Your domain name is something you will want to spend a bit of energy on. Your name choice is a permanent part of your business’ identity, so be sure to choose wisely. Some things to keep in mind when choosing a name:

1) Try to choose a name that will work well with both human visitors to your site, as well as search engines looking for key words on your pages.

2) Choose a name that is easy to remember and that is easy to express in advertising campaigns. If your business name is already established, using that name can work well unless there are potential syntax problems. For example, if your business name is Sam’s Salon, you will be unable to easily duplicate this for it to make sense when providing the name to others. You could choose sams-salon.com, but on a radio ad, for instance, it will be hard to express to people the two “s” letters. In other words, it will create a confusion for buyers that will hinder your marketing results.

3) Try to choose something that is catchy, but related to your business. In the example above, instead of trying to come up with a domain name that fits the business’ name, choose something like “best-cuts.com”, or “stylish-hair.com”.

4) Make sure the name isn’t too long. In some online advertising campaigns, really long domain names will get truncated.

5) Ask yourself, “Can someone easily remember my domain name?” Making it easy for customers to remember the name means they don’t have to search, and potentially find someone else.

Below are some helpful tools so that you can choose the best domain name for your business!

• 123finder.com – Enter keywords, set the maximum number of characters you want, and see what it comes up with.
• BustAName.com – Enter words to see the possible remaining combinations and suggestions.
• Domain-Generator.net – Gives tips and advice on how to pick a name, has a random generator and keyword checker.
• Domain Name Generator – Tool over at webmaster-toolkit.com that allows you to enter a word or phrase and see what’s available.
• Dot-O-Mator.com – Put in up to 15 each in the prefix and suffix columns and see what combinations are available.
• Dyyo.com – Helps you find the few 4-letter domain names remaining.
• Geek.name – Displays domain names that are unregistered as suggestions, offers a thesaurus for your keyword.
• MakeWords.com – See randomly generated domain names and check out which are available. Pick other languages, search for keywords and more.
• Nameboy.com – Enter two words and see what is out there and get suggestions.
• SnapItNow.com – Enter words, choose category, define if you will allow hyphens and more.
• Web 2.0 Name Generator – Generates random Web 2.0 “sounding” names and then lets you check availability.
• Lastly, you can always just start trying out domain name by entering words you like and see what’s available. Some hosting sites will offer alternatives if the name you want isn’t available.