WEBVTT 00:00.170 --> 00:04.370 In this video, let's talk about how you can choose a good domain name for your business. 00:04.370 --> 00:09.290 It's very important because it's your brand, and it's very often the very first thing people see about 00:09.290 --> 00:14.720 your business even before they come to your site, when they choose to click on it or not, from somewhere 00:14.720 --> 00:15.410 on the web. 00:15.410 --> 00:22.030 So people think you can't get a good domain name, but you can still get plenty of great good.com domains. 00:22.040 --> 00:27.170 What you should try to do is keep it relatively short 2 to 3 syllables. 00:27.170 --> 00:28.820 If you go longer, it's okay. 00:28.820 --> 00:32.720 It's not the end of the world, but you should make an effort to stay short on it. 00:32.720 --> 00:36.590 And usually they should be English words that are easy to spell. 00:36.590 --> 00:41.330 I say usually because what if you have an international business or a non US business? 00:41.330 --> 00:46.580 Then of course you don't need English words, but generally you want words that are simple and easy 00:46.580 --> 00:52.100 to spell and easy to remember because people will forget everything. 00:52.100 --> 00:53.240 I used to have a website. 00:53.240 --> 00:57.320 Com hicom about hiking com hicom I thought it was so easy. 00:57.320 --> 00:59.390 Two English words, two syllables. 00:59.390 --> 01:01.430 Impossible to forget, I thought. 01:01.430 --> 01:03.110 And then people would forget all the time. 01:03.110 --> 01:04.850 They would be like go hiking. 01:04.850 --> 01:05.300 What is it? 01:05.330 --> 01:06.350 Is it go hike? 01:06.350 --> 01:12.680 So then I realized people will forget to make it as easy as possible for people and of course give hints 01:12.680 --> 01:14.270 about your brand. 01:14.270 --> 01:19.490 It doesn't have to be exactly what the business is, but at least a little bit of a hint to it. 01:19.490 --> 01:25.310 And of course, before you get your domain, you want to check social media handles and existing trademarks 01:25.310 --> 01:29.570 to make sure that that name that you're thinking about is not trademarked. 01:29.600 --> 01:33.400 Some people ask, what about getting exact match domain? 01:33.410 --> 01:39.260 Exact match domain are like, let's say if you're selling shoes, your domain will be shoes.com. 01:39.260 --> 01:44.570 And so when people search for shoes, your site will have a much higher chance to come up in Google 01:44.600 --> 01:47.720 because it's obviously domain is shoes, the searches shoes. 01:47.750 --> 01:55.820 And so especially earlier on like ten years ago, 15 years ago, exact match domain used to rank amazingly 01:55.820 --> 01:57.380 well in search. 01:57.380 --> 01:59.360 And they were very, very popular. 01:59.390 --> 02:03.740 Of course, it's very hard to even get an exact match domain for something very lucrative, but it's 02:03.740 --> 02:05.210 still possible at times. 02:05.240 --> 02:07.910 The question is, is it worthwhile? 02:07.910 --> 02:14.180 It still makes a difference, but it also has some problems because if you need to change direction 02:14.180 --> 02:21.920 later, then your exact match domain will restrict your brand flexibility because that same exact example 02:21.920 --> 02:23.210 come hicom. 02:23.210 --> 02:29.570 If I wanted to expand into camping or skiing, it would be hard because the name hike is right there 02:29.570 --> 02:31.340 in the domain. 02:31.340 --> 02:36.140 So if I had named it come do outdoor stuff that's too long. 02:36.140 --> 02:39.020 But you see, I did it more generalized, like outdoor. 02:39.050 --> 02:43.100 Then of course camping and skiing would be all under that. 02:43.100 --> 02:50.030 So exact match domains, they do help now a tiny bit for SEO, but they also restrict your brand. 