Domain Names

Archive for March, 2011

What is in a name, many have asked. When it comes to the World Wide Web, apparently there is a lot. Businesses often make their most profitable investments with the domain names they choose to brand their business for the online community. Easy to remember names can be the difference between losing out to the competition and becoming the only name in one’s respective industry. Securing the proper domain name can be a challenging endeavor, but if one follows certain procedures, he can soon settle on a name that will represent the business well for years to come. In order to do so, one must keep the following matters in mind:

Firstly, domain names need not describe the whole of your business. Your domain name, while it can be your most profitable investment, should not necessarily tell one everything about the business. For starters, that would result in a name that was too long to remember, and it would frustrate your target audience. Keywords, on the other hand, should be specifically targeted whenever possible, but that is something best left for the search engine optimization campaign. With domain names, you should instead focus on branding and try to secure a name that is direct and to the point. If your business is “Lombardo’s Italian Food and Gourmet Cuisine,” for instance, you would want to first see if you could secure “Lombardos,” followed by the appropriate extension. If not, you might try “LombardosItalian.”

Secondly, it is important to capture the perfect extension, which is usually represented by “dot com,” though “dot net” and “dot org” are also very popular. What many prefer to do with their domain names is bundle them together and purchase a “dot com,” “dot net,” and “dot org” for the main root word. The reason they do this is they can redirect all attempts at reaching the destination to one central locale. This protects the integrity of the root word and it adds to the branding initiative.

Thirdly, a domain name should be supported by a site that is worth your reader’s time. If you run a restaurant, then you may wish to run web only specials, where patrons must go to the site to secure a discount for an in store purchase. You may also use the web to sell merchandise such as T-Shirts, coffee mugs, and other souvenirs. A good domain name can be a sales floor for you night and day, even when the doors are not open and there is no staff on the clock.

Before you move forward with your domain name purchase, make sure you have given appropriate consideration to its importance. Do your research and secure a name that will represent your business well.

Registered domain names are for the owners to enjoy but that can change if there are lacking security measures. Getting your domain name hijacked is indeed a reality and that can bring a lot of frustrations if a hijack really takes place. There are reports of people hijacking domain-names through the use of site vulnerabilities, pages in disguise where hackers use phishing methods to gain access, or upload viruses and trojans that grant them full access to the domain. As a result, the intruder changes the login information so that you can no longer access the domain name.

Whether you are using valuable domain names or free domains, you should act very quickly because your customers can get confused if strange things occur to your website. Hackers can also redirect your domain to other harmful sites which can ruin your image entirely.

Making an Offer

Although performing this method puts the hijacker in the winner’s chair, offering to pay for the domain is a very quick route out of the whole situation. You do not have to go through the tedious legal actions and you can learn your lesson from there and apply further security precautions after you get your domain back. However, take note that hijackers take domain names for the sole purpose of gaining more money. As much as possible, do not let these people have their way and make sure your site and domain stays secure.

Writing a Formal Request

The possibilities may be low but there is always a slight chance that the hijacker accidentally took over your domain name. Contacting the person involved with aggressive intentions may affect the odds of getting your domain names back safely without spending. It never hurts to write a formal request in a polite manner because you may get your domain back with ease. You can even suggest free domains that the person can use instead of yours.

Taking Legal Action

This is where the attorney comes into play but you should not just seek out any ordinary attorney. This individual should have experience in Internet law so he or she can give you the appropriate advice for taking action. This is the best option to take if your domain name is trademarked as you will enjoy a much better chance of success.

This also means that you can further protect your domain name by trademarking it. This method does not work for all domain names if the name is too generic but all business websites should consider this security precaution. Expect to pay a hefty cost for this but it is so much better than paying for legal actions or making negotiations with hijackers.

If you hijacked domains include free domains that you have gotten recently, going through all the trouble to get these domains back may not be worth the effort especially if you can find similar or better domain names. Otherwise, you should try every possible method from the easiest to the most difficult. If you do not have extra capital, simply skip the method and move on to the cost-efficient ones. Seeking out an attorney should not cost you that much if you are just asking for advice. Some other people online in forums may help as well if they experienced similar situations.

