The Importance of a Domain Name

Tony Hardy

Well-Known Member
What are people's opinions on this debate.
If I were to set up a website doing design work, would you register as say;

tonyhardy.com
or
tonyhardydesigns.com

Do you think it's important to have what you do in the domain name?
 
It helps SEO a little having 'design' in the name, and it gives an indication of what you do (though the term design is broad, and could refer to a few genres rather than graphic design).

Personally I would have preferred just my name since paulmurraydesign.com is pretty long, but apparently Paul Murray is a popular name choice.

The important things is having your name in their since you're basically branding yourself.
 
Yeah, I don't personally like it when it says design in the domain name.
I don't think I'm going to use my name, fancy a change and I want to run it more of a studio where I can bring in more people in the future etc.
 
Most the decent tonyhardy extensions are already taken, unless you own them? :icon_smile:

hardydesigns was a possibility but most also taken.

Maybe come up with something totally different....
 
Yeah I wanted to start up as a studio, so I was going to go with a totally different name.
I just meant it as an example :)
Do you think it's worth having design in the domain Boss?
 
I was thinking maybe 'studios' but like you said it doesn't say what I do straight away. But, it'll be more of a studio than just design, because I"m hoping to offer photography and animation/video too.
 
Have you thought about a geographical slant on your domain name? Can be powerful if concentrating on working locally.
 
I'd never thought of that before. I was thinking along the lines of the arty studio names you get in Computer Arts magazine etc.
But, that could work :)
 
Yeah this is a good idea which will help you rank for local searches on google, however, from a client perspective it may for example put someone based in London off dealing with you if you are called 'newcastlegraphics.co.uk', it may not but just something to think about.

I think these types of domains are good as satellite websites solely for getting your website listed highly for good local search terms, having then a main business domain separate to these, just my thoughts.
 
it may for example put someone based in London off dealing with you if you are called 'newcastlegraphics.co.uk', it may not but just something to think about.

Yep, agree with this. I think it probably would put someone off but I wonder how many companies would look outside of their own locale for design? I can pretty much draw a 25 mile radius circle around our office and all of our web clients will fall inside it. We sometimes pick up 'white label' code work from outside our area but that is through agencies based closer to the client.

I think these types of domains are good as satellite websites solely for getting your website listed highly for good local search terms, having then a main business domain separate to these, just my thoughts.

This is true. I see one particular example of an IT company close to us who do just this and it seems to be working well for them. So well in fact we are doing the same thing :icon_biggrin: It is bloody hard work running two websites with original content though. To be entirely honest though it's not just about location for us, we have split the home and business computer services as well to focus branding on each.
 
Yep, agree with this. I think it probably would put someone off but I wonder how many companies would look outside of their own locale for design? I can pretty much draw a 25 mile radius circle around our office and all of our web clients will fall inside it. We sometimes pick up 'white label' code work from outside our area but that is through agencies based closer to the client.

Yes true, and I don't think concentrating on your local market is a bad thing to be honest, if you live somewhere fairly big in size.

Trying to compete online against other internet based companies when starting out is really difficult, targetting local businesses who are not actively searching online for the cheapest quote they can find is the best way to go in my opinion, initially anyway.
 
At first, I was going to target local businesses, maybe prepare a leaflet/card drop.
In regards to the domain, are you saying buy something like 'newcastledesign.co.uk or .com' and AS WELL as another domain (my studio name probably) and then point them both to the same website?
 
In regards to the domain, are you saying buy something like 'newcastledesign.co.uk or .com' and AS WELL as another domain (my studio name probably) and then point them both to the same website?

Yes something similar (look at what local terms are searched for most), buy a suitable domain then optimise the domain for your chosen keywords, maybe with a link to your main domain.

As an example search 'ncr pads' on google and look at results 1 and 5 :icon_wink:
 
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