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First question: Do I need my own URL?
A URL, also called a domain name, is the address people use to get to your site.
There are many websites that will give you a page or pages within their URL.
For example, diaryland.com will give you your own online diary (often called
a blog). It will be called http://myblogname.diaryland.com/. Yahoo's Geocities
offers free webpages (supported by advertising). Your address on Geocities will
by http://www.geocities.com/ThisIsMyName. If you just want to share some thoughts
with friends, or pictures of the new baby, perhaps you don't really need your
own URL.
There are three main reasons for getting your own URL:
- You need credibility. If you want to be perceived as a real merchant, expert,
authority or whatever, telling someone to go to your page on Geocities is
-- well -- tacky.
- You need a short, easy-to-remember name. If you're going to be giving people
the address verbally or on a business card, you want it to be as simple to
remember and type as possible.
- You need more capability than a blog or a free web page can provide. For
example, you want an online store to sell your products.
Second question: What shall I name my site?
Many search engine optimization experts will tell you that your URL should include
one or more searchwords you want to be found under. For example, if you have
a Yoga studio in Kalamazoo, you might want to register the site as "yoga-studio-kalamazoo.com".
But you have to weigh searchword inclusion against the question of how hard
that URL is to remember. For example, if "yogakalamazoo.com" is available,
even if it doesn't use the desired searchword "studio", it might be
preferable, because it's shorter and doesn't have the hard-to-remember hyphen.
Of course, there's the contrarian argument: It's better to have a meaningless
but catchy URL than a dull but relevant one. Did Google originally try to register
"search-engine.com"? Did Amazon try for "bookstore.com"?
Would they have been more successful if they had started up their websites under
those names?
It's also best to use as simple a name as possible. Before I knew any better,
I registered my webdesign site as "auntreeneeswebsites.com". Not only
can nobody remember it, no one can even spell it. I covered myself a little
by registering "auntreenee.com", which is much easier to remember,
but still not ideal because of the quirky spelling.
Your domain name (for example,"www.mystore.com") must be 32 letters
or less, including the extension, which is the part following the dot. The most
popular extensions are .com for commercial sites and .org for nonprofit sites.
Many of the most appealing .com and .org names have been taken already. Consider
these alternatives:
.biz
.info
.net
If you are in a country other than the USA, you can take that country's extension,
for example, .ca for Canada. The nice thing about many country registrations,
Canada for example, is that they demand proof that you're legally entitled to
the name (for example, incorporation papers for "The Ajax Corp" if
you're trying to register ajax.ca). That protects your right to an appropriate
URL for your company.
Third question: How do I register the name I've chosen?
The registration process is simple. You fill in the name you want and click
the button. They will tell you whether the name is available, or suggest others.
Once you have a name that's not taken, you purchase it just as you would on
any ecommerce site. (If you've never made an online purchase, you may want to
consider using a professional web design company to build your site!)
If you're creating your own pages, you'll need to do your own registration.
The oldest company in the business is Network Solutions. They're quite reputable.
Also expensive. Their less expensive rival is GoDaddy, where names cost about
nine dollars a year each to register.
If someone else is registering the name for you, make sure you are listed as
the owner of your domain. Otherwise, you won't have control over the name if,
for example, you want to move your website to a new web host.
About the Author:
Irene Herz
A web designer and programmer for over a decade, Aunt Reenee holds a Library
and Information Science degree and has eight nephews and nieces. |
