4 business domain name mistakes

We all make mistakes, and these are four common domain name mistakes that companies should look to avoid. Thankfully they are all easy to remedy.

Mistake One:

A domain name and an email address domain name that are different to each other.

How to fix it:

You can solve this by using your website domain name as your email domain name.

If there is a good reason why they are different (such as Zealand Ltd. where we have multiple domain names for business segments but we only want one main email domain) then make sure that if an email is sent to any one of the individual domain names that they end up in the right place.

Mistake Two:

Using a free or ISP email.

This looks bad for you since many customers won't view you as a serious business. This goes for free emails (hotmail, gmail etc.) and paid ones through your ISP (xtra.co.nz, woosh.co.nz etc.).

How to fix it:

Simple really, get a domain name and setup your email system using that domain name.

It is so cheap now to have your own domain name and email addresses that there is no reason not to. In fact in many instances it can be cheaper to have a domain name and email addresses than it is to pay your ISP for one. We recommend .com domains from www.godaddy.com and .co.nz domain names from www.freeparking.co.nz as they are low cost and easy to manage for you, and for us if we are your IT provider.

I recommend email addresses be done through Google Apps using the free or Premium editions depending on your needs.

Mistake Three:

You have a domain name as shown in your email address, but you don't have a website.

This is a problem because if someone sees you have your own domain name via your email address then it is likely that they will type that domain name in to view your website, even if your business card doesn't show a website address. I actually come across this quite often and it doesn't look too professional to see a blank screen looking back at you when you know the company owns that domain name.

How to fix it:

Mistake Four:

Long domain names and email addresses.

This is a problem because long or complex domain names are harder to remember and easier to mis type. This is bad for you because you don't get emails and people find it harder to contact you.

How to fix it:

If your business has a complex or long name then you can use an abbreviation or acronym of your business name to make it easier to type. If your staff member has a complex or really long name that might be hard to type or remember how to spell then a simplified version using a nickname or initials might be the better option.

Remember, you can always create email aliases so that each person can have multiple email addresses so no matter what version of a name someone types in, it always goes to the right person.

Copyright © Paul Dowd and Zealand Limited 2009

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enable IT is a business services company specialising in business IT Support.