Before you head out on your great domain name search, you need to give a little thought to the process. Do you want to buy an existing domain that is a little established and has a website that already gets some traffic? would you rather go the cheaper (usually) route of buying an unregistered domain name and build it up yourself?
That is only the first of several questions you should ask yourself. I’ll break it down a little bit so you have a better idea of which option is the best one for you and your online business.
First things first, consider what your budget is for your domain name. A new, unregistered domain name is about $10 a year. You can save on that price if you register it for multiple years and / or you buy more than one domain name at a time. When you buy in bulk you can often get a per domain price of around $5 or $6 dollars, maybe less.
If this is the way you want to go then you need to find a list of keywords that are closely related to the topic of your business. For example, if you are starting a niche site about bird baths you need to do some keyword research so you can compile a nice long list of highly searched keywords associated with bird baths.
Once you’ve got this list you can go to a domain name registrar online and find out which sites are available There are many domain registrars available such as GoDaddy.com, DomainCheapsters.com or NameCheap.com to name just a few.
Try to get a .com extension if possible but if you’ve got a really great keyword that gets a lot of searches every month, going with a .net should work out very well for you too.
Also, try to get a domain name that just has the keyword in it and if possible, no other words. Though, again, if the keyword you are targeting is very popular you shouldn’t pass it up. So if all you can get is a domain name with something like the word ‘best’ or ‘easy’ etc, before or after the keyword, you should probably go for it.
If you are on the hunt for an expired domain name that already has a high page rank and a lot of search traffic every month you should go to an online domain auction site. There are a lot of them around and many of the domain registrar companies will sell off expired domains.
Make sure you know what you are getting if you go this route. Most of the time you are just getting the domain name and not the actual website. Also carefully consider the amount of traffic the site is currently getting and try to estimate what your monthly income will be for that site, so you don’t overspend.
As you can see, you have several choices when it comes to your domain name search. To a large degree the option you choose will depend on what your budget is. Taking the time to carefully investigate all your options before you make a purchase is a very wise idea.