A good domain name is a name that is easy to remember, pronounce, and spell. Using hyphens, symbols or numbers may make the domain more difficult for people to remember and spell unless the characters are used in branding your domain name. Furthermore, it is wise to choose a domain name that includes words or a phrase relevant to the type of site you plan to use the domain for. This helps your customers to recall your site name, and, perhaps more importantly, it will improve your placement on search engines.

Technical information on domain names: Practically every web page on the Internet is accessed using a domain name. A domain name is what allows your Internet browser (such as Internet Explorer) to find the address of the page you are looking for on the Internet. Every website has a numeric address, called an IP address. When you type a domain name into your browser, such as www.hotmail.com, your browser looks up the IP address associated with that name and pulls up the web page that it finds there. Basically domain names are used because they are much easier to recall than IP addresses. An IP address is comprised of four sets of numbers, such as 24.12.123.81, so trying to use numeric IP addresses to access the web would be tedious to say the least. Thanks to the domain name system (DNS), every domain name on the Internet can be looked up very quickly not only by your Internet browser, but by your email programs, FTP software, messenger etc.

Note - There are ways of creating a web page where registering a unique domain name can be avoided, such as securing a free URL from your ISP or from a provider such as Geocities. If this is the way you are planning to set up your homepage, then you can skip this section, and most likely the hosting section as well. We include domain registration as a fundamental step in setting up a webpage, because there are countless advantages to owning your own domain name.

OK - so you have your domain name, now what?

>> Move on to #2 - Setting up a hosting account