Hiring the Internet

Nowadays, online shoppers expect companies to invest real time and money into their websites. Businesses must make sure they have covered all the basic features of a trustworthy e-commerce site. To name a few: a good About page, a reliable and easy checkout process, and indications that the company has made efforts to protect customer information.

Yet another important e-commerce aspect is currently increasing in value and scarcity: domain names.

Domain names are like Internet real estate. If you open up a shop, you need to own or rent some space to sell your wares. Online, that space would be your domain name.

It’s also an extremely important part of how customers perceive your company.

The Importance of Domain Names

Take care in choosing effective domain names and then be prepared to invest money in a good one. With a suitable domain name, you obtain:

1. Stability and flexibility. The most important reason for owning or renting a good domain name is that you get to keep it in case you change web hosts or transfer to an in-house server. That URL stays the same no matter where you go, which means your site gets more mobility and resiliency.
2. Authenticity. Using a free or low-grade generic address from an ISP or web host makes your business look less credible. No customer wants to buy from a site that looks like a fly-by-night operation. A solid domain name spells out security.
3. An SEO boost. A domain name that contains a keyword often appears at the top of search engine results. You can bet that if you search with the keyword “cars,” a site result with the URL “cars.com” will show up at the top of the page. Domain selection is really the first step in search engine optimization!
4. Branding support. Who are you? What does your website say about you? Your domain name is a part of your brand identity, establishing your products/services, your personality, and your unique features.

The Future Expansion of Web Real Estate

ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) recently voted in favor of basically overhauling the current domain name system.

Some time in the future, we can expect businesses to use their brands as domain names, and for there to be domain names in other written languages. We’ll also have domains like .love, .bank, and .paris. It’s almost dizzying to think of all the branding possibilities!

It’s not clear when these new options are available. In the meantime, though, it’s a challenge to acquire an effective domain name. Not long ago, NPR recently covered the current trends of domain name ownership. (Download or stream the podcast here.) Based on this report, it seems that it will be common practice for domain leasing to dominate the industry. A few have already enjoyed large revenue streams from making smart purchases back in the late 1990s that proved to be lucrative in recent years, either through leasing to companies who use traffic redirects or through “flipping” their real estate.

As many .com names have been taken, it’s up to you to select a domain that’s relevant, creative, and easy to remember. Don’t downplay this step in your website development! As they say in real estate, “The three most important things are location, location, location.”

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