Web Hosting Reviews & Ratings

September 15, 2011

Domain Names: We Don’t Need Those Anymore - Do We?

So, it’s no longer the 1990’s. The Dot Com boom is officially over, and the mad rush for every available domain name with a one word tagline along with it. Gone are the days when a developer only needed Name.com to succeed, or even PopularPhrase.com, too.

We live in a world that thrives on .us, .info, and .biz domains, a sketchier version of the Internet where domain names are less and less emphasized in favor of content. So the real question is this: Do I even need to worry about having my own domain name?

The short answer:  Probably.

What we mean by domain name is this: If you own a corporation called Pinkleton Law, and you’re creating a new website for your business, you’ll want to grab up either Pinkleton.com, or PinkletonLaw.com. The age old wisdom is that this is preferable to having a domain name listed underneath another URL tag, such as pinkleton.blogstpot.com. The idea behind this is that having a user-specific domain name makes your content easier to find, as well as more easily spidered by trolling search engines.

However, registering a domain name is a complicated affair, especially with so many companies out there grabbing up anything and everything that resembles a common word or phrase. It’s a tricky game, and the benefits of playing it are grey at best. Essentially, the choice between registering your own domain name and not can be broken down like so:

Having your own domain name is a professional move that comes with easily expanded benefits. By registering a personal URL, you are—for life, unless you’ve infringed someone else’s copyright—claiming a portion of the Internet as your own. This is beneficial for businesses that are concerned about branding, especially as registering a domain name opens up all the thousand of available email accounts: If you own Pinkleton.com, you also own , or any million other email tags. This is yet another perk for the businessman, and an extra incentive to get registering.

However, if you aren’t concerned about expansion, or about your website’s branding potential, the benefits of registering a domain name are much smaller. As search engine spiders become more and more advanced, it’s easier than ever for your content to appear when users do a quick search for it. With this in mind, having an easily recognized and memorable domain name is less important. Also, if you’re only looking to own a space temporarily, a Blogspot or WordPress page is an idea solution.

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