I recently taught a class for start-ups and entrepreneurs on web marketing. I dedicated one slide to the topic of selecting a domain name. I was extremely surprised how this topic sparked so much discussion and interest. In light of this, I thought a blog post would help others facing that most important decision.

Many of the unemployed today are reinventing themselves and starting up businesses. One of the most important tasks a business owner must consider, second to selecting a company name, is the selection of their domain name. Brands are greatly affected by the ability of the company to obtain the matching domain name. If a company builds a brand around a name to which it does not own the domain name, it can end up directing traffic to another domain owner’s site. If it is a competitor, this surely would be problematic.

As you list your potential choices, determine how the name will be interpreted in both writing and in speech. Two or three word domains can easily be read in more than one way. A good domain name should require little or no explanation when verbalized. In other words when you tell someone your web site address and they ask, “is 2 spelled to
or two”? or “is it the number 2?”. Having to offer an explanation adds an unnecessary level of confusion and will guarantee that your domain name will be difficult to remember.

Numbers should be avoided and so should phonetic letters; i.e. “fone” for “phone”, “magik” or “Magic”. Also avoid homophones like “sweet” and “suite”. Avoid hyphens; i.e. www.my-company-store.com.

When you search domains during the purchasing process you’ll see the many extensions (.com, .biz, .info, .us) that are available. Domain registrars will always show you the “3rd rate” names like .biz, .us, .info etc. They want to increase the amount of your order by encouraging you to sign up for those names. Do resist for the mere fact that the business world thinks in .com and that’s the way it is. So stick with .com under all circumstances.

Keep your name as short as possible. Remember you domain will be reflected in your email address. If the name is longer but yet easy to remember and spell than that should be acceptable.

And once you register your domain, do put up a placeholder or a splash page until your web site is ready. The experts claim domain name longevity is a factor in search ranking. Now that is another whole topic.

I am very excited to be attending the up and coming New Jersey Online Marketing Summit that will be held on Wednesday July 16th in Basking Ridge. The full day event will cover topics like social media strategies, search engine optimization, paid search, website usability, web analytics and tracking, email marketing, content management, site search, web site budgeting and planning, ecommerce, integrated marketing and more. It’s great that such an event is actually in New Jersey versus having to go into New York City.

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Electronic handout: NJAWBO Essex Chapter meeting October 17, 2006

Down, down, down. Would the fall NEVER come to an end! `I wonder how many miles I’ve fallen by this time?‘ she said aloud. `I must be getting somewhere near the centre of the earth. Let me see: that would be four thousand miles down, I think–‘ (for, you see, Alice had learnt several things of this sort in her lessons in the schoolroom, and though this was not a VERY good opportunity for showing off her knowledge, as there was no one to listen to her, still it was good practice to say it over) `–yes, that‘s about the right distance–but then I wonder what Latitude or Longitude I’ve got to?’ (Alice had no idea what Latitude was, or Longitude either, but thought they were nice grand words to say.)
Excerpt from ALICE’S ADVENTURES IN WONDERLAND by Lewis Carroll

Such is the world of search engines. As your site travels the mysterious road of site optimization, with the insight below, you‘ll be armed with a few ‘grand words’ so maybe YOU‘LL know where you are going.

We are going to discuss several factors search engines (SE‘s) use when ranking your site. These are URLs, text, links, popularity, submission and HTML code.

To begin to understand these factors one has to remember that the goal of a search engine is to display the most relevant sites first. SE‘s use a complex site of algorithms. These algorithms calculate the best matches. What makes this art and science even more challenging is that the algorithms are kept secret and often change when work arounds (methods that get through the algorithms) are discovered. For example, in the early days, webmasters would stuff keywords into their pages by add text that matched background color.

Below are the factors to consider:

URL
-If possible do use keywords as part of your domain name
-Purchase other extensions to protect your name and your brand
-Create page name that a relevant to page content; for example www.bza.com/web_design.html better than bza.com/wd.html

TEXT
-Content is king
-Your site should be filled with relevant and keyword content
-Organized content- with heads and subheads
-Write articles, white papers, commentary, news, blogs, write about your keyword subject
-Naturally expand content with good keywords
-Change content often; SE‘s will visitor when they see new content
-Avoid; doorway pages, write content just for SEO, machine generated pages; small text, text that matches the background, keyword stuffing
-Don‘t repeat content
-Don‘t put keywords in graphic images; SE‘s can‘t read graphics
-To find keywords and phrases relevant to web sites used Yahoo Search Suggestion Tool , Google‘s Keyword Tool , WorkTracker Microsoft Ad Center
-Add geocentric terms to target local areas.
-Blogs- with content related to the web site; link back to the web site

HYPERLINKS
-Linking to relavant content within your site. Takes advantage of crawling as well as keyword
-Every page must be linked… No dead ends
-Find out what pages are indexed in Google by searching site:http://www.yoursite.com

POPULARITY
-Measured in two ways; Most frequently clicked link for keyword search on the site and inbound links
-Related to your content- makes you an authority
-Purchased listing/links from reputable sites
-Do not participate in non related link exchanges or link farms
-Inbound links from popular sites, .edu, .gov adds value to your rank
-Press release links like PRWEB.com
-Who links to you now? Go to Google and search link:http://www.yoursite.com

SUBMISSION
-Do submit your site only once. Google, Yahoo Search,
-Don‘t used any automatic program, submit each page, or more than once,
-Submit to directory, DMOZ and Yahoo
-Organizations, listing plus industry directories

META CODE and HTML
-First 100 lines on code; have the most influence
-Meta Tags are not a magic bullet; Meta Tags are the page title, description (12 to 24 words) and keywords
-Your page title is the single most important factor… should be 6 to 12 words; each page -should have a descriptive and unique page title.

Not to be forgotten
-Don‘t use Flash for an entire web site
-Get rid of Frames; old technology, search engines can‘t index and follow frames