Domain names - the identity in the web

A web address is an important marketing tool. In the interest of improving readability the registration of a well selected domain name is recommended. A short name is easy to remember for the user and the domain name should communicate the company name, the brand name or the slogan.

Domain names are not only for business usage, also privat persons can register a domain name. It could be the lastname, a combination of first and lastname, or maybe a nickname. With an own domain name you save your identity in the web, you look professional and you are independend. Even if you change your access provider you web address will be yours all the time and the web site and email addresses under your own domain will remain the same. Registering your own domain you should take care who will be the registrant. The registrant should also be the administrative contact who is the only one who is responsible for the domain name. He has the authority to modify the domain name. It is annoying, if you detect after the registration that you are not the registrant and administration contact of the domain name. Reliable web hosters and registrars like emerion will always enter the customer as registrant and administrative contact.

A domain name should be meaningful. If a domain contains terms which one are also in the content of the web site, this could affect the search engine ranking positive. But it also important that a web address can be printed. It should look nice on your stationery. It does not look good if the domain name needs two lines. Can you imagine how it might look, if you read a domain name on the rear of a car, containing a line break?

A domain name is very important, a lot of domains are already taken. So it is important to register your domain for your name, your idea, or your for your brand name.

Top Level Domains

What is a Top Level Domain? A Top Level Domain is the extension of a domain name, like .com, .uk, .biz, .de, .at. There are two types of Top Level Domains. The generic Top Level Domains, which one are not associated with a country, like .com, .net, .org, .biz, .info, and the Top Level Domains associated with a country, called country code Top Level Domains, short ccTLDs like .uk, .at, .de and so on.

Under a country code domain the user expect local content of the website. Even users complete domain names with their own country extensions. So British people may have mainly .uk in their mind, Germans .de and Austrians .at. For local companies the own country code domain is very important. The policies of the country code domains are made by the registries of each country and sometimes it’s not easy to register such a domain if the registrant is not a citizen of the appropriate country. For .de domains the registrant must be a german citizen to be able to register a .de domain name. Not so for .at domains. Everyone can register a .at domain name!

Gimmicks

It is recommended to register also slogans beside your brand, name or company name, because will also be found on the internet if users are using your slogan. But it can happen that the domain name is not readable anymore in that case.
To improve readability you can use dashes in a domain name like “register-a-domain.org”. You also can use different cases writing a domain name for better readability. It is easier to read HostingNewsBlog.com than hostingnewsblog.com. You can use the domain name itself in the address field of the browser in any case. But attention: everthing after the domain name is case sensitive! www.HostingNewsBlog.com/Index.php results in an error, while www.HostingNewsBlog.com/index.php shows the correct page.
It is also not recommended to use capitals for the whole domain name, it is less readable and does not look good for the customer.

It is also not recommended to publish domain names with subdirectories like http://www.emerion.com/domain/cms/products/. It is better readable to use a sub domain and point it to the long URL, like http://products.emerion.com/.

Now let’s have a look at mistyped domain names. Longer or complicated names are subject to be mistyped. Sometimes it can happen, that the user is redirected to a competitor, because he registered a mistyped domain. To avoid this situation it is recommended that you also register wrong spelled domain names of your own name, brand name or slogan. So it is ensured, that the user sees your web site, even if he mistyped the domain name. For example emerion is also reachable under www.emerin.com.

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