Graphics Programs Reference
In-Depth Information
Written Communication: Selecting a Domain Name
The domain name you select for a Web site is one important tool for communicating with
your customers and your target audience. It should provide the user with useful informa-
tion about the site and should be as simple, direct, and intuitive as possible. There are a
few things to consider when selecting a domain name. The name should be short. If the
name of the company or project is long, brainstorm to come up with condensed versions
then select a name that will still make sense to end users. The domain name should provide
information about the site, or it should communicate the brand, product, or company name
to the end user. For example, the name of the Web site for the company NU Design, Inc.
is nu-design.com. Because you cannot have spaces in a domain name, people sometimes
run two words together. This can be confusing to users and can sometimes produce unin-
tended results. Again, using the example of NU Design, Inc., the hyphen was inserted to
preserve readability and to demonstrate that, when run together, the two words could be
read as nude sign; this would be an extremely undesirable result that could cause problems
for the company. Remember, communication is key; every miscommunication is a missed
opportunity to increase your branding, your visibility and your chances at success. Never
miss any opportunity to inform your users about who you are or what you do. Finally, make
sure to select a top-level domain that is intuitive for users. For a U.S. company, .com is the
most common top-level domain. If the top-level domain/domain name combination that
you desire is not available, consider selecting another domain name to avoid confusion in
the future.
The machine name is followed by the domain name. The
domain name
identifi es a
Web site and is chosen by the site owner. Domain names are often a word or phrase
related to an organization or individual. For example,
nu-design
is the domain name for
NU Design, Inc., the company owned by the authors of this topic. What is commonly
referred to as the domain name of a Web site is actually the domain name combined
with a
top-level domain
. A top-level domain is the highest category in the Internet nam-
ing system. The top-level domain might indicate the Web site's type of entity or country
of origin. Common top-level domains are commercial (.com), business (.biz), organiza-
tion (.org), network (.net), U.S. educational (.edu), and U.S. government (.gov). Although
.com and .org are generally available to anyone, .edu must be some type of educational
entity in the United States and .gov is reserved for the U.S. government. Some top-
level domains for countries are .us (United States), .ca (Canada), .uk (United Kingdom),
and .jp (Japan). The domain name and top-level domain are combined to create a
unique name for a Web site. No two Web sites can have the same domain name and
top-level domain. For example, nu-design.com is the domain name/top-level domain
for NU Design, Inc. No other Web site can use this exact combination of names.
However, another site might use
nu-design.org
or
nu-design.uk.
To avoid any confu-
sion, many companies purchase all possible domain name/top-level domain combina-
tions and point them all to the same site. Many people commonly refer to the domain
name/top-level domain combination as the domain name.
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