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How to Use a Domain Name Checker to Check Domain Availability

The post How to Use a Domain Name Checker to Check Domain Availability appeared first on HostGator Blog . Finding the perfect domain name for your new website can be a little tricky. Not only do you need a domain that perfectly represents your website, but you need to ensure it’s short, catchy, memorable, and actually available. Luckily, there’s a number of tools that’ll help you not only uncover the perfect domain name, but also ensure it’s available. Below you’ll learn how to find the right domain name for your website, and how to use a domain name checker to help speed up the process of locking down your dream domain. Finding the Right Domain Name There’s a lot that goes into a domain name. Your domain needs to succinctly sum up what your site is about while being catchy and easy to remember. Your domain will define your brand and be the first thing that visitors see. As a result, your domain will create either a good or bad impression of your website. Here are some tips for finding the best possible domain name for your new website: 1. Connect Your Brand to Your Domain Name You want your domain name to be a differentiator. Having a unique domain name will always be better than a generic domain that sounds all-too-similar to competing sites. When you’re launching a brand, chances are you’re doing something different than the competition. Make sure that your domain name reflects this. For example, think of sites like Google, DropBox, Zillow, Facebook. All of these sites have unique and memorable names. Whether you’re creating new words from scratch or combining two unrelated words, one thing is for sure: they stick in your mind. 2. Keep the Character Count Low As a general rule, the shorter the domain name, the better . It might be very difficult to find a shorter domain name as most of these were purchased a long time ago. But, you still might be able to find a unique word or combination of words that are still available. When in doubt, go for something memorable over something long. Think about when you’re telling your friend about a website. For example, they’re more likely to remember catgram.com over picturesthatiloveaboutcats.com. 3. Make Your Domain Easy to Pronounce Your domain name needs to be easy to remember, and part of that is making it easy to pronounce. When someone thinks about your domain name, they shouldn’t have to look it up in a dictionary to get the spelling right. You want to make it easy for other people to pass on your domain name, whether that’s written or spoken. 4. Avoid Numbers, Hyphens, and Other Characters A memorable site name can go a long way towards helping your site gain traction. One quick way to make things more difficult is by adding hyphens or numbers to your domain name. Hyphens not only make it more difficult to pass on your domain, but it’ll probably lead to a lot of misspellings and people not being able to find your site. For example, what’s easier to remember and type into your browser? C-N-N.com or CNN.com. Or how about Face-book.com, or Facebook.com? The same goes for numbers. Adding numbers to your domain can come across as spammy and much more difficult to pass on. What’s a Domain Name Checker? Domain name checkers are tools that help you to determine if a domain name is still available . Often, these tools can also suggest other related domain names, along with presenting other domain name extensions that might be available under your chosen domain name. There are also other related domain finder tools that are more focused on helping you generate unique domain names, while at the same time searching for availability. Domain Name Checker Overview There are a myriad of different domain name checkers you can use to see if a given domain is available for purchase. Most domain name registrars will have these tools built into their domain search tools. After all, it’ll be impossible to buy a domain if it isn’t actually available. However, you might also come across domains that have been previously purchased or are currently owned by another party. Still, you can purchase these domains, but expect to pay a great deal more than a fresh domain. Here’s a breakdown of a few different domain name checkers you can use: 1. HostGator Domains HostGator Domains is not only a domain name registrar, but it’ll tell you which domains are available, and even offer suggestions for similar domains. With this domain name checker you can quickly see if your domain of choice is available and get it registered right away. Plus, you can pick up quality web hosting at the same time and start building your new site right away. 2. LeanDomainSearch LeanDomainSearch is another pretty helpful domain lookup tool. All you have to do is enter a keyword that you want to build your domain around, and this tool will do the rest. If you’re stumped for ideas then this tool will help you get started. For example, here’s a sample search for the word ‘house’. From that simple word, we’ve got over 400 different domains to look at and draw inspiration from. 3. DomainHole DomainHole is a search tool that allows you to find a very specific type of domain. Whether you’re looking for a new domain or an aged domain for SEO or other purposes, this tool is worth exploring. You’ll be