Domain names play an important factor when it comes to Search Engine Optimization. They are not case sensitive, meaning you can access and display your name in advertising in upper or lower case; or even a combination of both.

They are registered on a first come, first served basis, and there is no screening process to determine whether a chosen name is legally problematic.

They are not hard to find.. You search for the one you want, register it, and then add services like web-hosting and email. They always have two or more parts which are separated by dots.

These Names must be at least two characters long, less than 63 characters for each component of the domain name and less than 255 characters in total. Also the names are being snapped up all the time so if you have thought of a cool domain name for a future project then it might be wise to register it now.

These names are useful tools that can support your business online in many ways. They will still exist, but their value as landmarks will plunge if consumers rarely use them.

These Names are used to more easily identify devices on the Internet. Their names may be protected in two ways: registration of the name with an organization recognized by Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers and registration of the name as a trademark.

These names are used as an aid to identify hosts and networks in the Internet, since names are easier to remember than numbers. Their names are used in URLs to identify particular Web pages.

Selling expired names is actually difficult considering the stiff competition that exists among domain traders. The primary purpose of domain names is to make addresses easier to use than numbers.

The biggest myth about domain names is that they cost the same everywhere you go to buy domain name. Shop around and you will be surprises at the different prices around.

The demand for generic names in e-commerce is at a feverish stage and online companies are willing to pay high price tags for domain names solely for the purpose of getting Net surfers, i.e., potential customers, to their sites.

The result is that people quickly took advantage of their ability to register names of companies or celebrities they had nothing to do with, in the hope of selling them to the company, the celebrity, or one of their competitors

To buy your perfect name, search the web for domain names and you will find a internet provider who will have a search option, then you will know if your name is available. Then buy it before it goes.

SEO is a constantly changing thing, and in order to succeed you need to stay on top of the trends. One thing that has been a very useful strategy in helping to get your sites ranked quickly, is using keywords in your domain names. It has been a proven factor that Google favors exact match domain names over sites that don’t have keywords in their domains. For mini sites, or sites that are only targeting a single keyword, this is an extremely important strategy. For larger sites, or branding purposes, it might not be the best way to go.

If you are planning on building a very large site, then keywords in domain names are not always the right decision. You want to be able to rank for all kinds of keywords, including your main one and other long tail ones. If you settle for an exact match domain you might be limiting your site to a smaller portion of traffic. If you are trying to build a brand, then the exact match domain for your keyword might not be the best choice either.

Keywords are not usually as memorable as a single, snappy brand name that sets you apart from your competitors. For example: I have a large website that covers multiple keywords and topics. I chose a unique, easy to remember, domain name-something that would stand out in a person’s mind. There are other ways to make use of keywords in domain names that a lot of people don’t realize.

Another good strategy is to buy up available exact match domains for keywords that you are targeting, and have them redirect to your main page. Then, you can really get the best of both worlds. Do know, that when you are purchasing your domain name, stay with (.com) (.net) (.org) or (.info). These are considered to have higher value. If you are trying to build a brand, you would want your brand name to be your main domain. But by investing in the available exact match domains for related keywords and redirecting them to your main site, you will be able to harness the SEO benefits associated with them at the same time.

In the end, keywords in domain names are still good for SEO purposes, whether your have a mini site, or are planning on having a larger site. Don’t stress too much if there aren’t any exact match domains available though, because it isn’t a major ranking factor. Your long term rankings will be affected by much more than that.

Choosing your domain name, rather like choosing your business name or book title, is one of the most important parts of going online. From a visitor standpoint, shorter names are better, so well known brands with short names undoubtedly receive more direct traffic as a result. But unless you’re a recognizable brand, chances are that a short name doesn’t cause much direct traffic, so we’re back to relying on search engines to bring page views.

Most businesses register their names directly because it is their trading name – it’s more obvious to be johndoughs.com than bestlocalpizza.com from the point of view of real people seeing the site. But from an SEO perspective, bestlocalpizza.com is the better domain to have if the targeted search keywords are ‘best local pizza’.

The dilemma is that so many domain names are registered by spammers and companies intending to sell the names to third parties that your keyword-rich domain may not be available, or – if you wanted to buy at a third party – could cost anything from $10 to millions of dollars. Whether this investment is worthwhile depends upon your business, but many websites have had considerable success from just using their keyword phrase as the domain name (such as cheapflights.com).

