The best domain names can make a huge difference in the success of your businesses, websites and online properties. Utilizing them in the right way, and ultimately, picking out the best ones right from the start, can help lead you to greater levels of success more quickly than you could have imagined. Use this brief guide to see for yourself how to find the best ones, how to utilize free domains and more.

One of the primary concerns that you should be paying attention to with domain names is how short and memorable it is. The general rule of thumb is that the shorter the domain, the better it is, and the better results it will be able to produce. People need to be able to remember your address so if they see it somewhere, hear an advertisement, or anything else, they can just type it in directly and know where to find you.

It can be very hard to find great, one word domain names however. That's why many people utilize two or three word domain names, or utilize dashes in between words to keep it short but find a high quality name that hasn't been used already. This is a difficult game to play in some cases, and you want to keep the length as short as possible, and utilize no more than one or two dashes if you need to.

Search engine optimization also plays a major role with domain names. The best domains will be the ones that have your most important keywords right in there. Then, your website will have automatic value in the search engines, and will be closely tied to the words, phrases and markets you are targeting. It's an inherent advantage to that keyword research and it will give you an edge in the fight for search engine traffic.

One of the biggest debates when it comes to domains is the .com versus other extensions. Some people only use .com, while others are very open to using .net, .info, .biz, .org and other extensions as well. What you end up choosing should depend on what is available for which kinds of extensions, and what kind of business you're dealing with and trying to promote online.

Finally, sometimes the best website names are the free domains that you can pick up. There are a variety of ways to do this, and sometimes certain hosting companies provide you with a free name for signing up for their hosting packages. Other times if you buy a certain number of domains, you can get a certain number of free domains in addition. Be on the lookout for these kinds of deals because you can save yourself some money and end up with something that works out great for your business.

From free domains to carefully chosen, highly SEO valued names and more, the best domains are the ones that will provide real value to your business. Short domains that are easy to remember and type, domains with keywords that help you get found in the search engines, free domains which save you money, and more, are all important qualities.