Getting Started: From Scratch to Launch
6. Name Your Domain
Now, what you’ve been waiting for… choosing your domain name – your very own web address.
You are King (or Queen) Of Your Domain!
A Domain is like a kingdom where a King or Queen reigns. Animals establish territory that is theirs or their group’s domain. A lion’s domain is the area where he hunts and watches over his family. Your domain name stakes claim to your kingdom – a piece of the internet’s world-wide web that is ruled by you!
It’s All Yours
The domain name that you choose should reflect what your web site and business is all about in one word or short phrase – determined from your previous keyword research.
Search A Domain Registry…
I searched several companies which offer domain registry, the companies you can buy your domain name(s) from, for domain names related to music-themed decor to see what “.com” names were already taken and which were available. Each company will show whether a particular domain name is available, but different companies return other results, too, like if the name is taken, if it’s for sale, if it’s backordered…
These are some Web Service companies where you can begin your search for the “perfect” domain name:
Go Daddy.com
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1 and 1.com
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DotYou.comThis one’s fun to say! This is where I have purchased all of my Domains. |
If It’s Taken… Try, Try Again
When I searched for www.musicdecor.com at Go Daddy, the result came back as “unavailable” and “for sale… for $18,000” !!! (Gulp – no thanks!)
When I entered www.musicdecor.com in my url bar, I was directed to a generic web page that advertises other domain names that I may be interested in instead, which means no one is building a music decor business at that domain address. Good news. Someone thinks this would be a valuable niche, so they bought the domain name and are waiting for someone to be dying to buy it! Now, I just need to come up with a similar-but-available domain name to nab for myself.
The domain registry companies return suggestions of similar available domain names, like adding “my” to the front of the domain name (like mymusicdecor.com), or adding “online” to the end of the domain name (like musicdecoronline.com). I decided to try adding a hyphen to get “music-decor.com” and it was available. And it only costs $11.75 per year. I nabbed it for the year and ta-dah…
So, My Domain Name Is…www.Music-Decor.com
And I love it!
(Cost so far for this business – with education discussed in Step 2: $151.75 – without education: $11.75)
What’s next? “Get Web Hosting Service” →
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