able to search for expired, expiring, or dropped domains, plus with the extensive search filters you’ll be able to find exactly what you’re looking for. 4. Knowem Knowem should be used in conjunction with another domain checker tool, but it’s still just as valuable. If you’re going to be creating social media profiles for your new website, then this tool will check to see what social media profiles are available. Even if you aren’t going to be using social media right away, it can be helpful to still grab any existing social media handles for future use. What to Do if a Domain Isn’t Available? Let’s say you’ve found the perfect domain name, but when you run it through a domain name checker, it comes up as unavailable . This doesn’t mean that your search should end there. In some cases, you might be able to place a bid on the domain or even pick up a different domain name extension. Here are these two options in a little more depth: 1. Placing a Domain Name Bid Sometimes the domain you want will already be owned by someone else. If the domain isn’t being used for an existing website or application, then you can usually get in touch with the owner and place a bid on the domain. For example, here’s the website of a domain name that someone else owns. You have the option to reach out and purchase the domain. Keep in mind that the owner might not always respond, or they might want more than you’re willing to spend. Generally, when you place a bid you’ll be spending a couple of hundred bucks at the very minimum. Sometimes these domains will run up into multiple thousands of dollars. For example, take a look at some of these domains offered on Sedo . Overall, the price of domains will go up the simpler they are. You’d be hard pressed to find a single word domain of a dictionary word for less than a few grand. If you’re placing a bid on a domain name, expect a little negotiation back and forth until you land on the selling price. 2. Choosing a Different Domain Name Extension The most common domain name extensions are .com, .org, and .net. But, that doesn’t mean your search should end, just because these extensions aren’t available. In some cases, a different domain extension might even work better, but overall it depends on the type of site you’re running. When considering a different domain name extension, keep the following questions in mind: Does the extension I want belong to an existing website? If I choose another extension will it work with my brand? Can I get a different extension that doesn’t feel like spam? Is the new extension memorable? Overall, if the domain is taken by a website that’s currently live on the internet, then you’ll want to choose a new domain name. Otherwise, you’ll run the risk of copyright infringement and run into all kinds of legal issues. This headache isn’t worth it, and your time is better spent coming up with a new domain. However, if your first choice domain name extension is taken, but isn’t being used for a website you could get away with using another extension. For example, I really wanted a domain name, but the .com was already taken but wasn’t being used for anything at all, so I went with the .net version. This allows you to start building your site if you’re absolutely attached to a given domain name, while in time you can acquire any other extensions with the profits from your new site. How to Register a Domain Name Once you’ve found the perfect domain name that’s actually available, then it’s time for the easy part. Registering your domain. If you were using the HostGator Domains tool to search for the availability of a domain, then you’re already halfway there. Just, add your domain to your cart, and complete the checkout steps. Here’s a brief walkthrough just in case: 1. Navigate to HostGator Domains Here you can enter your domain name that you want to purchase. You can enter your domain with or without your desired extension. 2. Input Your Domain First, input your domain name and click ‘Search’. If the domain name is available, then you’ll get the message ‘Congratulations, Your Domain is Available!” This will automatically add your domain to your cart, and all you have to do is click ‘Continue to Cart’ and complete your purchase. 3. Select Your Terms When you register a domain name you’re going to have a lot of different options to choose from. For example, you can add things like domain privacy . You’ll also select the term for which you want to register your domain. Overall, the cheapest option will always be to register your domain for the longest term offered. You’ll be spending more up front, but the monthly rate will typically be much lower than paying a yearly fee and having to renew every single year. Plus, then you don’t have to worry about accidentally letting your domain lapse. Get Started with Domain Name Checkers Hopefully, you have a better idea of what to look for in new domain name for your site, plus how to use a domain name checker to actually see if your dream domain is available. Getting a domain name isn’t a process you’ll want to rush. Spend some time with the domain name checkers above until you find a great domain that speaks to the core of what your site’s about, while remaining memorable and catchy. Then, when you’re ready, you can register your domain right here at HostGator. Find the post on the HostGator Blog Continue reading

