Hosting Essentials

Choosing URLs

One website may have several URLs which point to it. Try to imagine what your clients would type if they had to guess your site name. If you have a main product or service, think of names which incorporate the product name. Keep the name reasonably short. Ideally the URL contains the most important keywords which your site will be optimised for.

NZ URLs rank better in New Zealand searches

A site with the country extension - for example a '.co.nz' site in New Zealand, will rank more highly in searches within New Zealand.

Getting a URL for a particular country can be a challenge.

Some countries require that you have a physical address in that country, in order to hold a URL with the country extension. In Australia you need an Australian Business Number to get a '.com.au' extension.

The URL you want may already be in use by someone else. To check if the URL is available do either:

• go to geektools.com and type in the URL and the code shown. If the result is either ‘no record’, or available, your URL should be available. OR,
• go to dnsstuff.com and type the URL into the DNS Lookup field with the ‘A’ record selected. If no A record exists, the URL should be available.

Securing the URLs is something you may want to leave until keyword research is complete. However, if you are certain you want a URL and it is available, you should register it as soon as possible.

Banking and Legal Advice

If you are planning to take money online you may need to arrange this with your bank, or you can work with services which provide the merchant facility for you.

Legal advice on name, trademark and disclaimers should also be sorted out early in development to be sure it doesn't cause last minute holdups.