02:50.030 --> 02:54.980 So it's a decision if you aren't sure that your business is going to be exactly the same in the future, 02:54.980 --> 02:57.590 you might want to stay with a more general brand. 02:57.590 --> 03:03.620 And that goes for your domain because specifics they just decrease your flexibility. 03:03.620 --> 03:10.130 And what you want to do is stay away from dot net, dot biz, dot info and even sometimes.co. 03:10.160 --> 03:16.970 I know that SEO are popular now, but a lot of consumers outside the tech world, they're not sure about 03:16.970 --> 03:17.690 this SEO. 03:17.690 --> 03:19.580 And they're always going to ask is it.co? 03:19.610 --> 03:20.420 Is it.com. 03:20.420 --> 03:24.230 You don't want the domain to be distracting from your core business. 03:24.230 --> 03:26.390 You want to get to the more important things. 03:26.390 --> 03:30.770 And the one caveat is country specific domains are okay. 03:30.770 --> 03:32.800 So in France it would be.fr. 03:32.810 --> 03:35.150 In UK it would be.co.uk. 03:35.180 --> 03:41.900 There are far more domain names available with those extensions then.com. 03:41.900 --> 03:44.090 So it's easier to get a great domain. 03:44.090 --> 03:48.050 Of course that's only if you're doing a business in France or in UK. 03:48.080 --> 03:50.660 If you're doing a US based business, don't make sense anymore. 03:50.690 --> 03:53.360 Now let's talk about what not to do. 03:53.390 --> 03:55.550 Don't put numbers in your domain. 03:55.580 --> 03:57.650 Don't put hyphens like this. 03:57.650 --> 04:00.080 Example x y, z hyphen ABC. 04:00.170 --> 04:01.580 Hyphens are just weird. 04:01.580 --> 04:03.710 Don't violate trademarks. 04:03.710 --> 04:08.960 This would be a trademark violation and Facebook would come after you like Facebook or.com is an example, 04:08.960 --> 04:09.230 right? 04:09.230 --> 04:11.030 It's I'm sure you can get that domain anyway. 04:11.030 --> 04:12.380 But if you could don't. 04:12.380 --> 04:16.460 So you always want to check if you're infringing on existing trademarks. 04:16.460 --> 04:18.920 There are ways to check on your own. 04:18.950 --> 04:24.260 You just google around for this course is not about checking for trademarks, but you should definitely 04:24.260 --> 04:25.910 google how to check for trademarks. 04:25.910 --> 04:26.840 It's very simple. 04:26.930 --> 04:31.970 Trademarks are publicly available information, and you can just find if something is trademarked and 04:31.970 --> 04:33.170 don't rush into a domain. 04:33.170 --> 04:36.980 A lot of people think, oh, if I don't get it now, people will buy it. 04:37.010 --> 04:38.690 Most of the time that's not true. 04:38.720 --> 04:43.760 Take a while before you decide, because you'll be stuck with it for a long time if you get it wrong. 04:43.760 --> 04:48.650 So get a lot of feedback on your domain, get a lot of opinions, and only buy it a little later. 04:48.650 --> 04:54.830 So let yourself think about it and avoid weird spellings, because people just won't remember that. 04:54.830 --> 04:59.360 And every time people forget or they feel confused, they're going to. 04:59.670 --> 05:01.380 Feel bad about themselves and feel stupid. 05:01.380 --> 05:04.260 That just causes them to go away or not engage. 05:04.260 --> 05:07.350 So the easier you can make things for people, the better. 05:07.350 --> 05:08.070 Always. 05:08.100 --> 05:10.350 Now buying domains. 05:10.350 --> 05:13.860 You can get your domain name, your first domain name for free. 05:13.890 --> 05:18.660 If you buy hosting on Bluehost.com, they have that perpetual good offer all the time. 05:18.660 --> 05:25.080 Or you can get a very cheap domain on GoDaddy.com if you google for like GoDaddy discount coupons, 05:25.080 --> 05:30.120 there's a ton of active coupons so you can get a discounted domain name for $1 or two or something like 05:30.120 --> 05:30.570 that. 05:30.660 --> 05:32.400 So buying them is no problem. 