Choosing a domain name - advice needed

Worry more about choosing a good brandable domain name than the SEO domain factor.

Tyrus

Personally, I don't understand the big hype about how you "have to" choose a keyword related domain name. Look at DP/WF/BHW/WickedF and a couple of other forum names. They don't have any terms related to Make Money Online or Marketing Strategies/Etc.

I guess it depends a lot on what you plan to do with what you plan to do with the website. If you're auto-blogging or just selling a quick informational product then just choose something such as "quickweightlossinfo.com" or something simple.. it can be cheesy.

If you're making a site you're constantly going to update, then pick a name people will remember. Forget having a keyword related to the website, the SEO is in the content, you won't be punished because of your domain name. Just pick something people can easily remember and come back to.

Every little bit helps. Make a list - and using your example look for the long tails that may be available that are getting some natural searches.

WeightLossFood.com $4,988.00

NewWeightLoss.com $2,688.00

Ok, both of these terms are available to buy as premium domains. Weight loss food got 49,500 searches last month AND the dot me and the dot us are completely wide open and normal price of 10 bucks or less. You can fork up for the dot com OR.....

With no one using the dot com or developing it at the current time, this gives you a great opportunity to rank to front page if you are diligent with your SEO on the topic thus opening you to 49,500 natural searches a month for this.

You want to use keywords in the domain, and you want to look for decent searches on the terms you decide to go with. And check to see the other domains.

IE: Are they parked? Are they on the market? are they a site but one that is poorly designed with no backlinks or SEO optimization?

This will get you started off on the right foot.

Thanks guys for such quick replies. Your advice has helped put a stop to me worrying too much about SEO regarding my domain name! I think I'll just go for a catchy name with some relevance to my market!

This forum is great!

Regards

Izzymay

It depends on the type of site you want to create.

If you want a site where you're selling an ebook called "lose 10 pounds a week" and it's dedicated to only selling that ebook you want that as your domain name or as close as you can get.

If you want to emphasize weight loss but make it personally brandable, you might want to go with izzymayloseweight.com or something else that combines keywords with personal branding.

If you want something wide open that's not related to any particular keyword, go with a good, short, brandable name like I did with my OpTempo blog.

The thing is that your SEO task will be easier if the keyword is in the domain name but you also become more generic and less personally brandable. With good internal and external SEO techniques you can have a brand name that ranks for a generic search term or terms.

Keep it short
use a keyword if possible
use keywords in the same manner they are spoken if possible lightbeer not beerlight
watch out for "bumping letters" carrental verses rentalcar those r's can get confusing!
shoot for a .com unless a specific keyword combo is available with another TLD extension
try to make it brandable if you want to score non seo traffic and mindshare


Bottom line is keywords help for a couple of reasons... they hint to the search engines what your site is about, they help you gain more targeted anchor text backlinks, and they show up in search to reinforce to the person about to click what your site is about.

IF you have a great idea, and can brand and have real skills behind you then you can score with just about any solid .com ... but why fight logic?

now i'm a bit confused! Conflicting advice and all that! Should I be trying to get separate keywords in the domain name such as healthyweightlossdiets.com where each individual keyword has a high search volume and the search engines deduce that my site is about health, weight loss, and diets, or will the search engines identify my site as a long-tail keyword which has little or no search volume?

Thanks in advance

Izzymay

What makes up for a good domain name?
It is considered a good domain name when it can be easily memorized or remembered.
Try to make it short as possible and have a catchy name, which kind of explains the purpose of the site in a short way.
Try to include one or two keywords of what your website stands for.
Try to first look for a .com domain and if not available then only go for the other alternatives like.net, .org, .us etc.
Try not to put an hyphens in the domain name unless, you are left with no option