Choosing the right name for your blog can be the difference between catching fire or having a blog that no one cares about. If you look at the top 1000 blogs, the majority of them have decent, catchy names. Naming a blog can be easy on the surface, but it really isn’t. A lot of us struggle to come up with an original catchy name.
I am sure you have heard of all the buzz that was going around a while back about folks using “Digg” to model their names. Then we started having “gg” at the end of 100s of new websites. While I can appreciate folks trying to use Digg’s success to come up with catchy names, it’s just too unoriginal to use the same letters. I mean I would get if you use “waterr.com” as your domain (even though it’s still not catchy).
Here is the thing. Folks want to have unique domains but they often think too hard about it. You don’t have to come up with some magical domain name to be successful. You want to have a domain that is:
- Easy to type: easy to type on a computer, a laptop, and a mobile phone such as the iPhone. For instance, putting hyphens and underscores is just not too easy for mobile visitors.
- Easy to remember: a domain that is easy to remember can help you get more traffic. Think about it. How difficult is it to remember Digg.com?
- Meaningful: I get all the crazy domain names out there, but your domain should be somewhat meaningful. Digg can stand for digging up stories.
- Brandable: a brandable domain is one that you can use to push your brand. Amazon, eBay, Digg, are all brandable names. While I have seen folks brand some not so brandable domains, it just makes your work easier if you have a catchy enough domain for that purpose.
Once you have found your desired domain, you should try to register it. Forget about registering anything obvious these days as everything is taken. You may want to consider buying a domain if it’s registered but that comes down on how large your budget is (you can expect to pay anything from $200 to $2M for a good domain). There are plenty of good domains still available to purchase. Just make sure you find a unique one that has the above characteristics (and is a .com).