I have been receiving emails or private messages on many small business forums about where and how to start a small business or home based business. They often asked me how to find their business name and register a domain name for their small business. Does domain name matter to their business? What a domain name can do to help them gain more business or drive their business forward?

The answer is simple. Domain name does matter. A good domain name will attract visitor and help the web site to be indexed and searched easier that just some weird domain name. I registered all my domains at www.GoDaddy.com. They are the largest domain and web hosting company in the world.

Now, what domain name should a small business owner get? Here is some guide lines.

1. Frist of all, don’t try to get a domain with a big brand name in it. For example, digggoogle.com or googleme.com, which has google in the domain name. You might get sue by those big shop when your site is getting quiet traffic.
2. Try to find a name close to your own business name.
3. Get dot com (.com), if you can. Most of search engine will look for your domain + .com to find if there is such a domain existing. The search engine will list it in the order or .com, .net etc. And most of people who only remember the domain name will type something like smallbizdir with .com after that while he/she means to type (smallbizdir.net). Not many people remember to type .net, .org, .info or anything else. So get .com domain as you can.
4. Find a good domain registration company to stick with. I personally recommend www.GoDaddy.com, because of their credibilities. I don’t host my site with then. Their shared hosting is not as good as what I am getting from ANHosting.com. I would choose GoDaddy.com for higher end dedicated hosting.
5. If you can’t find a good domain name close to your business name, think about something sharp and easy to remember. Yahoo and Google are both very easy to remember.
6. Don’t make your domain more than 12 characters long. Most of people will not remember long domain or just forget the .com, .net part of the domain. A long domain will also make your email address hard to remember. A long domain name might not fit your newly design business card of advertisement flyer. Can you remember this email address? [email protected]. You got the point.

Does domain matter to your business? Domain is just like your company name, it’s part of your business plan and success. Without a good domain name, you won’t represent your business in a good and wealthy way.