Ian Cozens (@wyrmfyre) wrote...

20-07-2009

For me, domains should be short, use no punctuation (personal preference) and directly reflect the name of the company. As an example, my first port of call for say, National Express will be nationalexpress.co.uk.

Which brings me to extensions :D I prefer my UK based companies to be .co.uk based, or at least have redirects to a .com.

Just a few random monday morning thoughts to kick this topic off :)

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Heather Noble (@saltevents) wrote...

20-07-2009

.co.uk or .com? Not that important as far as I'm concerned. I wouldn't reject or select based on this. Only possible benefit is ease to remember I guess.

Keyword or Company Name? Probably Company Name.


Multiple Domains? Whats the point. More cost. More confusion. Dilutes brand.

Length of Name - so long as memorable does it matter?

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Doug S. (@dougoftheabaci) wrote...

20-07-2009

OK, let's tackle this one by one:

"Should they choose a '.co.uk', '.com', '.eu' etc.?"
-If your company is primarily UK than .co.uk is best for SEO (see Google's YouTube channel). EU for companies that work all throughout the EU and .com as you wish but especially for international companies.


"Should it be a keyword driven domain name or use their company name?"
-Are people likely to search for your service or your company? If it's service then keywords are handy, though not necessary. Most cases a good name is best because it's memorable. Think Flickr. It's not as good for SEO but it's great for marketing.

"Should a website have multiple domain names and use web forwarding to point them all to the same place?"
-That's illegal and will get you blacklisted by Google so no, you shouldn't. BMW got banned for a period of time for it at one point. Google doesn't care who you are. If you break their rules they will show no mercy.


"... and if so, which domain does the website physically sit on?
How long should the name be?"
-See previous.

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Alex English (@AlexLBM) wrote...

20-07-2009

I'm currently looking at our company website with a view to re-designing and the domain names is a key part of that.

Personally I feel that a .com domain somehow adds more weight to a website - it somehow feels more established than a .co.uk, as if it was around from the beginning and is worldwide (although this is strictly not true as there are loads of .com sites that are only UK based for e.g.)

With regards to multiple domains - there seems to be something a bit sneaky about this - like you're tricking people into thinking they're going one place and then redirecting them. Mainly the reasons behind this are not in the best interests of the user, but the company, which I think is always a bit dodgy. You should run a website for the user, not for yourself. If it is good enough it will benefit you, which is why you should strive to use best practice and not little IT tricks to get the desired results.

Just a couple of personal thoughts!

Thanks
Alex

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Anthony (@afovea) wrote...

20-07-2009

In my experience it's always best to secure the .com and the .co.uk regardless. I also find that if the site requires a search engine campaign then it is wise to secure relevant keyword domains pointed to the same site or even dedicated landing pages worked towards a specific audience.

Generally domains should be kept as brief as possible but there is an exception to that rule. There have been instances in the past where a commonly used phrase can work just as well and even offers a uniqueness or "catchyness" (if that's a word) to the URL. This is obviously quite a broad view and most of the time the domain strategy (horrible marketing term) is specific to the project.

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Andy Kinsey (@andykinsey) wrote...

20-07-2009

Hmmm, Where to start?
As an seo expert I have mixed experience in the domains area, sometimes it is the most important thing others it couldn't be less important.
For example ... andykinsey.com - my site - nothing to do with SEO, WebDesign etc but does get a fair number of hits for these terms. other examples would be boagworld and clearleft.

length of a domain ... to a search engine has no real meaning - its the factors of a domain that May (as explained above no always) ... length is only important to Humans ... making it catchy and easy to remember is important.

level of a domain is important however... ok we all love the idea of being a global (.com) and most of my sites are this... but I also use UK and EU and other country codes like .jp.com for a jaapanese site... these lower level domains are used by search engines as a first stop to finding where a site is targeted at ...and will make locals feel more at home (aka if .co.uk they may feel they are helping a british company rather than an international giant, on the other hand being a giant may draw its own crowd).

web forwards from a single page site... generally not advised...each site/domain should have its own meaning and if not it should be parked on the other domain with a 301 permanent redirect. ... eg .com forwards to .uk or if your clever enough the end level for that country ... eg one of my .com's will forward to .jp.com or .co.uk amongst others.

im not sure how helpful this has been for you reading my rambling but its cleared my mind up a little

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Leu (@leunix) wrote...

20-07-2009

I think it is always a good idea to purchase the .co.uk and .com derivitives of your domain (where possible) just to prevent other people from taking your brand.

if it is a long name domain (composed of a few words), then it is better to separate these words by hyphens. So www.myreallylongdomainname.com becomes www.my-really-long-domin-name.com.