Where a domain name contains multiple keywords, there are two schools of thought on whether the name should appear as one long word or be separated with dashes to help search engines identify the keywords (e.g. bestlocalpizza.com vs best-local-pizza.com). While it may be true that there is a slight SEO advantage with dashes, it’s actually more confusing to human visitors to remember. If possible, it might be worth registering both versions, using the non-hyphenated version for your site, and having the hyphenated version redirected. From Google Analytics, you will be able to detect which is most popular over time.

If you haven’t named your business yet, consider embedding keywords and the location into your real business title, such as ABC’s Web Hosting (New York), and make sure you use keyword phrases where the domain names are readily available. While you probably wouldn’t use the location in the domain name because it makes the name too long, it may help your ranking on services such as Google Maps where location is a major SEO factor.

Essential tips for finding a good domain name

Consider the following when purchasing domain names:

Always purchase from a reputable big-name registrar (such as Name.com, GoDaddy, etc.) When you’ve invested time and money in a domain, you need to trust the registrar to maintain registration in a responsible way.
Many offer an option called ‘Private WHOIS’, either for free or a nominal charge. This hides the details of the owner, which prevents spam from companies harvesting the WHOIS database.
While including keywords is good, limit the length of your chosen domain (and the number of hyphens), or search engines may consider the site spam. For instance, best-cheapest-shoes-discount-footwear dot com is obviously designed to trick search engines, and they will penalize such sites. 10-12 characters should be considered a maximum length.
Be memorable: as always, make it easy on your target audience – names such as petesperfectpurplepizza dot com are hard to remember.
Creating completely new words is great for branding but will take more effort to build an online presence. If you’re inventive, you can find short domains this way. Although it will require more work initially to get brand recognition and become memorable, in the longer term it may form the foundation of a very solid brand – such as hulu.com or bibo.com.
Don’t abuse copyright or trademarks owned by others: you will eventually lose the domain and reset your SEO strategy to zero.

At domain registrars such as http://name.com, you can search for available domains based upon keywords and phrases. In addition to the.com extensions most users are familiar with, you may want to buy other extensions based upon your country of operation or other intended usage. For example, if you ever plan to operate in the UK, you should invest in the co.uk extension. Some of the more esoteric externsions, such as.me and.info are usually not worth buying.

Most registrars will allow you to search based upon keywords, so if your first choice isn’t available, there are usually others that will work. You can buy as many domain names as you want, provided you pay the annual registration fee to maintain ownership, but the goal for most sites should be to buy one great name that is memorable, contains relevant keywords where possible, and can be used to build and market their brand.

The domainer in you must have wondered at some time as to how exactly can an expiring domain name become available for re-registration by a new owner. To know the answer to this question, you must understand the Status of a domain as listed in the whois database. Here is the URL of the whois lookup provided by Domain Tools. When observing the results of a whois lookup, you will see a record similar in format to the one below:

ICANN Registrar: MARKMONITOR INC.
Created: 1997-09-15
Expires: 2011-09-14
Registrar Status: clientDeleteProhibited
Registrar Status: clientTransferProhibited
Registrar Status: clientUpdateProhibited
Name Server: NS1.GOOGLE.COM
Name Server: NS2.GOOGLE.COM
Name Server: NS3.GOOGLE.COM
Name Server: NS4.GOOGLE.COM
Whois Server: whois.markmonitor.com

There is a line item in the lookup data labeled Status. In the case of this domain, the status are listed as clientDeleteProhibited,clientTransferProhibited and clientUpdateProhibited Listed below are the various states that can appear in this field, and what they mean (There are two standard protocols, RRP and EPP – RRP is the older protocol that is being phased out in favor of EPP which is more fine grained. There is a specific mapping of statuses between the older RRP and EPP).

Below are the all RRP statuses, followed by EPP statuses.

Registry Operator Status codes: (RRP) Registry Registrar Protocol (Com/Net Registry Operator – Verisign Global Registry)

ACTIVE: The registry sets this status. The domain can be modified by the registrar. The domain can be renewed. The domain will be included in the zone if the domain has been delegated to at least one name server. A domain can only change registrars if in this state.

