Tag Archives: Domains

Quick Tip: Domain Auto-Renewal

Feb 18, 2008 by Matt | Posted in Domains No Comments

Your domain name is the most valuable part of your website, aside from the content. Do not lose it.

Today’s Quick Tip is set your domain to auto-renew.

Most registrars will, if you choose, renew your domain automatically before it expires. 1and1, the company where my domains are registered, does this automatically. Not all registrars do, though.

Plenty of people have lost their domains to cybersquatters when they failed to renew on time. One example is children’s book author John Scieszka, who’s domain ChuckleBait.com was lost to a domainer because he hadn’t set it to auto-renew.

Don’t let it happen to you!

Poll: What type of domain do you have?

Feb 11, 2008 by Matt | Posted in Domains 4 Comments

Your domains are arguably the most important part of your website. Without domains, well, let’s just say that search engines would be even more essential then they already are (you’d have to type IP addresses otherwise).

What type of domain do you have? Do you have a descriptive, keyword-laden domain? A misspelled domain like “Flickr.com”? Do you use a .com TLD, or do you use an alternate one? Answer the poll.

Don’t have a domain? Get one. They’re only $6/year. Before you go out and register a domain, be sure to read about naming your site and picking a domain.

Tabeze – The AJAX Domain Availability Checker

Jan 27, 2008 by Matt | Posted in Domains One Comment

Looking for a domain? It sure can get frustrating when you enter 375 different ideas into a WhoIs service, only to find that they’re all registered.

While Tabeze can’t help you come-up with more ideas, it can help you check their availability easier.

Tabeze is a domain availability checker that allows you to, with the press of a key, open as many search boxes as you want. Type a domain (including the TLD) into a box and press enter, and Tabeze does the rest. You can open more search boxes so you can check more domains at once, or you can do it so you can leave positive results onscreen for later reference. There are many ways to use this innovative feature.

My biggest complaint is that, unlike normal WhoIs services, it doesn’t show alternate TLDs that are available. If I search superwebmegasite.com on WhoIs.net, it will let me know if it’s available, and mention whether superwebmegasite.net and superwebmegasite.us are available. Tabeze doesn’t do that.

WWW or no WWW?

Nov 25, 2007 by Matt | Posted in Domains 7 Comments

To optimize your search rankings, you should decide whether your URLs should have the “www” in front of them or not.

This is a topic everyone has been arguing about lately. There are advantages to both.

Reasons to use WWW

  • Non-tech people need something to tell them “this is a web address.” The two things that tell them that are www and .com. If you don’t put the www in, then people rely on there being a “.com”. In an age when there is a shortage of .com domains, do you really want to reinforce the association between URLs and “.com”? You could use “http://” but do you really want to put that horrible-looking thing on your business card (or whatever you’re putting your domain on)?
  • It adds balance to the URL. The three characters (plus a dot) even things out, as you have “.com” (or some other TLD) after the domain.
  • When I want to go to Webmaster-Source.com, I type “webmaster-source” into the URL field and press CTRL+Enter. The browser adds the “www.” and “.com” into the URL. If you don’t use the WWW in your URL, then I have to wait an extra 3 seconds for the redirect to the www-less URL.

Continue reading →

Renaming Your Blog

Nov 16, 2007 by Matt | Posted in General One Comment

What if you decide to go in a different direction with your blog? It happens. What if everyone hates your blog’s name? Is your blog’s name too long?

It’s okay to rename your blog, but be sure to think it through. First of all, why would you want to rename it? Do you have valid reasons…or are you just bored with your blog? Don’t go through the hassle unless you have a need. For example:

  • You’re going in a different direction than when you started your blog, and the name doesn’t quite fit.
  • People are complaining about your domain being too long. If that’s the case, consider just getting an add-on domain and redirecting it to the normal one.
  • Your old domain has a bad reputation with search engines (which is common with “previously owned” domains).

There are plenty of reasons why you don’t want to change the name:

Continue reading →