Also this way it prevents strange words being created (experts-exchange.com being a prime example, without the hyphen it could read expert sex change.com.

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Adam Griffiths (@adam_griffiths) wrote...

20-07-2009

Personally when I choose a domain name I always use a company name over a domain purely for a keyword benefit.

Usually I buy the .com extension for any domain name because it's the most widely used, highly recognised and more people will type .com in first time than .net.

In some cases I would advise buying a .co.uk extension for example if the company or individual is based in the UK and only wishes to target UK customers or if the .com equivalent is taken.

But when I want to secure the name for marketing purposes, I will buy the .com, .net and .co.uk and forward them all to the .com. In some cases I have used the other domains for other purposes, such as a community forum. This also helps when targetting a wider range of users in multiple countries: for example, if UK users are more likely to type in .co.uk then US users are probably more likely to type in .com if they go to the same place then there's no harm done. But if a domain squatter buys another domain such as .net then your brand could be hurt as a result.

Hope this helps.

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Paul Ashton (@paulashton1979) wrote...

20-07-2009

I advise people to get both the .com and .co.uk. Which you put on business cards etc is up to you, but I prefer .com, as prev commented - sounds more established for some reason. I would also consider adjusting name slightly if someone has the .com... people will often just guess your domain name. Oh, and don't use hyphens, you'll spend hours over the next few years saying/explaining it down the phone (it's not catchy either "our website is www dot cheap hyphen stuff dot com")

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Pete Williams (@PeteWilliams) wrote...

20-07-2009

I'd go with the company/site name rather than a keyword. I remember reading some research a while ago about users preferring them, ie Amazon.com rather than Books.com. Think it adds credibility.

I'd keep them as short as you can get away with - easier to remember and more marketable in my opinion.

As the primary domain I would use whatever TLD is semantically applicable, be it .co.uk, .org or whatever, but it's always wise to register the .com as well for brand protection.

Kirsty, why do you advise against forwarding multiple domains to a single website?

Pete

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Kirsty Burgoine (@kirstyburgoine) wrote...

20-07-2009

In response to Pete...
It depends on how multiple domains are used. If you are buying the .co.uk, .com, .org etc. of the same domain name to protect the brand then using web forwarding is ideal. Or if there are old links that are now dead still listed within search engines, I will use 301 redirects to make sure they point to the new pages.

However, I tend to advise against having lots of different domains all pointing to the one site because the technique isn't viewed very highly by google. There isn't a lot to be gained from it and a lot to be lost if google decided to cripple the pagerank because of it.

At least thats my take on it, and of course there are always exceptions...

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Andrew Yates (@andy383) wrote...

20-07-2009

I would always go for the company name personally as that's the "brand".

A while in the past I would of gone with a site/company name that would include a keyword. If I had the domain andrewyates.com, i'm rather positive I would be higher in the search engines compared to other people with the same name. Like me and my 'AndyDev'.

I previously had a few other blogs/portfolio's I simply put in a redirect till these domains are up for renewal and leave them. I have never advised anyone to purposly go out and by domains to just redirect to a site. As you said, i'm sure Google wouldn't rate this technique very high.

On a personal note, I can't believe I haven't visited this site yet. I'll add it to my RSs reader. Not one to self promote but I feel your posts would fit well on my inBlogs.org site. :)

Andy

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Clive Walker (@clivewalker) wrote...

20-07-2009

I would echo the previous points about buying .com and .co.uk [for a UK company] and I always forward one to the other. Main reason for buying both is to protect against someone else [a competitor for example] buying the other. I have not seen any Google penalties when there are two names and one is fowarded but of course if you do this many times it may be construed differently.

Of course, sometimes the top level domain has already been bought but you can often be creative with other top level domains [.net or .info or .biz for example]. Not ideal perhaps but can still be effective and relevant to the company/website.

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Martin Smith (@marttn) wrote...

21-07-2009

I read some sensible stuff commented on. There is a difference between a biz selling stuff rather than organisations that use the web to promote. So my feeling is .com is short and no nonsense we are a biz - .co.uk is busness like too but feeling a bit friendlier uk cuddly and not a hard .com that could be anywhere. Volunatary sector go for .org.uk which I feel rather grand! As for the .net .eu and all the other new fangled I don't like them - there is sense of trying to be clever.

.coms should go for it and buy as many key names domains etc as they can afford and be damned google cos we are .coms!

.co.uk we are brits so its not polite to take up all the names.

.org.uk no one looks at our site so whats the point of buying more useless names.

The rest ... I don't care.

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