· REGISTRY-LOCK: The registry sets this status. The domain can not be modified or deleted by the registrar. The registry must remove the REGISTRY-LOCK status for the registrar to modify the domain. The domain can be renewed. The domain will be included in the zone if the domain has been delegated to at least one name server.

· REGISTRAR-LOCK: The sponsoring registrar sets this status. The domain can not be modified or deleted. The registrar must remove REGISTRAR-LOCK status to modify the domain. The domain can be renewed. The domain will be included in the zone.

· REGISTRY-HOLD: The registry sets this status. The domain can not be modified or deleted by the registrar. The registry must remove the REGISTRY-HOLD status for the registrar to modify the domain. The domain can be renewed. The domain will not be included in the zone.

· REGISTRAR-HOLD: The sponsoring registrar sets this status. The domain can not be modified or deleted. The registrar must remove REGISTRAR-HOLD status to modify the domain. The domain can be renewed. The domain will not be included in the zone.

· REDEMPTIONPERIOD: The registry sets this status when a registrar requests that the domain name be deleted from the registry and the domain has been registered for more than 5 calendar days (if the delete request is received within 5 days of initial domain registration it will instead be deleted immediately). The domain will not be included in the zone. The domain can not be modified or purged; it can only be restored. Any other registrar requests to modify or otherwise update the domain will be rejected. The domain will be held in this status for a maximum of 30 calendar days.

· PENDINGRESTORE: The registry sets this status after a registrar requests restoration of a domain that is in REDEMPTIONPERIOD status. The domain will be included in the zone. Registrar requests to modify or otherwise update the domain will be rejected. The domain will be held in this status while the registry waits for the registrar to provide required restoration documentation. If the registrar fails to provide documentation to the registry within 7 calendar days to confirm the restoration request, the domain will revert to REDEMPTIONPERIOD status. The domain status will be set to ACTIVE only if the registrar provides documentation to the registry within 7 calendar days to confirm the restoration request.

· PENDINGDELETE: The registry sets this status after a domain has been set in REDEMPTIONPERIOD status and the domain has not been restored by the registrar. The domain will not be included in the zone. Once in this status all registrar requests to modify or otherwise update the domain will be rejected. The domain will be purged from the registry database after being in this status for 5 calendar days.

EPP Domains (The newer better protocol)

Domain Status: Normally operating domains have a status of “OK” or “Active.” Other status values detail pending operations and restrictions regarding the domain. If the status is OK then the domain can be transferred.

· OK: This is the nominal status value for a domain object at all times, whether or not the domain has pending operations or prohibitions.

· New: This is the nominal status for a newly created domain object. The domain can be modified unless locked.

· Active: The domain can be modified and appears in a zone file. This is the nominal status for a domain object once it has been published in a zone.

· Locked: The domain cannot be transferred, renewed, or deleted. (Though the status value can be changed.) Hierarchical and associated objects cannot be added or removed from the domain object. Domain names involved in Sunrise and other disputes may be locked, subject to registry policies.

· Hold: The domain will not be published in a zone for DNS resolution. Names without at least two nameservers may be placed on Hold status; in this case submit nameserver data through your registrar.

· pendingTransfer: A transfer request has been received for the domain, and completion of the request is pending. The domain cannot be renewed, deleted, or updated while in this state.

· pendingDelete: A delete request has been received from the registrar for the domain. The domain has been removed from the zone, but has not yet been purged from the registry database. The domain cannot be renewed, deleted, transferred, or updated while in this state.

· clientHold: The domain will not be published in a zone for DNS resolution. This status is placed on the domain by the registrar.

· clientLock: The domain cannot be transferred, renewed, deleted, or updated. This status is placed on the domain by the registrar. An update command may be used to change the status value. Hierarchical and associated objects cannot not be added or removed from the domain object.

So, for those of you interested in registering previously registered – but now expiring domains: the domain will always go into REDEMPTIONPERIOD status before it is released to be re-registered.

It will remain in REDEMPTIONPERIOD status for 30 days at which time it will then move to PENDINGDELETE status. After 5 days in PENDINGDELETE status, the domain will be released to be re-registered.

