A lot of business owners mistakenly think that a domain name is inconsequential. Hence they can just pick any name that they fancy. However, nothing could be further from the truth. As explained by Rand Fishkin of Moz, there are various factors that you should have in mind when you are selecting a domain name. Here is a quick rundown of those essential factors.

Brand it

Your domain name can be a reflection of your brand. Therefore, make sure that it sounds like your brand name. Make it short, comfortable and memorable. Also, avoid things that will confuse your audience; for instance, inserting hyphens, numbers or anything that will make it hard for your audience to remember it. For example, a name likesupermarket.com is much easier to remember than supermarket-1-2-3.com.

Choose a name that is easy to pronounce

The pronounceability of the name is essential. This makes it much easier for people to recall it. If you choose a name that people can’t pronounce, then you will always have to spell it out. This will result in people misspelling the name, and you will eventually end up losing a lot of your traffic.

If people cannot pronounce your domain name, they might give up searching for it and possibly move on to your competitor. Therefore, make it as easy as possible for your clients to find you online.

Brief

Along brand name can be hard to remember since high quality domains can be tedious to search for. Therefore, the shorter it is, the better. Avoid using acronyms, unless it is an acronym that is quite synonymous with your brand and your audience is quite familiar with it.

Use a .com extension

While there are different kinds of domain extension names, the most common one is .com. A lot of people enter .com by default when they are looking up a domain. Even though a .net or .pro domain might sound hippy, it might not actually be the best one for you.

You can also go for a country-specific extension. This is only a good idea if you are planning to do business specifically in that country alone and you do not plan on expanding outside that country.

Use keywords

Using a keyword rich domain name will help you to rank higher in search engine results. It is also intuitive since once people come to your website, they have an idea what it is about. It also makes it easier for people to remember your website name. For instance, if your website name is toothpaste.com, you can bet that your users will remember it easily.

Unique

Your domain name should be unique. It should not sound too much like another company’s domain name as this can create confusion among your customers. In some cases, you might even be sued for copyright infringement if the name is too close to your rival’s name. Therefore, choose an exclusive title.