• Domain Name
• Sub-domain Name
• Difference between Domain and Sub-domain Name
• Getting a Domain Name or Upgrading to a Domain Name
• Choosing the NAME
• Allowed Domain Names
• Generic Domain Names
• Easy Names
• Reasonable Length Domains
• Spelling
• Trademarks
• Adult Domain Names
• Ask for Advise
• Don't Abbreviate if it Makes it Harder
• Hyphens
• Prefix, Postfix
• Plurals
• Choosing the TLD (Top Level Domain) or Extension
• Registering the Name
• Free Redirector

This is not an easy issue as it seems, because you will be choosing a name that is also your website address.
You can choose your domain name anytime you want before or after building your site, but its better to choose it now and get done with it, this will help stay focused on the content and the spirit of the layout. And besides, there is no real reason why this issue should be delayed to later on in the guide.

www.mail.buildguide.net

mail is the Sub-Domain
buildguide is the Second-Level Domain also called the Domain Name
net is the Top-Level Domain (TLD) also called extension

•  Domain Name

In the Domain Name System (DNS), Second-Level Domain or domain name is a domain that is directly under the Top-Level Domain (TLD).
Like lyricsandsongs in www.lyricsandsongs.com
and sitediary in www.sitediary.com

•  Sub-domain Name

In the Domain Name System (DNS), Sub-domain is a domain that is part of a larger domain that comes directly under the domain name (second-level domain)
Like help in www.help.buildguide.net
and danny in www.danny.sitediary.com

•  Difference between Domain and Sub-domain Name

At the begging you can choose between a paid Domain Name and a free Sub-domain. If you choose a free sub-domain you can later upgrade to a domain name.

This website is an example of a free domain name upgraded to a domain later, I chose the word build, I did choose netfirms by going to there website but I didn't chose the letters (the word netfirms itself), this is called a sub domain, there is already a domain ( www . netfirms . com ) , they run a web hosting service and gave me the sub domain ( http://build.netfirms.com ) I then got the domain name ( buildguide.net ) , An example of a paid domain is ( http://www . info2device . com/ ) that as well was originally built on free hosting and a sub domain and ( http://info2device1.netfirms.com ) and then upgraded into a full domain.

Now that looks pretty simple doesn't it, well it is!

Lets start by giving you the bottom line then we will elaborate, the bottom line is that you could start by taking free hosting and a free sub domain and get a domain later (note: free hosting always has a catch like a banner on top of every page on your website as you can see here).

Note : some hosting companies give free Domain (not sub-domain) when buying a hosting plan (paid), and paying for 12 months or more in advance.

Here we will assume you are going to go with our plan and get free sub domain and then get a domain name to point at it, Please note that you can get a sub domain and then get a .TK Domain free that points to your sub domain.

•  Getting a free Sub-domain Name

If you want to get your own Domain Name and not a free sub-domain, you can skip this section and go to (Getting a Domain Name or Upgrading to a Domain Name).
Where to get you free Sub-domain Name from? Some web hosting services (ex: tripod and netfirms) offer free Sub-domain Names. But you have to remember that when choosing under what Domain Name your Sub-domain Name will be, you are also choosing your hosting service, because for example you cant choose a Sub-domain Name from tripod and host your website on neftfirms.

So what are the considerations you should make before registering the subdomain?

Getting a sub-domain does not mean you are out of choices, for example the domain http://0.4mg.com does not even show that it is a subdomain, since the . Comes naturally in the number 0.4 ! The domain 4mg.com belongs to freeservers.com. The deal on the issue is that free servers although offer great domains to be listed under, they give you so little tools and statistics with free hosting.

Some hosts offer you a directory above the domain rather than a subdomain, an example of this is http://www.angelfire.com/space/yozzy I personally prefer the subdomain method to this one

•  Getting a Domain Name or Upgrading to a Domain Name

When choosing your domain name there are two parts to choose, the first one would be the second-level domain like buildguide and the other part is the top level domain like .net. Second-level domain can be any name you want (there are some constrains on that see ( Allowed Domain Names ) but the TLD is fixed there are a few TLD that you can choose from like .COM, .ORG, .NET, .TV, .BIZ, .CO.UK, .JO, .DE, .EG, .IL, .PH etc... COM is the most important one, then comes .NET and .ORG. other extensions are country specific, for example .JO is for The Hashemite Kingdome of Jordan , .CO.UK is for the united Kingdome, .EG is for Egypt and so on.
It is better to choose .com or .net or .org than choosing ccTLD (country code top level domain) if your business is international, but if it's a local business it is better to choose the ccTLD of that country.

•  Choosing the NAME

Here are some things that you should know when choosing the Name. Remember that these things apply on a Domain Name and Sub-domain Name

•  Allowed Domain Names

Letters, numbers, and dashes are the only allowed characters in a domain ame, underscores are not permitted, and they are not case sensitive, so BuildGuide.NET and buildguide.net and BUILDGUIDE.NET are the same. The maximum number of characters in a domain name is sixty seven Characters.
Your Domain should be your website's name and preferably your company name if it is a company website.

It is usually best that your domain name is your website name, because people tend to use the company's name or brands name as the URL like www.mcdonalds.com or www.nike.com , so what would happen if Nikes website wasn't www.nike.com? Everyone who wants to visit Nikes website will be going somewhere else , it is sometimes good that your website name and domain name is the same as your company name , but not necessarily and not always. Many company names are either very long, hard to spell or simply do not make a good domain name. That's where you should act creative and find one that works, for example commission junction's website is located at http://www.cj.com , this is a company you will be properly introduced to in the build section, the acronym CJ is a real good choice, that is short, simple and sounds nice, a similar example is Anderson consulting at http://www.ac.com

If you find that your company's domain name is taken or you brands domain name is taken and you have worked hard to establish that name, you might try to buy that domain name from its owner if you think it's worth the money he is asking for. (You can find out who own any website by searching for the owner at www.whois.com).

