Things to keep in mind while deciding a domain name

Deciding a domain name is the first step before launching a blog or a service. A website is a reflection of what it provides, name of a service based site must be professional and relevant to what it offers. Similarly a blogging site must include words like ‘blog’, blogger’ to indicate its niche. You must have heard of problogger.com which is a blogging website, similarly ehow.com, imgur.com are some of the sites that hint its core functions. Just a name doesn’t seal the website fate as content and quality holds the key. Though, easy to remember name has slight advantage over lengthy and confusing domain name. One such example is howstuffworks.com, an awesome website that I often visit. Due to a bit long domain name people often mistype it that results in reduced number of direct visitors to the site.
Here we enlist some points to keep in mind while deciding a domain name,

1. Go for ‘.com’ generic top-level domain (gTLD) name. Browsers and search engines take ‘.com’ as default. Other gTLDs like .in, .org, .net are okay only when you’re getting a good domain name like myblog.in, webserve.org or anything similar.
2. Decide niche of your website, look if its a service based website, e-commerce, file sharing, blogging or anything else. Its important to know the exact niche while deciding the most suitable domain name for your business website.
3. Keep it short, easy to read and remember. Names like webdesign.com is better than websitedesign.com which is again better than websitedesigngurgaon.com. Lengthy domains fail to get much direct traffic and are less SEO friendly than shorter ones.
4. Must reflect your objective. An e-commerce site can’t be named as yourRavi.com. Domain name for such sites must appear professional rather than a collaborative effort of a few individuals.
5. A good domain name must be keyword rich with low to average traffic, it should hold 1-2 keywords relevant to your business. Good keywords in domain name improves the SEO of the entire website.
6. Finally, collect some 10-15 good domain names and force brainstorming into it, ask your colleagues and office members to help you decide the perfect domain name for your business.

Explaining by Real life example

You want to run a blogging site wherein you write on social media – how tos, tips and tricks, marketing etc. You should first pick a notebook and note down the keywords that you would probably use most, some are internet, social, media, how, tips, marketing etc.
Now try and find a mix that has the potential to grab attention of search engines and visitors. Some website names could be – olmedia.net, olmedia.in. Getting a .com domain is like peeling off grapes you know.
Such a domain name can do wonders as ‘ol’ is often used by people in searches and hence it narrows down the traffic. ‘media’ in the domain name helps website in grabbing query with media in it. The diagram helps you in understanding the example a bit better,