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Choosing the right domain name for your business blog is very important. This is not a decision to make hastily. The domain name is the one thing about your blog that can never be changed (without doing some url redirecting which is for advanced web experts only). Nearly everything else can be easily edited, fixed, or altered in some way. Once you’ve registered a name, it’s pretty much a done deal. So, you’d be wise to make sure you get this step right.
Criteria That Should Be Met When Picking A Domain Name
Every blog expert has slightly different ideas about picking a good domain name, but I’ll tell you the things that I personally take into consideration when I buy a domain name for a business blog.
- It should be short, if possible. Three words or less is ideal. Four is okay if one of the words is “a” or “in” or “the”. Any more than four words and it will be hard for people to remember. Do you really think a potential customer is going to remember your domain name if it’s something like JacksMowingandLandscapingServicesofOrlandoFlorida.com? Of course not. Instead, Jack would be better served to go with something easier to remember. JacksMowingServices.com. MowingByJack.com. Better still: OrlandoLawnMowing.com. Which leads me to criteria number two:
- If your services are specific to a city or geographic region, then the domain should have your city name in it, if possible. This, more than anything, is for the benefit of the search engines so that they will send you more traffic and qualified leads. One of the things that the Google algorithm takes into account when returning results for a search phrase is the text within the domain names of websites. It uses the logic that if some or all of the text in the domain matches some or all of the text in the search phrase, then it’s a site that is more likely to give the user exactly what they’re looking for (whether it be information, products, or services). If a user searches for “house painters in Memphis”, then all other variables being equal, Google is more likely to display results that have “Memphis” in the domain name than results (sites) that do not.
- It should have your most popular service in it, if possible. This is for the exact same reason as #2. If somebody searches for “house painting” in your area and your domain name has the words “house painting” or “house painters” or “house painter” in it then there is a much better chance that Google is going to give you a favorable location in the search results. The higher you are in the search results, the greater the chance that a user will click on it, which lands them directly on your blog and gives you the opportunity to grab a new customer.
Try to get a .com, and stay away from hyphens. Domain names that end with .net or .biz or .org extensions are at a disadvantage, in my view, because most people will forget the extension and assume it’s a .com. If somebody at a party asks you what your website is and you say “HoustonWindowReplacement.NET” (maybe you had to settle on .net because the .com was taken), when that person goes to look for your website the next day I can almost guarantee that they will type in “HoustonWindowReplacement.COM”, which sends them to your competitor’s site, in all likelihood. Epic failure. Instead, try slightly different wording and go for a .com. You could try ReplacementWindowsHouston.com or NewWindowsHouston.com or HoustonWindowInstallation.com. For the same reason, I recommend staying away from hyphenated domain names. Nobody will remember the hyphen!
It’s not always possible to nail all four of these criteria, but get as many as you can. Some of these things might sound nit-picky, but it can mean the difference between a blog that just sends you the occasional lead and a blog that takes your business to a whole new level.
“But These Blog Name Ideas Aren’t Cool…”
It seems like I hear this a lot. People think their blog domain name has to be clever or cutesy in some way, but for a business blog that targets a specific geographic region or service this simply isn’t the case! In this situation you’re not trying to become the next big blogger about sports or politics or entertainment (in which case a more brandable name would be understandable); you’re simply trying to pull in more local leads for your service business. Sticking your city name and service in the domain name might look a little ugly and weird at first, but it’s a necessary evil in my view. Sure, if you can find a way to meet all of the above requirements AND make it sound good, too, then go for it! But, I think you’ll find that this could be difficult.
Alright, so now I want you to write down a list of five or ten potential domain names for your business blog that meet all or most of the above four rules. If you missed the first post in this series, then I recommend you go back and read it: How To Start A Successful Blog For Your Business. If you have your list of contender domain names then you’re ready to move on to the next step in this series: Registering A Domain Name and Setting Up Blog Hosting.
My name is Jeff and I created this blog in 2007 to help and inspire contractors and home service providers. It’s come a long way since then.