Confused about what domain to choose for your Internet marketing site? You've probably found that most of the more relevant and obvious domain names have already been registered. Don't let it deter you, creativity and some insider professional knowledge will help in this regard. This article will enable you to understand why the correct strategy for domain name choice is absolutely critical to your success.

Here a few tips:

1. Use a Dot Com

It may be tempting to use a .net, or .tv or something along those lines as they tend to be more readily available. Say you're hooked on coolringtones.com, but find that it is already registered. You see that coolringtones.net is available, so it looks like a viable option, doesn't it? The problem is that people think of domain names in terms of “.com” 90% of the time. It may be less of an issue if you use exclusively link based strategies. But if you are including more traditional forms of marketing (and believe me you are leaving cash on the table if you aren't), it may come back to hurt you.

A customer sees an ad for coolringtones.net in a magazine, or hears about it from word of mouth. What are they likely to remember? “coolringtones”, not "coolringtones.net”. They will go to their browser, type in “coolringtones.com” and voila – you've provided your competition with free traffic.

Dot coms also carry more authority. You should only get one of these alternative domains if you get a dot com and then if you can afford to also then get the .net, .tv etc and use to re-direct to your site.

2. Avoid underscores and hyphens

For the same reasons as above. Underscores are especially bad as they can be very hard to read and sometimes don't get noticed.

3. Your domain name should be targeted as closely as possible to the niche

Use keyword search tools (Google Adwords Keywords tool is great for this) to give you a list of highly searched terms, relevant to your niche and website. You can use these and work them into a powerful domain name. If your domain name contains highly relevant and highly searched for terms, it is one aspect of acquiring great organic traffic in search engines. It will also help you get a better Quality Score if you go into using Adwords as a marketing tool. On top of all this, it will help conversion rate, as your domain name has successfully conveyed the correct message to your visitors who were led to your site.

4. Never use sub-domains for different niches

Never get a domain like coolmarketing.com and then use sub domains of this to promote different niches. For example: coolmarketing.com/ringtones and coolmarketing.com/dogtraining. This will destroy credibility with your visitor instantly. You want to establish your sites as authority sites. Given how cheap it is to register and host domains, there is really no excuse.

5. Split Test domain names

When trying out a new niche, if you can afford it, buy multiple domains tightly related to the niche. Setup these domains as aliases and then test them to see which one generates the highest click through rate. Slightly different domain names can dramatically effect the click through rate to your site.