Keyword domain names are additional domains that a business owner purchases and registers for the sole purpose of driving traffic to their primary website.
Five-Step Guide
Step 1 – Audit Your Products and Services
To get started, just make a list of everything you sell. Be as specific as you can. If your customer base is strictly in a certain geographical area, you can put that area before or after your product/service name to generate keyword phrases. Make sure that if you are well known for a particular service/product, this features high up on your list.
Step 2 – Think Like a Potential Customer
Ask yourself what a potential customer is likely to type into their browser/search engine if looking for the services/products that you offer. Assume they’ve never heard of your business and write down any keywords/phrases that you think they might type in.
Step 3 – Prioritise
If you have a very long list, there are tools that can help you put them in order of relevance/importance. Google Trends, for example, allows you to type in different keywords and phrases and see how popular they are.
Image Credit
Step 4 – Check Domain Availability and Register as Appropriate
For each of the keywords/phrases you have identified, you’ll want to carry out a search to see if the relevant .com domain is available. If it is, you will want to register it. There is no real limit on how many you can register – it all depends on what you can afford and how many you deem relevant.
There are numerous websites where you can buy and register domains, such as https://www.names.co.uk/domain-names – all of which give you control over where your domain points to. Most providers give you the option to buy domain name only – you don’t have to commit to hosting with them too.
Step 5 – Forward the Domain
Once you have ownership of the keyword domain name, you can then forward it to your primary website.
Because you now own the keyword domains as well as the primary domain, an individual who types in one of the identified keywords is very likely to end up on your site. That is one motivated potential buyer.
Overall, this tactic is a relatively cheap and simple way of capturing potential customers.