If a domain is renewed by the original registrant during the REDEMPTIONPERIOD status, the domain will NOT go to PENDINGDELETE status. Once a domain reaches to PENDINGDELETE status, it will become available to re-register.

Hope this helps

Great Benefits Of Having A Registered Domain Names That Have Value.

Premium registered domain names are domains that has good meaning and great value which are already registered or taken by some one else. If a particular domain name you want is already registered or chosen, you may want to consider registering an alternative or related name.

In this case you can search the whois records to know exactly who has registered your choice domain. Please note that some times people who register their domains hide personal and contact information from the public when they are registering.

If you experience such, you can search for some websites that sell domains that are already registered to see if you could find the exact domain name, but the price they will be willing to sell it to you may be too expensive if you are lucky to find it listed in their site.

You can go ahead and pay for it if you think you can afford it, but it is important you be careful with how you make your payment for the domain so that you don’t lose your fund and the domain at the same time. There are lots of benefits and importance to go for a valuable registered domain names as a newbie or professional. The need can not be over emphasized. See some reasons and benefits below:

1. You don’t need to go through the process of doing research for the keywords to use for your domains or niches because some times the person who registered it must have done that for you.

2. It is very true that you can register a new domain of your own at the price range from $8 to $12, but you can also get a great valued registered domain for that same price or less, and some times a bit higher if you don’t know the tricks of making offers to buy domains already registered. There are websites that offer these domains at a very cheap price that is very far lower than the market price.

3. Registered domains have more edge to a new one created because you will not need to start afresh to get it known to people as it is already indexed on search engines. bringing you free traffic that you never worked for.

4. Most great registered domains are combination of keywords and phases that people are already searching for, so you so will do yourself and business a lot of good if you find such domains.

Many more advantages to prefer the registered domain that have great value can be found by searching online and getting more guides too from good registered domain websites.

During my research for premium registered domains names, I found out that there are some domain websites that offer quality registered domains at a very low price that is far from the market price.

Linking your website with a domain name is beneficial in the long run. Those that opt for paid shared or dedicated hosting packages will likely get a single domain to work with for free. As your site grows in popularity, your domain becomes more valuable. The domain itself has its own value and it is not directly linked to the site it points to. Although the linked site has an influence on how valuable your domain name can get, you can safely sell your domain name to another individual to earn some extra cash. You can set higher prices if your domain names are valuable. People will go for these valuable domain names rather than the free domains because they serve as quick boosts in getting their new sites popular. Here are some tips that you can use to ensure you get the most out of your spare domain names.

Getting Domain Names Early for Selling

You can find many domain names online for very cheap prices especially if you buy them in bulks. There might even be some sites that offer free domains because they have very little value. Take advantage of these offers because you can put these domains to use and host websites that are used to increase the value so they become worthy of selling. You can start out with a couple of domains so you won’t have to worry too much on multitasking when you have finally have to do the selling. When purchasing or acquiring these domain names, be sure to put your relevant contact information so others can make inquiries if they are interested to purchase your domain. People often check the WHOIS information of your domain so they can see the contact details.

Effectively Pricing your Domain

Before you put your domain up for sale, you need to finalize your price so you can make deals with confidence. Determining the price depends on the domain’s search engine ranking. You can figure this out by searching for online tools that check the page ranking or PR. The actual domain itself can control the price as well. If the domain consists of popular keywords or proper combinations of keywords, the domain has greater appeal. The same can be said with domains that are easy to memorize.

Once you have assessed the value of your domain, look for other domains online that have similar assessments and get the value for those domains. If you feel that your domain is superior, you can slightly bump up the price. Ultimately, you have full control on how much you can price your domain names. Your chosen price will only affect the decisions of others but take note that they cannot get better deals elsewhere unless they encounter a domain name that is very similar to yours. Getting those domains as well and putting them up for sale as a package can eliminate this possibility.

From this point forward, you have to use your standard marketing efforts to spread the word that you have some valuable domain names for sale. One of the best places to market is in forums or social networking sites. Just make sure you are in a community filled with webmasters that may actually be interested with your deal. Many domains focus on a certain theme and are therefore targeted for specific users. You will get more inquiries if you reach out to those people. Then you can contact your registrar and proceed with the transfer once you found a buyer.

