11 Smart Domain Name Tips!

Think you've found the perfect domain name? Before purchasing your domain, run through the following criteria: 

1. Marketability

• How profitable is it?
• How large is the market it is targeting?
• Does it apply to the entire market?

A domain such as dryflowers.com is without a doubt worth less thanvacation.com. The reason is that dried-flowers market is less profitable. vintagecars.com is worth less than cars.com since it applies to a minor portion of the industry.

2. Clarity

• Can it describe its content?
• Can it be associated with a product, a service, a brand etc? 

Bookshop.com or Musicstore.com have a great development potential since they're perfectly clear.

3. Memorability

• How memorable is it?
• Will people easily remember it?
• Will people easily recognize it? 

A domain name should be easy to remember and easy to recognize. The easier to remember, the higher its price will be. Moreover a good domain name is hard to misspell.
Escrow.com, News.com, are easy to remember and hard to misspell.
cyberwebdiscountcoupons.com is difficult to remember and retains a good amount of value.

4. Link Popularity

• How popular is your website? The more popular your site is, the better it is ranked on major search engines.

Note: Link popularity applies only to developed websites.



5. Top Level Domain (aka extension)

• What is its TLD? 

e.g. com, net, org, ws, etc.  I have VERY rarely ever recommended that a client purchase anything other than the .com. Dot Com names are the gold standard on the Internet.
carwash.net is worth less than carwash.com


6. Length

• How long is it? Is it easy to type? 
• When it comes to domain names, shorter is better.

carwash.com (7 characters) is worth less than car.com (3 characters)
fastsearchengine.com (16 characters) is worth less than searchengine.com (12 chars) etc.


7. Word count

• How many words it contains? The most valuable domain names consist of few words. Two/three words are good, and four words are about the limit.

carwash.com (2 words) is worth less than car.com (1 word).
veryfastsearchengine.com (4 words) is worth less than searchengine.com (2 words) etc.
[Each abbreviation, acronym, prefix or suffix is also considered one word.
e.g. eshop.com = 2 words]


8. Hyphens

• Is it hyphenated?

Hyphenated names are not recommended. Users will forget the hyphen, and if you don't own the hyphen-less domain, you may be just helping your competitor increase traffic. That said, if you do own the hyphen-less domain, it may be wise to register it with hyphens


car-prices.com is worth less than carprices.com
compare-car-prices.com isn't worth much.

9. Numerals

• Does it contain numbers?

top10.com is worth less than topten.com etc.


10. Substitutions

• Does it contain substitutions?

i.e. "2" instead of "to", "k" instead of "c",
"4" instead of "for", "ez" instead of "easy" etc. 


Don't do it. You are asking for confusion! 

2morrow.com is worth less than tomorrow.com
ezshop.com is worth less than easyshop.com etc.


11. Abbreviations

• Does it contain abbreviations?

wallst.com is worth less than wallstreet.com

Last but not least: Be aware that trademark conflicts reduce the value of a domain name dramatically. Check your domain against trademarks at http://tess2.uspto.gov/