From Linda Roeder,
Your Guide to Personal Web Pages.
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More of this Feature Part 2: - Register Your Passion For A Price

One of the most important things you can do for your Web site to ensure higher placement in the search engines and an easier way for people to find you is to register a domain name.

What this means is that instead of using someone else's domain name, like you do when you join a free hosting service, you will use your own. When you register a domain name you can choose any word or series of words that you like and use it after the http:// in the URL with a .com or .net, or something else, at the end as long as it is still available.

You can also purchase and register a domain name for someone else which means that you can use them as gifts. If you know someone who has a Web site that they are really involved in and you want to get them something for their birthday, anniversary, holiday or just to say "I love you" then register a domain name for them as a gift.

Picking A Domain Name For Your Web Site

Choosing a domain name for your Web site is one of the most important things you can do for it. Not only should the name you choose be descriptive of what your Web site entails but it should also be easy for people to remember so they can come back to it easily.

If possible choose a domain name that will also serve as a keyword for your Web site so the domain name will show up higher in search engines when people are looking for Web sites like yours. For example, if your Web site is about cats then you could choose to register a domain name like cats.com, but if that one is taken you might want to try allaboutcats.com, ilovecats.com, catscatscats or something like that.

Availability and Registering

Finding out if a particular domain name is available is easy before you go to register it. First go to InterNIC and choose a domain name company. There are so many of them these days that you may want to look through them first to see who has the best deals. After you choose the company you can begin your search for the perfect domain name.

On the domain name company's main page there will be a search box. Type your first choice into the box and click on "Search". You will now receive a message telling you whether the domain name is available to register or not. Just for fun I typed in "catscatscats" from my example above and was notified that "catscatscats.org" and "catscatscats.com" are both taken but "catscatscats.net" is available.

If your first domain name choice is not available keep trying different domain names until you find one you like that is available. Now click on "Register" and fill out the form. Now you are on your way to owning your own domain name.

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