BustAName Just Got A Little Better

A frequent request is to be able to say that a group of words will only be used as the "first word" or the "last word" of the domain.  Today that feature is live.  You'll notice that the down arrow next to groups now shows a menu with "[x] first word", "[x] last word" (and "[x] middle word" if you have 3 word combine enabled)  Simply uncheck one of those options if you don't want the words in that group to show up as the first, middle, or last word.  This should be fairly strait forward if you are a frequent bustaname user.  Expect to see updated video tutorials soon, most likely there will be a basic tutorial and an advanced tutorial.  Please let me know if anyone is confused or finds any bugs.

Increasing Update Frequency

Just a quick note to let everyone know that we are increasing how often the BustAName domain database gets built, so this should be the first step in helping cut down on "false positives" on BustAName (where it says a domain is available and it isn't)  Next up is a second check to check for domains without dns A records.  I'll keep you posted.

- Ryan

BustAName sells domains now...

So in an effort to provide better integration into BustAName, you can now buy domains through us (using Godaddy's reselling program) You should see the option under the "buy" link now. We are offering domains at $7.49 for now. We think $7.49 is a pretty good deal. We are also offering hosting if anyone is interested :-) Let us know what you think. If we can get it figured out, we will probably add a "Buy All" button that lets you purchase multiple domains from the "Save Domain For Review" tab.

- Ryan

More TLD's (Finally)

So I finally got around to adding more TLD's. The first two up are .biz and .info From what I understand .info is growing fast and is expected to pass up .net at some point (maybe not, but that's what I heard) So anyway, give it a try, it works just like the other TLD's. Also, I haven't decided if I want to integrate this into the quick lookup. I think the plan is to make it so you can add an extension (such as .info), then the quick search would only display whatyoutype.info, and tell you if that is available. If you don't have an extension it will display .com, .net, and .org Any thoughts?

- Ryan

Hosting Search Beta Launched

After finding a domain, the second biggest problem when starting a web site is finding good hosting. There are a ton of hosting companies out there, but finding one that meets your needs without overpaying is tough. To solve this we created our new hosting search tool.

The hosting search tool lets you see a list of hosting plans from 20+ hosting companies (and we're adding more every day). It gives you easy access to the important things like disk space, monthly transfer, price, setup fee, and we even have a review/rating system. Most important is our filtering system which lets you set ranges for any numerical value (price, disk space, transfer, domain price (for companies that sell domains with hosting), number e-mail accounts, number of databases, cpu speed, and amount of ram. We also give you check boxes for specific features that you need, such as php, mysql, plesk, and a whole lot more.

The list sorts by price by default, and displays the basic info above. We also have a compare feature where you can select a few plans that you are considering and see every feature side by side (Note: this is cool, give it a try)

Our review system uses geocoding techniques to prevent the hosting companies themselves from leaving good reviews of themselves or as is often the case, bad reviews of the competition. When a user leaves a review, we show the geocoding data along side with the review. So you will be able to see the reviewers ip, network, and location (city, state) With that information, we can easily flag users submitting reviews from a hosting company's network. Reviews also have a ranking system, which lets you see things like uptime, tech support, customer service, server speed, value for cost, and an average of all of the previous values.

Lastly, we have a quick buy link so you can get up and running quickly. Please be sure to leave a review of your existing hosting plans so other users will know what they should buy.

Give our new hosting search a try.

12 Tips for Finding a Great Domain

The right domain name can make or break your site. (example: here, here, here) Finding the right domain can sometimes take hundreds of hours and sometimes thousands of dollars. This article will show you the best methods for finding a good domain.

Types and Styles of Domains

In the domain world today we see four main types of domains, I will referrer to them as compounds, randoms, appendages, and mutations.

Compound Domains are formed by combining two (or more, but usually two) words together. Compounds are common for blog names and businesses as well as some web 2.0 sites.
Examples: facebook, purevolume, allcrunchy

Randoms are domains that have no direct tie to a real word, but are often easy to pronounce and remember. "Randoms" appeal to those looking to have a strong company brand name.
Example: Fandango, Blogger

Appendages are domains that have letters added to the beginning or the end to produce a new word that is easy to remember.
Examples: Shopify, Friendster, Quizlet

Mutation Domains are created by dropping a letter or overlaying two words
Examples: Flickr, Travelocity

What to Look For in a Domain

There are three important factors in domain choice:

1. Must be Readable/Pronounceable - If you are going to go with a domain that is not made up of common English words, then people had better be able to spell it from hearing it once and be able to pronounce it easily so they can tell it to their friends.
2. Must be Memorizable - I used to work for a company that was fortunate enough to grab the domain web.com, while this seemed like an amazing domain purchase, I soon realized that the domain wasn't as useful as it seemed. web.com is extremely generic and believe it or not easily forgotten by most. A domain like yahoo.com is much easier to remember.
   