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Beginner’s Guide to Google Ads

The post Beginner’s Guide to Google Ads appeared first on HostGator Blog . The web is crowded and getting people to visit your website – out of all the other options available to them – is an ongoing challenge that all website owners are familiar with. One useful tool for getting your website in front of more people is Google Ads (formerly called Google AdWords).   Why to Use Google Ads You only have so much money to spend promoting your website, so what makes Google Ads worth the investment? Google’s advertising platform provides a few main benefits that make it worth considering: 1. Your ad can reach a huge audience. Google Ads doesn’t just control the ads that show up on the search engine (which billions of people use each day), it’s also behind the ads on all Google properties (including YouTube and Gmail) and a huge number of other websites included in the Google Display Network. All told, the Google Ads platform reaches over 90% of all internet users, making it the best tool for reaching a large audience online. 2. Google offers targeting options.   For a lot of businesses, reaching a lot of people is less important than reaching the right people. Google Ads allows you to target which search terms your ads show up for, what people see your ads based on demographic information, and the types of sites they show up on in the display network. All of that helps you to more efficiently reach the people most likely to care about your website. 3. You only pay when people visit your website.   With a lot of advertising, you pay for the exposure the ads bring you. Google Ads uses a pay-per-click model, so you only pay for the times people actually click on an ad and visit your website. 4. It’s faster than most online marketing tactics . While tactics like SEO and content marketing are valuable, they’re slow. Google Ads gets your website in front of more people faster. If your online marketing efforts could use an extra boost, PPC marketing with Google Ads can provide it.   How to Set Up Your Google Ads Account Setting up an account in Google Ads is pretty easy. When you’re on the Google Ads website . You’ll see a big green button that says Start Now. After you click, you’ll encounter a form that asks you to provide your email address and the website you’ll be promoting. You’ll need to use an email here that’s already associated with a Google account, so if you already use Gmail and Google Analytics , use the same account you use there. If not, you can set up a new account here. You’ll be asked to log into your Google account, then you’ll be in.   6 Best Practices for Google Ads While you could theoretically dive right in and start creating ads today, in order to get the most out of the money you spend on Google Ads, you need to take some time to learn the ropes. Google has a series of videos that can offer a good start to understanding the platform and how to use it. Going through them all can take some time, but for most website owners it’s worth it. Until then, here’s a shorter summary of best practices to keep in mind.   1. Determine your goals. What is it you want from your Google Ads? Are you at the point with your website where the most important thing is getting those initial leads to learn you exist, or do you want visitors to convert to customers right away? Your Google Ads campaigns should be designed around the main goals you want to achieve.   2. Do keyword research. This is one of the most important steps in PPC marketing. Your keyword lists will be a big part of the campaigns you set up for search. You want your ads to show up specifically when people are looking for what you have to say or sell. The way to learn what terms people are using (and how competitive different terms are) is to take time to do the research.   3. Prioritize relevance. One of the best things about online marketing is that you can more effectively reach the specific people most likely to be interested in your website in the context where they’re looking for or thinking about what you have to sell. Your ads will perform much better if you can make them relevant to the person at the moment they see them. Good keyword research is a big part of this, but you should also do ad targeting based on demographic information and user interests to better get your ads in front of the right people. And relevance has to go beyond what shows up on the ad: your ad content should always match what people will see when they click through.   4. Test out your ads. It will probably take you a few tries to figure out what gets people to respond to your ads. Try out different ads with different wording, different images, and different targeting to collect data on which ones work best. If you just do one thing, you won’t ever know if it could be working better.   5. Use retargeting. Getting a visitor to your website once is nice, but getting them to come back again is much more valuable. Google Ads provides retargeting so you can target your ads to the people who have already viewed your website and even use it to show them ads for the items they viewed while they were there.   6. Refine as you go. Google Ads provides useful analytics that will help you gain a greater understanding of what your audience responds to based on your ad performance over time. And the platform even factors your ad success into how much you pay for each click through the Quality Score. You Quality Score is determined based on how well your ads perform, and can affect your pricing.   For best results, Google Ads requires a time commitment. If you don’t have a lot of time to spend on running your Google Ads campaigns, you may benefit from hiring a PPC specialist or agency who can bring their expertise to your campaigns and help get you better results while saving you time. If you stick with doing it yourself, actively monitor your campaigns. Pay attention to the data they provide and use it to improve your campaigns over time. If you manage your ads well, you can expect to see better results the longer you use the platform.   How to Create a Campaign in 6 Steps Google Ads makes it pretty easy to get started by walking you through the steps to create a campaign. A note here: Google Ads just recently rolled out an all new interface, so if you have any past experience with it or have done research into it from resources created before this summer (2018), then you’ll notice that the platform looks different that you probably expected.   To get started in the new interface, look for Campaigns in the menu on the left side of the page. Then click either the plus sign in the big blue dot on the left side of the page, or where it says New Campaign toward the bottom. Select New Campaign. 