Website Domains: 7 Things Your Web Marketer or Designer Might Not Tell You

Most businesses who hire a web marketing company or designer to put up a website are more interested in results than process. While that’s understandable, blind trust is a liability in any business transaction. By not taking the time to understand what’s inside the black box, you may be putting your business–and even your reputation–on the line. One of the most common “black box” issues I see is business owners entrusting their web designer or marketing consultant with the selection and purchase of a domain name for their website.

Now, don’t get me wrong. Lots of web marketers deal with this process responsibly. But a ton more don’t, including the ones who charge an arm and a leg for their “expertise.” Here are some things you need to be aware of when selecting and purchasing a website domain:

1) Select a domain that is easy to remember and even easier to spell. Long-winded or otherwise hard-to-spell domains frustrate users and make for clunky marketing messages, online and off. For the same reasons, go with a .com domain if you can. This is what people tend to default to when typing a URL into their browser or relaying a website address to friends and colleagues.

2) If you can use a relevant keyword or phrase in your domain, great. If not, don’t sweat it. Keywords only matter to domain name selection insofar that the people who maintain websites tend to link out to other sites using a site’s URL in the “anchor text” of the link. Search engines like this, and so do users. But there are other ways to get juicy anchor text into your backlinks. This method just happens to be a handy one.

3) If you’re struggling to choose a domain name because all the ones you want are taken, or you just can’t think of something simple and memorable that fits, go to InstantDomainSearch.com. I use this tool all of the time to brainstorm both domain names and names for entirely new websites or product offerings.

4) Purchase variations of the domain you will use for your website, but just the obvious ones. For example, I own the domain snapwebmarketing.com for this website, but I also own snapva.com (no hyphen). I’d just rather not have another website out there with a domain that is so close to mine. If you do purchase slight variations of your main domain, however, be sure to point the other versions to the main URL. That way, if someone types one of these other variations into their browser, the main website will still be called. Your hosting service should be able to help you with this.

You could also purchase the .ca, .biz, .net versions as well, but don’t go crazy with this either. The main thing is to find a simple .com domain that makes sense for your target audience. Everything else is gravy.

5) Make sure your domain is registered under YOUR name and YOUR business. I am blown away by how many marketers, web designers and IT consultants register client domains under their own name or business and not the client’s. There are 2 reasons this is problematic:

• A domain name is intellectual property like anything else you use to market and operate your business. Yet many businesses out there don’t even know that someone else owns their website domain(s). Moreover, they often don’t find out until the third party does a disappearing act with their precious domain(s) in tow. It’s a downright irresponsible business practice carried out by consultants and designers who either can’t be bothered to educate their clients or don’t understand online business fundamentals (but pretend they do).

• There’s a very good chance your website will outlive the relationship you have with your web designer or consultant. There’s an even better chance that such a person will go MIA when your domain comes up for renewal. (I’m being facetious here, but this happens so often it’s almost funny. Almost.) Domain registrars won’t hunt you down to make sure your domain gets renewed. The domain will simply expire when the renewal date passes without payment, and now your website will be missing in action as well. If you rely on your website to attract leads, generate sales, and keep the marketing pipeline humming along, having it go down for an extended period of time is bad for business.

• Bonus Tip: Make sure your hosting service is also in your name and not that of a third party. It’s a rude awakening to call your Internet service provider (ISP) for a password reset only to be told you are not the authorized account holder. Your name may be all over the website in question, but the ISP doesn’t know you from a hole in the wall. As such, they won’t give you any information. The only person they’re interested in talking to is the person who is paying for the server space. They don’t care that you paid Joe Designer for the hosting; they care that Joe keeps paying them. And Joe may be vacationing in Timbuktu right about the same time you want to make critical changes to your website. You won’t be happy, and your new web designer will be left twiddling his thumbs until you sort out the mess.

6) To ensure you always renew your domain on time, provide your domain registrar contact info that is unlikely to change often. I like to use my Gmail address as the email contact and my post office box as the mailing address. If you use your marketing consultant, IT consultant or web designer as the admin contact, be confident that you can remember to change that information should one of these people quit, get the axe, do something naughty, or otherwise scram.

• Domain Admin Tip: I buy all my domains through Netfirms.com. There are lots of great domain registrars out there, but this is one I’ve come back to over the years due to its user-friendly control panel. Pick a registrar you like and stick with it. It makes managing your domains much easier over the long run.

7) Don’t move an existing website to a new domain because your consultant or designer thinks you need a new one. Google likes to see a domain hang around for a while before indexing individual web pages and assigning them rank in the search results. Don’t go switching domains all willy-nilly because you found something sexier on the market. There should be a very good business case for moving an existing (read: aged) site to another domain. Even then, there are specific steps that will help you protect your rankings–and traffic–through the transition. If your web guy doesn’t know what I’m talking about, either keep the domain you’ve been using or give me a call.

It’s unfortunate that when you hire someone who is supposed to help you with your website, you risk doing more harm than good to your online presence. As with any transaction though, Buyer Beware. Take the time to understand the steps your consultant or designer wish to take, and speak up if something just doesn’t seem right. Know what will and will not be attached to your name, your business and  your reputation when the transaction is complete. And understand that the law is still catching up with the Internet, so you are still your best advocate for the welfare and protection of your business’ web operation, and reputation.