bristol” to your domain, or use other local features such as “Avon” to give a local feel to your name and help people associate your company with a particular area.
Short Extension
The extension is the letters after the “dot” in your chosen name. There are a huge number of possible extensions you can use, and it can be tempting to choose something unique and catchy, like pizza, to make your website stand out, but this will often work against you. If someone types the wrong extension in the web address it will lead straight to an error page which isn’t good and could make people think your site is no longer active.
The most popular extension is .com, it’s well known, and many people will often type it as the default option, assuming it’s what your website will use. It also makes your company look more professional as it’s a popular extension for many of the big companies we all know, and can give your site a boost to its profile.
Another big choice is .co.uk. If you are solely UK based, this could be a better option as it lets people know immediately you’re a UK company (don’t forget that there’s a Bristol city in the USA), and it’s also common enough for people to remember easily.
Remember that whatever name you choose will have to last a long time, even as your business grows and changes, as it’s very difficult to change a domain name, and the one you choose will become indelibly associated with your brand, so make sure it’s a good one.