05:32.400 --> 05:37.980 So that's essentially how you go about shopping for a domain and researching your domain and getting 05:37.980 --> 05:38.760 the right one. 05:38.790 --> 05:45.570 Now I'm actually on GoDaddy.com and I'll show you how I would look for a domain. 05:45.570 --> 05:51.000 There are many, many better places where you can look for a domain and domains adjusters, but they're 05:51.000 --> 05:53.550 a little bit outside of the scope of this video. 05:53.550 --> 05:55.230 This is just a beginner introduction. 05:55.230 --> 05:59.580 So what you would do is like let's say you have some idea for a business. 05:59.580 --> 06:00.690 Maybe it's a coaching business. 06:00.690 --> 06:02.790 So you would do strong coaching.com. 06:02.790 --> 06:06.690 You would literally type that in here and they would tell you if it's available. 06:06.720 --> 06:08.340 You see they say it's taken. 06:08.340 --> 06:11.130 So they tell you all these other ones are available. 06:11.130 --> 06:13.200 Like they give you suggestions. 06:13.320 --> 06:15.210 Strong coaching services okay. 06:15.210 --> 06:19.500 It's a boring sounding domain name but it's clear. 06:19.500 --> 06:20.640 So it's not terrible. 06:20.640 --> 06:22.920 I wouldn't buy it though, but it's possible. 06:23.040 --> 06:25.080 And you would see you would browse here. 06:25.110 --> 06:27.090 Don't get any of this movie club. 06:27.090 --> 06:28.650 Nothing in that site don't get any of this. 06:28.650 --> 06:35.430 But if you have anything like.com suggested like strong coaching center, okay, like if that resembles 06:35.430 --> 06:40.140 what you're doing, then sure that you would get that domain, but then you can just keep searching 06:40.140 --> 06:41.880 instead of strong coaching. 06:41.880 --> 06:43.380 You may be like epic, right? 06:43.380 --> 06:45.090 So you would just try different words. 06:45.240 --> 06:49.080 And of course that one is taking a lot of the domains around coaching are taken. 06:49.080 --> 06:55.920 But as long as you play around and you maybe use a thesaurus would give you ideas for different keywords 06:55.920 --> 07:01.980 and you try like 1 or 2 terms like epic coaching, strong coaching, and then you'd get into like something 07:01.980 --> 07:02.610 interesting. 07:03.180 --> 07:06.810 Now here's an example that I just found randomly. 07:06.810 --> 07:10.440 Now this violates a lot of our rules. 07:10.440 --> 07:12.720 So I would not recommend this per se. 07:12.750 --> 07:15.600 But here's the sky's the limit. 07:15.630 --> 07:16.590 Coaching. 07:16.590 --> 07:22.320 It's quirky and fun which is good, but it's a little too long and it's too many words and it sounds 07:22.320 --> 07:22.800 awkward. 07:22.800 --> 07:28.080 So I would not get this, but you can see how you can play around with the prefixes and suffixes you 07:28.080 --> 07:28.710 can take out. 07:28.710 --> 07:31.710 The sky's the limit and you can say dream coaching. 07:31.740 --> 07:36.930 Of course this will be taken, but you will just play around and play around and you would always keep 07:36.930 --> 07:40.200 trying and eventually you'll stumble into some interesting domain names. 07:40.200 --> 07:44.870 This is a process that takes time, but over time, maybe days. 07:44.880 --> 07:47.610 Keep playing around, keep thinking, keep being creative. 07:47.610 --> 07:51.120 So even as I'm thinking, I thought of like, oh, better you coaching. 07:51.120 --> 07:54.480 And I typed it in here and it was taken, but still it's an idea. 07:54.480 --> 08:00.720 So keep getting these ideas and eventually you'll stumble into clusters of terms around which domains 08:00.720 --> 08:01.890 are not taken. 08:01.890 --> 08:07.920 And then as long as they fit the rules we outlined, you can grab one and they will represent your brand 08:07.920 --> 08:09.270 well and they'll be professional.