How to choose a domain name for your business
Your domain goes on your signboard, your visiting cards, your email address and every message you send. Choosing it takes ten minutes, but changing it later is expensive and risky. These are the rules I give clients.
Use your business name
The simplest domain is your business name. Customers who know your name can guess it, and it matches your signboard and Google listing. Stuffing keywords into a domain, like a service and a town, used to be popular; today it looks less trustworthy and gives little search benefit.
Pass the phone test
Say the domain to someone over the phone. If you have to spell it, explain a hyphen or clarify whether a word is singular or plural, it will cause lost emails and lost visitors. Avoid hyphens, numbers that could be written as words and unusual spellings.
Keep it short enough to type
Shorter is easier to remember and to type on a phone. If your full business name is long, a shorter version that customers already use can work, as long as it's clearly yours.
Choose the ending
- .com is the most familiar worldwide and a safe default if it's available
- A country ending such as .in signals a business in that country and is often easier to get
- Newer endings such as .travel or .school can work, but some customers mistype them
If you can, register both .com and your country ending and redirect one to the other, so nobody else can take the second.
Check before you buy
- Search for the name to make sure another business, especially a big brand, isn't using it
- Check trademark concerns if the name is close to an existing brand
- Check the matching social media handles, if they matter to you
- Look up the domain's history if it has been registered before; some come with a bad past
Register it in your own name
This is the most important rule. Register the domain in your business's name, with your email address and your own login at the registrar. Turn on auto-renewal and transfer lock. If a developer registers it for you, ask for it to be in your name from the start. Losing control of a domain, because the person who registered it left or a renewal reminder went to an old email, is one of the most painful problems a small business can have.
Then put email on it
An address at your own domain looks more professional and stays with the business. Set it up with the records that keep your mail out of spam, explained in my guide to SPF, DKIM and DMARC. I register domains and set up hosting and email as described on my hosting and domains page.