3. Keep it short - The general rule here is keep it less than 3 syllables, and 2 is better. Anything much longer and not only does it get harder to remember, but no one wants to say it or type it.
   
4. Letters Only - Hyphens and numbers can be tempting, but it just throws people off. Not a single site in the top 400 sites has a hyphen (though a few do have numbers)
5. .COM only - I learned this one the hard way. When launching a new social network, I chose stage.fm It seemed like a pretty good domain, and I figured since most of the music community had heard of last.fm, the whole .fm thing wouldn't be so bad. Instead of following last.fm's lead, I copied their mistake. Last.fm does do well, but it is not because of their domain. Not only do less musicians know what the .fm thing is than I thought, but search engines won't treat a non-dot-com domain the same as a dot-com. Dot-com sites naturally get a boost from the search engines, and even get indexed more often. Long story short, go with what works, even if its a little harder to remember.
   
6. Describe Your Site - There's nothing better than being able to look at a url and know what the site does. (Example: CommissionJunction.com, WishListr.com) The real value is it makes SEO easy - more below.
7. Don't Follow the Crowd - Flickr started a trend where er was shortened to just r (mutation domain) to create a new group of domains. Most of the new sites with the dropped e failed, while not entirely due to their name, they failed that had Flickr been able to purchase flicker.com, they probably would have. Even worse is del.icio.us They have managed to fix their mistake by getting delicious.com
8. Plan Ahead - So you have a domain that is pretty good, but you're not sure people are going to be able to spell it. The best solution is to buy every possible misspelling you can get your hands on. Just be sure to redirect to the real domain, that way search engines don't get confused.
   

How your Domain Affects your Search Engine Placement

A lot of SEO blogs claim that search engines no longer use the words in your domain as keywords in searches. While there is some evidence for this, doing a search for something like search engine news, you will notice the first five results have the words "search engine" in it. So you might wonder what is going on here. It turns out that there is a simple explanation, in addition to the keywords on a page google also creates search results by looking at the words in anchor tags that point to the site. So how does your domain come into play? Simple, the most common text when people link to a domain is the domain name its self. Often times people take the initiative to split the domain into its words.

So how do you find out what keywords should be in your domain? The best way I have found so far is to create a list of words associated with your site, then check them on Google Trends. It gives you an idea of how much search traffic each search word gets.

Tips to Find a Good Domain

1. Use Tools - There are lots of good tools out there. (we of course have our own personal favorite) The worse thing you can do is just keep trying domains on a slow service like godaddy. This is 2007, and there are better ways. BustAName for example lets you enter in words that relate to your site, and it will try every combination and tell you which ones are available.
2. Be Persistent - Most good finds don't come after 20 minutes. Come up with a list of words and try all combinations of those words. Then try to think of one new word per day for a month (go to a thesaurus if necessary). By the end, you should have something a lot better than when you started.
3. Know When to Quit - There are plenty of good domains still available believe it or not. But sometimes there aren't in your field. Pretty much everything you can ever think of with books and music and a few other fields it taken. The good news is if you're not in one of those fields and you're willing to be flexible, you can probably find something good. Most people give up too soon. When you do give up, give domain resale markets a try. Most of the time, everyone wants $100k for areallycrappydomain.com, but you never know. Reselling usually is a process that takes even longer than just regular looking.
   
4. Get Help - My wife became really addicted to BustAName after I launched, and she has been able to find better domains for some of my projects that I ever could have. The main reason is she's just more creative than I am.

Conclusion

No one ever said finding a domain was easy. But if you are willing to put in the time, you can come up with a winning combination.

BustAName Affiliate Program

So here's the deal: I think BustAName is a good service (and I should since I'm the one who made it), but the issue is that it's not getting much use compared to how many people look for domains every day. Now I know wanting to be the "go to place" to find a domain is a bit ambitious, but I think maybe after I launch a few more tools, it might be a plausible goal, or it would be if it wasn't for one little issue, "I'm not any good at marketing." So to compensate for the issue I have decided to release an affiliate program. You might say, "hey doesn't BustAName make its money from affiliate programs to begin with?"... The answer is yes, we make a commission on every domain sold through the site, when a person clicks on one of the "buy" links.

So the BustAName affiliate program pays you a commission off of our commission (at least 50%, usually more) just for driving people to the site. If you have a web site that gets tech savvy traffic, I would recommend putting up a link to BustAName and giving it a try. Hopefully this can be a win-win.

BustAName Affiliate Program

- Ryan