What is a good name for a web site to get good search results?

Why a good web site name, isn't a good company name!

How to find a good website name and what is a good domain name or what is a good company name?

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Defining what a good domain name does for a company web site

There are opposing opinions and perspectives about what constitutes a good domain name. Most of the controversy is between SEOs ( search engine optimizers ) and SEMs (search engine marketers). For the purpose of this page, we will focus on what your domain name means to search engines and the value that search engines place on good domain names. If you don't need free search engine referral visitors, please ignore this web page!

What is a good website name and how do you find a good website name?

Good website names are easier to choose, when you understand how important your website name is. Before we can explain why a domain name is important, we must explain what a domain name is and how it works.

They are sometimes colloquially (and incorrectly) referred to by marketers as web addresses.

Domain names are hostnames that provide more easily memorable names to stand in for numeric IP addresses. They allow for any service to move to a different location in the topology of the Internet (or another internet), which would then have a different IP address.

Each string of letters, digits and hyphens between the dots is called a label in the parlance of the domain name system (DNS). Valid labels are subject to certain rules, which have relaxed over the course of time. Originally labels must start with a letter, and end with a letter or digit; any intervening characters may be letters, digits, or hyphens. Labels must be between 1 and 63 characters long (inclusive). Letters are ASCII A - Z and a - z; domain names are compared case-insensitively. Later it became permissible for labels to commence with a digit (but not for domain names to be entirely numeric), and for labels to contain internal underscores, but support for such domain names is uneven. These are the rules imposed by the way names are looked up (resolved) by DNS. Some top level domains ( a list of TLDs ) impose more rules, such as a longer minimum length, on some labels.

Definition by: Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.    domain name explanation

A domain name is only a label

The important point to understand about your domain name is: Your domain name is NOT YOUR WEBSITE ADDRESS. It is simply a label for your website's IP address. This means that you can have more than one label to tell the WWW or world wide web, where your web site is! One of the simplest ways to correct a poor initial domain name choice is to register a good domain name and label your existing website with the new name as a parked domain name. With so many domain name myths, most business web site owners don't get it right the first time. A good seo will always recommend correcting a poor domain name choice.

One of the first questions we ask a new client is: Did you register a name already? Their answer, frequently creates an important conversation. A good designer names a web site to be easily understood by search engines.

Please read: What is a website, before you make a website investment decision.

How to find a good business name

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What is a good business name and why isn't it a good website name?

A good business name is instantly understood by people, but might not make any sense to a search engine. A good website name is instantly understood by search engines first and people second. Search engines only identify literal meanings. People reason, search engines don't.

More than 90% of business website visitors should come as a search engine referral

A good business web site will get most of their visits as search engine referrals. The right domain name will help search engines to send them. Most SEM's will advise you to choose a simple domain name, so it's easy to remember and simple to type into your browser window. This means that any new customers will need to know who you are BEFORE they can even find your site! That's the complete opposite of how the web actually works. If you design a good web site, your visitors will bookmark or add you to their favorites list, after they find your website the first time. Ignoring 90% of your potential customers is never a very good business decision.

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A good domain name is the foundation of a good SEO

A good domain name choice will:

• Contain important keywords (that your customer might use)
• Describe the website information content
• Tell visitors who you are, what you do, or where you do it

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The best domain name for a business web site

The best domain name for your business website, will immediately tell search engines what your website information is about. Unless your company name clearly describes your business activities, DON'T USE IT AS YOUR DOMAIN NAME. This is one of the most common mistakes made by company website owners. Having "My company.com" may be great for your ego, but it's usually search engine suicide! Unless your company name is full of the keywords that a potential customer would use as a search phrase, you will lose search engine referrals. Good page titles and good links to find good business information help create a user friendly website and good search results. Understanding how to search, will certainly help you to choose a good name. Good websites are where you find answers to questions.

From a search engine's perspective, choosing the wrong domain name is the first and worst mistake a business website owner makes.

The right domain name extension ( TLD ) identifies and adds credibility

The use of .com for all business web sites makes it the obvious choice for a domain name extension. Country and industry specific domain names may be a better choice, if you want to focus your website information to a specific user group (A country, region or specific city). A good website example would be a business that only operates in British Columbia, Canada. A .ca or even .bc.ca would focus your identity to your specific customer demographic.

The use of sub-domain names should be restricted to VERY focused and specific sub topics of your website's information. Sub-domains have been used by unethical seo's to try to manipulate search engines. Caution should always be exercised before using a sub-domain.

See also:

• Web site questions?
• Important web site components
• What is a good website design?
• A good SEO?
• Find a good web site designer?
• Domain name myths
• How to find answers

Should you find our website name information useful and wish to link to this web page, simply copy and paste the following link text onto any of your site's pages:

<a href="http://www.asite.seowebsitesdesigners.com/seo-good-domain-name.html">What is a good name?</a>

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