A. Shibli
There’s a lot more in a name than you can imagine. Names give your business identity. It is your first point of interaction with your potential customers and getting it right brings you that much closer to forging a lasting relationship with them.
Names are crucial in the online world because, unlike at a store or in a workplace, online interactions are highly perception-driven. How your users perceive you greatly depends on how much you invest in building your brand. One such important investment that every business owner makes is the domain name for his website.
Nowadays, acquiring a domain name is as easy as it is inexpensive. However, astute entrepreneurs understand that a domain name is more than just a URL. It is an investment that will help you stand out from the crowd and shine in the virtual world. It is a concrete step towards building a credible reputation for your brand.
What makes a domain name premium?
Certain domain names are more meaningful, understandable and brandable than others. They are sought after by many businesses, which makes them more expensive. Below are the characteristics of premium domain names:
1. They are highly brandable
The perceived brand value of a domain name makes it premium and increases its demand. For instance, www.rentals.space is a memorable and indicative domain name and therefore, has a premium value attached to it.
2. They are short in length
Brevity is all-important in the online world. Domain names that are short and simple are easier to remember and less prone to being misspelled, making them a premium commodity. For instance, if you were a cotton clothing store, a domain name such as www.cotton.store or would be perfect for you.
3. They offer great SEO benefits
Industry-relevant domain extensions such as .store, .tech or .online when combined with a meaningful word or phrase make for keyword-rich web addresses, which can give you on-topic backlinks and significantly improve your website’s overall SEO.
4. They are highly relevant to the industry
No two entities can have the same domain name. As a company, you need a domain name that is closest to what you’re offering and gives you the opportunity to unambiguously promote yourself. For example, www.designmy.site.
Benefits of a premium domain name
1. Establishes brand positioning
Premium domain names allow you to establish your category of business or your niche in a short and simple manner. By using contextually-relevant and industry-specific words in your domain name, you are clearly communicating to users what your business is about. Take, for instance, domain names such as www.fit.tech. It immediately communicates what the business is about.
Premium domain names can help brands better establish their value proposition. In the long run, this can help companies build the desired perception without having to spend big budgets on branding efforts.
2. Is more marketing-friendly
Premium domain names are short and easier to communicate, which makes them ideal for usage in offline and traditional marketing efforts such as on billboards, print ads, business cards, flyers and other marketing material.
Moreover, they are designed to have greater recall value and pass the radio test, which means that they are easily understood when communicated through word of mouth. Consider, for instance, URLs such as www.hop.online. If one was to print them on a standee at an event or verbally narrate them on a radio show, a TV ad or a podcast, the audience is more likely to remember them correctly.
Radio-test-friendly premium domain names become all the more valuable in the era of voice searches as they are a better match for voice search keywords.
3. Drives more traffic
People are often skeptical about using newer domain extensions. However, Google treats all domain names as equal. Using a new extension that is easily available and, more importantly, is relevant to your business, can actually be better for driving traffic to your website.
Organic traffic is related to the quality of content and the backlinks you manage to acquire on other credible sources. If search engines find a closer link between your domain name and the content on your website, it enhances the authenticity of your website and encourages search engines to send more traffic your way.
The same applies to backlinks. A closer match between the URL and the anchor text sends a positive signal to search engines. For instance, if you’re a company that sells insurance and your domain name, www.insurance.online, is linked to the text “insurance online”, search engines will be more convinced about the relevance of your website’s content.
4. Creates a positive reputation
Digitally-savvy Internet users are not just wary of clicking on untrustworthy links, they also know how acquiring domain names works. A simple and clear domain name immediately establishes that it belongs to a credible business or organization.
This could be the beginning of a relationship of trust and brand loyalty between you and your potential customers, which you can enhance by providing top-quality services and meaningful interaction. This trust can also extend to other communication on social media and email marketing.
Finally, short and simple premium domain names are just less cumbersome, have better readability and are less prone to being misspelled, which is crucial for any online entity.
Conclusion
Before you decide on a domain name, ask yourself the following questions:
- How relevant is the name to your company name and what you do?
- Will others understand and remember it easily?
- Does it give you an edge over current and future competitors?
- Does it come across as legitimate and trustworthy?
If a domain name checks all the above boxes, it might be worth paying the premium price for as it will help you build and sustain the right identity and positioning for your business.
This article was written for Webnames Blog by Alisha Shibli, a Content Marketing Specialist at Radix, the registry operator behind great new domain extensions like .store, .online, .tech, .press and others. You can follow Alisha on twitter @alishashibli.