Which Domain Name Is For You?

Getting the right address is important in today’s business climate.

When we enter a website address into our browsers, we’re effectively using a pseudonym for the actual address. Although you may have typed www.uk2.net into your address bar a few minutes ago, this is merely English-language shorthand for our website’s internet protocol (IP) address. The IP address is the official address of any site, typically comprising four sets of numbers between 1 and 256. For instance, this website’s IP address is 83.170.69.14. If you copy and paste that numeric sequence into your address bar, it will load our homepage.

The use of names for website addresses is chiefly for simplicity since it’s far easier to remember a brand name than a complex series of numbers. Companies always try to register addresses that will be easy for customers to find, although DIY chain B&Q struggled as the & symbol isn’t permitted as a character in address names. Instead, they registered diy.com. Punctuation symbols are also banned, which is why the Sainsbury’s web address lacks the all-important apostrophe and What Car? magazine’s online presence is located at whatcar.com.

The current variety of website suffixes can be quite confusing, but it wasn’t always like this. Once upon a time British brands effectively had a straight choice between .co.uk and .com suffixes, with the former identifying the specific site. Companies wanting to attract an international audience would often adopt the (primarily American) .com suffix.

Since these days the organisation responsible for allocating website addresses decided to expand the variety of suffixes on offer.  Better known as ICANN, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers have an aim of making 1,400 alternative domain names available in future, and they’re well underway.

For new businesses, choosing the right domain name is becoming increasingly complex. If you’re a sole trader, do you want to play it safe and adopt a .com suffix or take a risk on one of the newer .biz or .me addresses? A .co.uk address will demonstrate your British roots, but it could deter customers from abroad, assuming they can even find you. Google in Australia will prioritise .com and .com.au suffixes as being most relevant to its audience, whereas a .co.uk address will be unlikely to register since it’s clearly foreign.

It’s advisable to keep the main body of any domain name as short as possible. As an example, iwantoneofthose.com may contain five words, but the body part of the address is only 15 characters. If you wanted to register a website for a company called Animal Drums, animaldrums.co.uk would be a far better title than animaldrumsbutnottheonefromthemuppets.co.uk.

This is where UK2 can help. Our domains page allows you to search for a variety of suffixes with clearly indicated prices, and we’ll automatically scan the internet to ensure nobody has claimed a particular address. Using the fictional company from the last paragraph, animaldrums.com has already been snapped up but the .co.uk suffix can be reserved for just £2.50 a year. People rarely go to the trouble of registering web addresses in the hope they can re-sell them at a later date, though occasionally a site’s homepage will display a message advertising the domain name for sale. Unless it’s being promoted through a legitimate hosting company like UK2, such offers are best avoided.

While it may seem bizarre to choose a new brand name according to the availability of website domains, bear in mind how much custom is generated by Google and Bing searches nowadays. Potential customers will be lost if people searching for your brand keep ending up on an unrelated site, or, even worse, a competitor site. Wherever possible, it’s far more sensible to research the market and choose a company name whose web domain is still available.

Find your perfect domain name today with UK2!