1. Choose Your Campaign Type You’ll see a page that includes the five main types ads you can create in Google Ads: Search ads – Ads that show up on the search engine results page, usually above the natural results Display ads – Ads that show up on websites across the web Shopping ads – Ads that show up on the search engine results page for product-related searches that often include images and information like price and availability. Video – Ads that show up before or on the bottom of YouTube videos. Universal app – Ads that show up on mobile apps. Make your selection for which type of ad you want to use in your first campaign. You can run multiple campaigns, so choosing one now won’t keep you from creating the other types of ads as well.   2. Select Your Goal Now the platform will ask you to choose your goal for the campaign. It will fill in different suggestions here based on the campaign type you choose, but the most common options are:      Sales      Leads      Traffic      Brand awareness      Product and brand consideration You can also choose to create your campaign without choosing a specific goal. Choosing your goal allows Google Ads to better determine how to track your campaign’s success and provide you with the most important analytics.   3. Define Your Settings On the next page, you’ll do a few important things. First, give your campaign a name. This is for internal use only, so you just need to make sure it’s something that makes sense to you and any other marketers who will be accessing the PPC account, and that it will differentiate this campaign from any others you create. Next, choose whether you want your ads to show up in the search network, the display network, or both. Ads in the search network will show up on the Google search engine results page, as well as on other Google properties. Those in the display network will show up on websites all across the web.   Select Your Language and Geographic Targeting Next choose your location and language targeting. If your business is local, then you don’t want to waste money on clicks from people in other states or countries. And if you only have a staff that speaks one language, then you’ll want to stick with reaching customers you can communicate with. Set Your Budget Now we get to the money side of things. Set your maximum daily budget, as well as the maximum amount of money you’re willing to pay for each click. As you’d expect, the higher you go, the more times your ads will show up and the more visitors you can expect to come to your website. You can either choose to do the bidding for your ads manually, or you can let Google choose bids for you automatically. The latter option is recommended for everyone but the most experienced of Google Ads users. The Google Ads automated option is programmed to get you the best possible results for the amount you spend, so it’s usually a good choice. Provide start and end dates for your campaign, or select None if you’d like the campaign to run indefinitely.   Audience and Extensions At the bottom of the page, you’ll see a few optional sections. The most important of these are:   1. Audience Targeting This is where you can define who will see your ad in terms of their general search habits and interests. It’s also the section where you can set up remarketing to show ads to people who have already visited your website. 2. Extension options You’ll see a few different extension options . These all give you the chance to add some extra information to your ad, whether it’s including links to additional web pages on your site, adding your phone number, or providing extra details like price or discount offers.  These are a good way to provide important information in a way that stands out and gets the viewer’s attention. Once you’re done with this page, click Save and Continue. 4. Add Your Keywords The next page is where you bring in the keyword research you’ve done. You can set up a number of Ad Groups for each campaign. In each group, you only want to include ads that are focused on a particular product or service so that you can use a specific set of keywords that will be relevant to those ads. 5. Create Your Ads This is the part where you’ll need to bring your creatives in (or bring your own creative skills to the process). Load the images and copy you want to use for each ad that’s relevant for the keywords in this ad group. 6. Pay and Launch When you’ve got everything else set up, you’ll see a red banner over the top of the Google Ads interface letting you know to add your payment information to make your campaigns active.  Click on Fix It and enter your payment information where prompted. Follow Your Campaigns and Improve The hard part of getting started is now done, but you still have work to do. Make sure you pay attention to your campaigns and track the analytics Google Ads provides. Use the data available to make changes to your ads, your budget, and your targeting to get more relevant clicks and better conversions over time. While Google Ads is notable for getting faster results than some other types of online marketing, it’s still true that you’ll get more out of it the longer you do it, as long as you do the work of learning from your campaigns and improving them as you go. When done well, Google Ads can provide a healthy ROI and bring a lot of new relevant traffic to your website. Get expert help managing your Google Ads campaigns. Learn more about HostGator’s PPC Advertising services . Find the post on the HostGator Blog Continue reading

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Donuts Inc. Opens Sunrise Period for Seven New Generic Top-Level Domains

The Sunrise period has begun for seven new generic top-level domains with the extensions: .BIKE, .CLOTHING, .GURU, .HOLDINGS, .PLUMBING, .SINGLES, and .VENTURES. These are the first new gTLDs have been introduced by registry Donuts Inc., and the domains will be made available during the Sunrise period to trademark rights holders through Donuts’ domain registrar partners via Registry-Registrar Agreements. Continue reading

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Browser Speed Tests 2012

Browser Speed Tests: Chrome 17, Firefox 10, Internet Explorer 9, and Opera 11.61 by Whitson Gordon, LifeHacker.com Chrome 17 is out with a new prerendering feature designed to make your pages load faster, and both Firefox and Opera have also released speedy new versions since our last round of speed tests . So, we’ve once again pitted the four most popular web browsers against each other in a battle of startup times, tab loading times, and more, with more surprising results. We’ve been testing browsers for awhile, and we’ve refined our method pretty well . Continue reading

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BlueVoda taught me how to build a website like an expert

I recently found myself in an awkward position of needing a website to promote my business, but not making enough money from my business to get a website professionally built. Continue reading

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