Using the metaphor of web sites as virtual real estate properties, then the domain name would be like the address for this piece of property. More accurately, the URL assigned to that domain name is going to point people to the location of your web site, which is populated with millions of sites competing for viewer attention. So, how do you get your domain name to stand out?

This is, by far, one of the most important decisions you will make concerning your website. A good domain name can be flipped all by itself as something extremely valuable. Combining it with a full fledged site it creates additional value that attracts buyers. What are most buyers looking for in a domain name?

The characteristics of a good domain name are as follows:

- One or two word phrases

You can’t even get a one word domain name anymore, they are all taken and being squatted on by domain name investors. Even two word phrases are difficult to come by, but this is the ideal. Now, you may end up having to work with three words, which should be the maximum number of words in your domain name.

- Consists of popular search terms

You want to do a little research on what people are searching for across the Internet and try to incorporate a keyword in your domain name, if possible.

- More than one meaning

A domain name that has multiple meanings can be more valuable and marketable than one that is defined in more concrete terms.

- Marketing buzz

Does the domain name roll off the tongue? Is it memorable? The more memorable and snappy, the better the choice is for the domain name. A domain name should seek to be easy to remember, as well as easy to type.

- Conscious of different spellings

If you pick a word that can be misspelled easily or substituted for one with a different meaning that sounds the same, then you will have cyber squatters lining up to try to register those before you do. You will want something that cannot be misspelled so easily. Even now, if you were to take someone else’s popular site and register a misspelling of their domain name, you may end up being sued. So, be careful when you use this strategy.

In essence, you want a domain name that people find easy to remember and that search engines like because of misspellings or search term popularity. You want to avoid hyphenated domain names, numbers in the name, and any other top level domains that don’t end with the .com extension, unless you already have a buyer interested in that.

You will be creating multiple sites to flip, so you want to try out services that allow you to buy domain names in batches and to allow you to flip ownership easily too. The ideal is to have a “push” capability that is a simple process of pushing the domain name to another owner without too much hassle. Namecheap.com is an example of a domain name registrar service that has a push capability. It’s not the cheapest domain name registrar service and you can try Name.com for better prices. Other Internet marketers like popular portals for domain names like GoDaddy.com. Be sure to check out the resource page to get more information on these and links to them too.

Forming a domain strategy is an integral part of anyone’s online marketing campaign. To have your domain name work for you and your business from a branding and search engine optimisation point of view, which results in increased traffic and business visibility for your site, isn’t just as straight forward as picking a name out of a hat. So how do you form a good strategy and how do you monitor it to ensure it is achieving the desired results?

Its all about your business objectives; what do you want out of your business? What services or products do you offer? What perception do you want to convey? Do you want to remain generic or build a brand. Asking yourself questions like these will form the basis of a strong domain strategy.

Say you sell umbrellas…Lets ask the question: Do you want to become a brand, or stay generic? If it is the latter, then umbrellas(dot)com would be the ideal domain, it is, in a nutshell THE domain for umbrellas. If you want a brand then keepdry(dot)com could be a cool name to use. The beauty of domain names is that it is completely irrelevant what your business is called offline. Your domain name is the key to what you want your business to become ONLINE.

Geographical location of your business and your target audience is also a very important factor to consider when choosing a good domain name. Search engines place certain “weighting” on geographical domains if the end user is from the same location; in their attempt to provide the most relevant search results to the customer. For example if your target audience is solely in the UK it would be more beneficial to register a .co.uk domain name as consumers will feel your website is more relevant to them than a .net or .us domain. This isn’t just an assumption either, if you search for the Nominet 2008 industry report in any good search engine you will be able to see some extremely useful demographics and reports on the domain name industry and how consumers relate to different top level domains or TLDs.

Search engine optimisation and online marketing should also be considered before choosing a domain. It is always worth speaking to an SEO or online marketing company prior to jumping in at the deep end and developing any old website on the first domain name that comes into your mind. You will be surprised the difference it can make. They may even suggest registered several domain names depending on your business objectives.

As far as I am concerned, planning a good domain strategy should be considered as a primary, not secondary part of any online marketing campaign. It should integrate smoothly with your offline marketing efforts, online marketing and search engine optimisation, your business objectives, search engines themselves and ultimately your end users.