We frequently get called on to help a client pick a URL or URLs for their website.
Here are the basics.
“URL” is short for “Uniform Resource Locator” which is a silly enough name. All it is, is your website’s address. It is how computers all over the world can find your website.
A website address usually starts with “www” for world-wide web but these days you never have to type that. Your browser will fill it in automatically if needed.
It ends (after a “.”) with 2, 3 or 4 letters which are the “TLD” or “Top Level Domain”, such as “.com”. Every country has its own TLD, like “.ca” for Canada. In addition, there are TLD’s more oriented to what you do or are – most famously “.com” – for commercial, “.org” – for organization, and “.net” for Network.
There are no limitations on the use of .com, .org and .net. However, in most cases .com is your best choice because people in the U.S. usually assume that is what your website address ends in – and if you use something else, probably a lot of people are going to try to go to the wrong place.
Now that we’ve got that out of the way, how do you go about picking the best URL for your business? Tune in tomorrow for the answers.