The only given in the world of web design is that without traffic, your site is useless. Having a name that's easy to remember, that people can spread around without much hassle is key to success. Following these simple tips will help you choose an enduring an appropriate name.

1. Dot coms will always rule.
Maybe you're an organization and want www.yourorganization.org. Or maybe someone convinced you that it would be cool to have www.yourname.names. Or you want to be patriotic and get www.yourname.us. Though there are a lot of reasons that are very logical and valid for doing any of these, when it all comes down to it, .com has and always will reign supreme on the web. In an age where people have to remember a pin number for everything from their bank account to their garage door, your domain name is just one more simple little thing to remember in a world of sensory overload. Getting them to remember your name will be tough enough, but getting them to remember your name plus a random extension will be even tougher. Dot-com is the default that people remember and associate with most websites. When they get home at the end of a busy day and log on to find Bagel World, Inc, they're probably going to start at www.bagelworld.com, not www.bagleworld.ws.

2. Change it up...a lot
So the name you want isn't available as a .com anymore? Sure you could try to spend tons of money to buy it back from someone else, but it makes more sense to try and think of something catchy that IS still available. Say your son Scott has a lawn mowing service that he calls, appropriately enough, Scott's. Well obviously Scotts already belongs to a well known green-thumb. Try something different, independent of the name. Think of the services that are offerred, or the location in which they're offerred. Maybe BayAreaLawns.com or WillMowForFood.com. Remember, memorable names are successful names.

3. Don't drive traffic to competitors.
Well why couldn't Scott just get ScottsLawnService.com? Well simply put, he could. But then consider when someone is looking for Scott's website later on, and they can't quite remember what the domain name was. So they go to a search engine and type in "Scotts" and "lawnmowers." What will they find? Scotts lawn care products. Though it's not a direct competitor, they may branch out and become one someday. You also never know when competitors will appear higher than you in search engine listings, so it's important to distance yourself from them as much as possible.

4. Avoid cutesy plays on words
Four, fore, 4 and for all sound the same. And unfortunately, they're all valid parts of a domain name. While it might be cute to sell golf clubs from ForeStrokes.com, think about what happens when you say the name out loud to someone. They hear "Four Strokes dot com" and that's what they remember. If you think you might have to spell it out or write it down for people, choose something else. Avoid using combinations of words and numbers also (is it TwoHouses.com or 2Houses.com?)Which brings me to the next tip:

5. If you have to spell it, forget it
So you've been cursed (or blessed?) with the last name Weinerschnitzel. You've built a successful company out of this name and want to take it online. Certainly it's likely that your unusual last name will be available as a dot com, but it's equally likely that you'll have a beast of a time trying to get people to remember it. Think of how many times you've had to spell your name out letter by letter for someone over the phone. While people may stop to write down your domain name, carefully spelling out each letter, think of how often you've lost tiny slips of paper. And once it's lost, they'll never spell that name correctly again.

6. Think ahead and typo-away
If you really want to be diligent, or you're absolutely set on buying a domain that has an unusual spelling, try thinking of all of the ways people might misspell your name, and purchasing them all. For not very much money (typically free or just a few dollars a year), you can "forward" a domain name to make it point to another site. Back to the golf clubs, if your site is at ForeStrokes.com, you can buy fourstrokes.com, forstrokes.com, 4strokes.com and have them all automatically push the user to ForeStrokes.com. The average internet browser won't even notice that they've been redirected, and you will have caught traffic you might otherwise have lost.

7. About the...
The word "the" in domains is always questionable. It can cause a lot of confusion, especially if other words make sense in it's place (GettingTheJob.com for example, people might remember as GettingAJob.com). Unless it's unmistakably "the," then do without.

8. Ditto on the hyphens
So the domain name of your choice is gone, but you can still get it if you add one or more hyphens? Say 'no, thanks.' Nothing is more confusing than having to type www.prescription-drugs-from-home.com. Even more confusing is a string of words with just one hyphen in it ("wait, was the hyphen between these two words or these two?"). Try to stick to letters only.

9. Keep it short and sweet
As more and more dot-com names get snapped up, it's becoming common for names to get longer and longer. Just remember that there's a delicate balance between having a name that represents you and having a name that people can remember. If you have to use several words, try keeping them short, or at the very least memorable. There's really no general rule of thumb for the length of a name, but I'd say anything over 25 characters is pushing it, unless it's very easy to remember (christopheranton.com is 16, in case you were curious). Not everyone types 80 words per minute like you, and for hunt-and-peck typers, long domain names are agonizing.

10. Don't be afraid of change
You bought your domain name years ago so that no one else could snap it up. Since you knew you'd someday have a good site to put on it, you had it printed on all of your letterhead and business cards. After reading all of this, suddenly you're realizing that it may not have been such a smart name at all. But you already have all the printed materials, so it's too late to do anything about it now, right? Wrong. New business cards and letterhead are relatively inexpensive compared to the dramatic revenue boost of having a successful website.