Setting up a blog: Part 2 - Choosing and Registering Your Domain Name
To set up your blog, there are three things that you will need to work on, often simultaneously. And with practice, you can repeat the exercise easily whenever you launch another new blog.1) Choosing and getting a domain name
2) Evaluating and subscribing to a web host service
3) Choosing and using a blogging platform
So, let’s get down to work:
Step 1: Choosing and getting a domain name
What is the easiest way to choose for a domain name? Whenever I need to choose a domain name for my blogs, there are a few things that I often consider:
It should be something related to what I blog about. Well, that is something blatantly obvious, really. If I am blogging about, say, manga dolls, I will choose a domain name like www.mangadollsunited.com, rather than something less related like www.ilovedolls.com. Well, if you are planning to write in a personal capacity and try to monetise that, you can use your own name as the domain name, like I did.
It should be something short and catchy. There are two main reasons why I consider this. A short URL like viralvoices.com has a better chance being recalled by readers, rather than something lengthy like i-blog-for-money-and-you-can-too.com. Secondly, those long complicated domain names packed with search-engine friendly keywords are often spam sites, or, in the case of blog, splogs. You don’t want to be associated with those, do you?
It should be something that is SEO friendly, if possible. I know, this is in contradiction with what I have said in the point above. The main thing is that you should choose something that is related to your topic and short. If you blog about email marketing, an ideal domain name will be emailmarketing.com (obviously taken), rather than inboxconnection.com (one of my now defunct blogs).
At the end of the day, the domain name you have chosen should be something you really like. After all, you will facing it day in, day out.
Now you have chosen a domain name, it’s time to register the domain name. This is a process where you check that no one else owns this domain name, you claim it as your own, and everyone who keys in this domain name in their browsers will be directed to your blog.
Over the years I have been using a couple of domain name registers, and I can vouch for these:
I was firstly attracted to Yahoo! Domains because of its low fee! During that particular promotion period, annual fee for each domain name was a mere US$1.99, and I can register up to five years! I guess that particular promo attracted many customers, so right now Yahoo! Domain only offers US$1.99 for the first year only, and even so this offer is not available all the time. Personally I also find that Yahoo! Domain control panel is the most user-friendly one among those that I have used. Changing DNS settings, redirection etc were a breeze (it is okay if you don’t what are those), especially if you have been using Yahoo! services
Another domain name registrar that I use is NameCheap.com. If you have never heard about the company, you should visit the site and get an idea on the wide range of services that they have. The whole site gives you a very professional feel, and my past experience with their customer service (despite a very brief one) has been pleasant. Their control panel has very good features that allows you to do advanced stuff with your domain names. Advanced users will like it (though I still find Yahoo! is easier to use). The price of the domains vary, but do check out the promotion that they’ll have from time to time.
In my next post, I will share with you my experience in selecting web hosts, what you should be looking out for etc. But before that, do share with me what domain name registrar that you have used before, and how was your experience like?
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