8 Tips in Picking a Winning Domain for Your Online Store

How to pick a Winning Domain for Your Online Store and have a great head start in the business!

1) Shorter is better

Long name like TheWorldMostPopularOnlineStore.com is hard to remember, hard to type and your email can barely fit into your namecard even with a super tiny font! Just Keep it Short and Simple. (K.I.S.S)

Unless, if you are trying to break Genius World Record by "outlong" the longest domain in the world...
http://iamtheproudownerofthelongestlongestlongestdomainnameinthisworld.com/

2) Is it easy to spell & pronounce?

If your store domain is hard to spell, then most people would mistype your name and they end up on some other websites instead (what if the sites were owned by your competitors?)

If it is hard to pronounce, then how are your satisfied customers going to promote you easily via Word-of-Mouth (WOM) if they cannot even shout it out loud properly?

3) Avoid numbers & hypens "-"

Whenever possible, avoid numbers and hypens. Hypens is not something that comes to people's mind and it makes your domain looks ugly. (Imagine UKPetStore.com vs UK-Pet-Store.com)

As for numbers, look at the list of Global Top Brands for 2008, do you see any names bearing a number?

4) Relevant or Unique

Is the domain name descriptive and relevant to what you do? Good example would be like MazzyFashion.com or EsnClothing.com, people can easily relate to online fashion store.

If it's NOT relevant, then is it unique and fun like Amazon.com or Zappos.com?

5) Avoiding Trademarks Issues

Avoid all variations of existing brand names, mispellings, abbreviation and trademarks. If you are NOT sure whether such name is already utilized, just Google it.

Bottomline, don't try to outsmart the big brands as they have an army of lawyers that basically do nothing but focus on sueing your ass off for so-called intellectual infringement (they can twist it in a way that normal earthlinks like us cannot). Don't believe? See how Perfumebay got sued by ebay.

6) Think BIG, Pick .com first.

Always pick a .com domain first if it's available. If .com is already taken, then settle for .net or .biz, both will still give you an International appeal. For non-US merchants, if you only focus on your local market, then goes for a Country-Level domain (See Tips 7).

7) Local market? Pick local domain

If your online store focuses on local markets rather than International markets (cross-border selling), register a Country-Specific Domain in your own country. Eg UK (.co.uk), Australia (com.au), Singapore (com.sg), China (.cn) or Malaysia (com.my). If budget allows, do register a .com / .net / .biz too as a way to protect your most valuable business assets - Your Business Trademark.

Do you know that selecting a Country-Specific Domain will give you an edge when people search for your keywords using a localized-filter for the search results? see below:

Why a Country-Specific Domain can give you an edge when it comes to local search? Most country-level domain required a local business registration (think higher trust) and if it's hosted within the same country IP address, it signifies that you are very likely offering contents for which people wants locally.

Learn more about Google's geotargeting at
http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=62399

8) Keywords in the domain

Keyword(s) in domain is also one of the factors considered by search engines when it comes to website ranking. If you can slot in a keyword or two which relate to what you do and still fit the above 7 tips, then go for that domain.

Let's assume you are starting up an online fashion shop and you like the word - pinky.Then you might want to consider all these alternatives.

- PinkyFashionHouse.com
- PinkyOnlineFashion.com
- PinkyFashion.com
- PinkyClothing.com

Interesting link:-
Interesting facts about domains