Let's be honest, most of us are (or were) pretty excited about the prospect of having our own Domain Name and building our first site. And so we should be; it's a great achievement. Before we get ahead of ourselves, we first have the daunting task of choosing our Domain Name, finding a Hosting Service and then working out what we do with it!
So, in this article we are going look at some of the issues you may come across on the rocky road to internet stardom!
Before you rush off and find a hosting service and register your new Domain Name: STOP! I want to share some thing with you.
Back in the days when I didn't have a clue what I was doing, I decided to use a free site builder to build a website. I got a free Domain Name and so I proudly chose my new Domain Name, registered it 's still sat there! Why, I hear you ask? Because I had no idea how to choose an effective Domain Name! I chose to use a word my son used for "pussy cat" as a toddler! So, as you can imagine, it bears no earthly resemblance to anything!
So, until I decide what I can do with it, it's just parked on my Hosting Account's servers! All, I'm saying is, just spend a little time thinking about your Domain Name, as it's going to be yours for at least a year!
With that in mind, what should you choose? Well, first of all think about what your aim is; are you offering? A product, service, affiliate product, information? Ideally, whatever your site is about should be represented in your Domain Name. For example, when I first set up (TSR) I only intended to write product reviews, as that was where I felt the most comfortable. However, I realised that I had a wealth of knowledge that I could share with others. As TSR was doing quite well, however, I decided not to register a new name, just build a new site around the existing content.
If, for example you wanted to build a site about playing the guitar, you could have something like "" or "". However, a lot of these types of Domain Names will be already taken by longer established sites. So that leaves us with the problem of getting our Domain out there. Search Engines like to see your Keyword(s) in the site title, after all it defines your online presence.
So we have a little problem in that most of the "good" Domain Names are already taken. Well, you can now do one of two things; firstly you could chose a name that is something "johnsmithguitar" or "johnsmithsguitarinfo" or "learnguitarinfo". You're still getting your keywords in the title, so your visitors will know what your site is about. It's worth noting that generally, shorter Domain Names are better than long ones; they're easier to remember and Search Engines like them. Having said that "" looks much better than "learnguitear167283729736388" for example.
The other thing you could do is conduct a bit a research into buying an expired Domain Name. Basically, is a Domain Name is not renewed by the owner, you could possibly buy that Domain Name. The price will depend on a lot things; how much traffic the site gets, page rank and so on, but can get some really cheap, good Domain Names if you're prepared to do a bit of trawling.
Finally, for this article, I just wanted to mention TLDs or Top Level Domains. This simply means .com, .org, .net and the like. Generally, TLDs are afforded a greater value or .biz. Just something to bear in mind.
In the next Article we will look at how you go about choosing a Hosting Service and how you get started on your first website.
So, in this article we are going look at some of the issues you may come across on the rocky road to internet stardom!
Before you rush off and find a hosting service and register your new Domain Name: STOP! I want to share some thing with you.
Back in the days when I didn't have a clue what I was doing, I decided to use a free site builder to build a website. I got a free Domain Name and so I proudly chose my new Domain Name, registered it 's still sat there! Why, I hear you ask? Because I had no idea how to choose an effective Domain Name! I chose to use a word my son used for "pussy cat" as a toddler! So, as you can imagine, it bears no earthly resemblance to anything!
So, until I decide what I can do with it, it's just parked on my Hosting Account's servers! All, I'm saying is, just spend a little time thinking about your Domain Name, as it's going to be yours for at least a year!
With that in mind, what should you choose? Well, first of all think about what your aim is; are you offering? A product, service, affiliate product, information? Ideally, whatever your site is about should be represented in your Domain Name. For example, when I first set up (TSR) I only intended to write product reviews, as that was where I felt the most comfortable. However, I realised that I had a wealth of knowledge that I could share with others. As TSR was doing quite well, however, I decided not to register a new name, just build a new site around the existing content.
If, for example you wanted to build a site about playing the guitar, you could have something like "" or "". However, a lot of these types of Domain Names will be already taken by longer established sites. So that leaves us with the problem of getting our Domain out there. Search Engines like to see your Keyword(s) in the site title, after all it defines your online presence.
So we have a little problem in that most of the "good" Domain Names are already taken. Well, you can now do one of two things; firstly you could chose a name that is something "johnsmithguitar" or "johnsmithsguitarinfo" or "learnguitarinfo". You're still getting your keywords in the title, so your visitors will know what your site is about. It's worth noting that generally, shorter Domain Names are better than long ones; they're easier to remember and Search Engines like them. Having said that "" looks much better than "learnguitear167283729736388" for example.
The other thing you could do is conduct a bit a research into buying an expired Domain Name. Basically, is a Domain Name is not renewed by the owner, you could possibly buy that Domain Name. The price will depend on a lot things; how much traffic the site gets, page rank and so on, but can get some really cheap, good Domain Names if you're prepared to do a bit of trawling.
Finally, for this article, I just wanted to mention TLDs or Top Level Domains. This simply means .com, .org, .net and the like. Generally, TLDs are afforded a greater value or .biz. Just something to bear in mind.
In the next Article we will look at how you go about choosing a Hosting Service and how you get started on your first website.