Also try to use interesting names, for example jordanconnection is better than holidayinjordan for a company that sells vacations to Jordan .

In short: people will tend to remember your websites name not the URL, so the URL should be your websites name, if you didn't start yet, I would advise you to get an available domain and then name your website after it.

•  Generic Domain Names

Generic domain names give you a better chance of a direct hit, Generic domain name like cars.com have a great chance of being typed into the browser and have the advantage of being easiest to remember, t hat's at least what I think. Some people say that it doesn't really matter because if you are looking for BMW you will go to bmw.com rather than cars.com.

•  Easy Names

Meaning easy to spell, easy to remember and preferably easy to type into the browser (somewhat short but not necessarily), remember one of the most popular websites on the internet was welovetheiraqiinformationminister.com

•  Reasonable Length Domains

It is true that your domain name can be 67 characters long but its advised to keep it short, up to three short words. Because long names has many disadvantages, like you can miss spell them easily while typing and they are harder to remember, even tough it is said and I do believe that search engines do consider your domain name words as keywords, this advantage is probably very small and it may even be emphasized in smaller names more than longer ones.

•  Spelling

This is a very controversial issue, many words are spelled in different ways in different places (especially English vs. American English) the advice here would be give the priority to the spelling commonly used in your target market, and then consider getting the other domain name. If both are target markets to you, consider the one more commonly used or used by a larger audience. If you go here http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/

you will find out which word is used more as a keyword

•  Trademarks

You are advised to get your trademark before someone else does and gets you into trouble, and more to that you are advised not to take anyone else's trademark to spare yourself sitting in the court room, trademark owners will usually reach for there lawyers rather than there pockets these days when you have there trademark.

•  Adult Domain Names

Try not to choose names with adult sexually oriented or other words that may be classified by engines as adult when your website is really general audience.

•  Ask for Advise

Sometimes you think of names and you think you found the best name ever, but if you ask other people they will find it very hard to remember or too long or too lazy or. . . So it's a good idea that you ask your friends advice or the people around you. Remember the domain name is something you will be saying allot and having on your business card.

•  Don't Abbreviate if it Makes it Harder

Sometimes it is easier to remember (jacks-computer-literature-ebooks.com than JCLEB.com) so I would say have yourself in the visitors shoes and see which one is easier to remember!

•  Hyphens

The only non alphanumerical character allowed in your domain name is the hyphen, but should you use it?

In general no, I advise you to have the words stuck together, since your website name is usually used verbally, a hyphen makes it harder to say, and people tend to forget it, like you visit www.photo-celebrity.com then you go tell your friends "you should visit photo celebrity dot com" and your friends will be visiting www.photocelebrity.com which is not the same one you recommended. Now if your website makes it and becomes popular, someone will reach for the non hyphen version and take many of your customers.

On the other hand, you could just get the non hyphenated version, and if your website makes it, get the hyphen version as well, you would be making allot of money anyways and it will have a good return on investment. But don't do it the other way round (at least this is my advise)

•  Prefix, Postfix

when it comes to domains, good ones are all gone, not all but most of them are gone, so you if found your domain but with a prefix (the) vacant, should you take it, or with a postfix (online).

It really depends on the domain, but your website name should become the full URL with the prefix or postfix, and you should use the name often on and off the website so that the prefix/postfix will stick to the visitors' memory, you would not want him to come back to the other website without the prefix / postfix. So if you want Jordan.com and its not available and you choose Jordanonline.com then you website should be "Jordan Online" and only "Jordan" anymore.

•  Plurals

As for variants of the word like its plural for example, I really don't advise you to go for that one unless the plural form is the more commonly used form of the word.

•  Choosing the TLD (Top Level Domain) or Extension

Dot What?

Well in most cases .COM FIRST, The .COM comes first then you might want to consider other extensions, .com not only is the standard domain for commercial websites, it also sounds professional, and is also one of the oldest along with .net and .org, COM gives a professional impression to the visitor, .net and .org come next.

When you finish deciding the domain name you want, it is recommended that you buy more than one extension (if available) for the same domain name so if you have mysite.com and you find mysite.net and mysite.org available, it is better that you buy them so that no one (a competitor for example) would take them and people will be mistakenly directed to these other sites.

•  Registering the Name

It is important to get your domain name at a well established domain name registrar

Updating your DNS to your host

You get your DNS details from your host and update them at your registrar's website, that's all there is to it, The process usually takes about 24 hours, it sometimes takes up to 72 hours.

It is important to know that you can modify this from the company that registered your domain name, not from your hosting after that since you have not changed the person in charge of the domain, you merrily made it point to your hosting company

More (You can skip this part)
      DNS stands for Domain Name System, DNS is used mostly to translate domain names to IP addresses, Since every computer based machine on the internet has an IP address, the domain name service sends the request for a domain (when you type it in your browser or click a link) as a request with that name translated into an IP address (of the server this Domain is assigned to) So when you change this value to the hosting company, you inform the system where you want visitors to this domain to go (your website)

•  Free Redirector

The best redirector available today is .TK, once you have a website under a sub-domain you can get a FREE domain name with a .TK extension, Although owning the domain is not free, getting a domain redirector is, Choosing the name of the redirector follows the same rules as getting a domain name, the redirector itself is a domain name with a .TK extension, all you need is your Email address and the subdomain you want it to point to. Click this link and it opens in a new window http://www.dot.tk .

NOTE: This free redirector is great for your business card, also great for telling people about your website, but you should not promote it online, search engines have problems with redirectors ( see why here )