The Best Damn Web Marketing Checklist for Domain Names and URLs

Posted by: Date: September 03, 2008

by Stoney deGeyter

What this is about: This checklist covers various aspects of the domain and site URL structure, how they should be used and how to ensure proper site and browser functionality.

Why this is important: The domain name is part of the identity of your business. The URL chosen can have a significant impact on brand identity and in a lesser extent, keyword ranking performance. However, how your site domain name and page URLs function can have significant impact on the crawlability of the site as well as overall visitor and traffic performance.

What to look for:

Short and memorable: Keep primary domain name short and, if possible, something easy to remember.
No: creative-widget-solution-factory.com
Yes: widgetfactory.com
Uses Keywords: Use targeted keywords in your business name, and therefore domain name.
No: degeyter-enterprises.com
Yes: batterystuff.com
Used in email addresses: Don’t use free email accounts for business, rather use your business domain name for all business communications.
No: pimpmcfly@aol.com
Yes: stoney@polepositionmarketing.com
Uses Favicon: Make sure your favicon shows in the address bar (create one if you must.)
Site.com redirect to www. version: Set a canonical URL and be sure the other version 301 redirects.
site.com redirects to www.site.com or vice versa
Alternate Domain redirects: Make sure all alternate domain names 301 redirect to the primary domain to prevent potential duplicate site issues.
batteryfreaks.com redirects to batterystuff.com
Home page redirects to root: Your Home Page should be accessible from the domain root only, not the page file name.
www.site.com/index.html redirects to www.site.com
No underscores in filenames: Don’t use underscores in filenames, go with hyphens instead.
No: /battery_chargers.html
Yes: /battery-chargers.html
Keywords in directory names: Use keywords in directory names wherever applicable.
No: /category2568/product8954.html
Yes: /battery-chargers/samlex-24v.html
Multiple pages per directory: Don’t create directories for a single page but organize directories so multiple pages fit in a single directory.
No: honda-chargers/honda-chargers.html, yamaha-chargers/yamaha-chargers.html
Yes: chargers/honda.html, chargers/yamaha.html
Registered for 5+ years: Keep your domain name registered for 5-10 years at a time, rather than renewing year to year.
Multiple versions: Purchase multiple versions of your domain name, including .com, .org, .net, .biz, hyphenations between words, common misspellings. Also purchase alternate domain names such as product names, brand names and any other keywords that might be typed in randomly.

Did I miss anything? Add to this list with your comments below. Check out all Web Marketing Checklists in this series.

Free White Paper: How to Optimize for Google
A free 10 page white paper on how to optimize a website on Google the right way – so the website succeeds.