How to choose the right domain name
When a company decides to create its own website, one of the main issues it faces is choosing the right domain name. Choosing a domain name can be a very easy or very painful procedure depending on a great degree from the name of the company and the available domains. What follows is a series of rules which will help you choose the right domain for your company. All examples used in this post will involve choosing the right domain for the fictional company chain “TastyChain Bakeries Ltd”.
Size Matters
Who said size doesn’t matter? The chosen domain must have the smallest size possible in order for users to easily remember it and easily insert it in their browsers. Lets start with the simplest step: removing the “Ltd” from the end of the company. The same can be done with other similar company postfixes. We proceed by removing other parts of the company name which are common to other company names and which denote the nature of the company’s activities, its partners etc. In our fictional example we can remove the term “Bakeries” and have as a result the name “tastychain”.
.com, .eu or .com.cy?
Since we have already decided what the main name of the domain will be (TastyChain), what remains is to choose the right extension for our domain. The most common extensions are: .com, .eu, and .com.cy while others exists such as: .net, .org, .info, .mobi and .tv. The oldest extension is .com while each extension has its own meaning and is possibly destined for specific geographic areas. For example, the .eu extension is used for European countries, .com.cy for Cyprus only, while .tv is used for TV channels and shows. The combination of your chosen name along with the chosen extension will create your full domain name. You can use our related service to check whether your desirable domain is available.
In general, we suggest the use of .com.cy extension only when your company’s activities are constrained within Cyprus. If you have plans to extend your activities abroad or you are already providing services abroad you should definitely choose either .com or .eu. However, if your company’s activities are directed only to a foreign country such as Greece or Italy then you might be interested in other country’s extensions such as .gr and .it respectively. If you are interested in those special extensions please contact us.
The domain is not available
There is no reason to worry since this is a common phenomenon especially with English domain names. What we suggest you to do in such cases is either to consider using alternative extensions (if this is possible) or to alter your initial domain name. Therefore, in our example we could use tastychainbakeries. As you can see in such cases we use parts of the company’s name which were initially removed in order to create an available domain. However it is important to be careful not to break the first rule and end up with a large domain.
Should I reserve only one domain name?
No! If it is possible we would definitely suggest to reserve more than one extension for your domain name. The annual rental cost is quite small and it will protect you from possible future troubles where a company with a similar company name will reserve the same domain as you but with a different extension. If for example you have decided to reserve the extension .com.cy but .com is available as well, you should definitely reserve both extensions! The same applies for a .eu extension.
Following these four simple rules will allow you to successfully choose the right domain for your company. But do not forget to reserve your desirable domain as soon as possible since things in the world wide web tend to move quite fast!