A domain is how you would identify a site on the Internet. No two domains can be the same, and this is what makes each site unique. To host a website on the Internet, you will have to first register the domain. While earlier this used to be a very costly affair, it is very cheap now. It can be done for reasonable prices, and almost anyone can afford to register their sites.
It can also be called a host name, as this is what one will refer to when looking for a site. The colloquial term used for this is web address, and most computer experts would freak at the use of this term. This is completely incorrect and has to be referred to as a domain. This is what a website owner will use to replace his IP address, as naturally no one is going to remember such numbers.
Different domains are used for various sites, because when one user moves from one to the other, it makes it easier for him. A domain name is allowed to have many IP addresses, and vice versa. You really do not have to follow any of the industry jargon unless you want to explore further into this field. There will be many restrictions about how you can use the domain names as well.
Certain characters will not be allowed to be part of the domain name. There are many types of domains as well. There are the top-level domains, second level and sub domains and many more. The first type will use a short form of the country of the site's base such as .co.uk. The second is the normal .com and .org that you find most of the time. Domains could be complicating to many general users.
You can purchase your domain name from domain registrar like godaddy or even purchase directly from web hosting provider. And some web hosting provider does offering free domain name for hosting sign up as well.
Take note that, while your domain name on Geocities or AOL may seem like the least expensive way to go, it may also get you dropped from certain search engines. Some search engines ignore domain addresses that reside on these 'free servers' or on the 'cheap' servers.
In fact, unless your site is a personal home page I highly recommend that you stay well away from using any form of free web hosting. Not only will the search engines not like this but very often your web site will have banner or other forms of ads displayed on it by the hosting company.
The last thing you want to do is advertise a service or product that is not related to your site. You won't gain any revenue from the ads displayed on your site either.
Even if your site is recognized and considered by search engines, a professional domain name that uses your primary company name or associated words is likely to get more attention and be considered as a stable business by your prospective customers.
Purchasing domain names are not that expensive and there are hundreds of companies that can register the name for you, provided it is available and has not already been used by another company. Domain names used to cost an arm and a leg but those days are long gone.
You can now register an available '.com' domain for as little as a couple of dollars. Godaddy.com are one of the best choices for price and service.
Using one of your keywords in your domain name can increase your score on some search engines. You might also choose to establish more than one domain name using keywords and then link your 'doorway' domain sites to your primary site. But you will have to pay for each of the domain name and also the monthly hosting fees. It all depends on the type and size of your business and your competition.
Note the above says "doorway domain sites". This is not the same as "doorway pages". Doorway domain sites are one or two page sites which are highly targeted to a specific search word or phrase. This one phrase is targeted in the domain name, key words of the meta tags, the body text of the page and the anchor text of the hyperlinks. Don't design it as an empty page.
It is these hyper links of the doorway domain sites that will link to you one main site. One thing that these doorway sites will not do is increase your page rank though. The search engines will know if you host all of your doorway domain sites on the same host as your main site and will not give you credit for links from these sites that point to your main site.
The main purpose of doorway domain sites is to pick up extra traffic by focusing the entire site to one or maybe two search terms. If you target two search terms then ensure that these are very closely related too.
Both Andy Tao & Michael Sherriff are contributors for EditorialToday. The above articles have been edited for relevancy and timeliness. All write-ups, reviews, tips and guides published by EditorialToday.com and its partners or affiliates are for informational purposes only. They should not be used for any legal or any other type of advice. We do not endorse any author, contributor, writer or article posted by our team.
Andy Tao has sinced written about articles on various topics from Make Money Online, About Web Hosting and Spyware. Andy TaoFind out more about midphase web hosting from site at midphasereview.org &. Andy Tao's top article generates over 60500 views. to your Favourites.
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