How to Pick a Website Domain Name For Authors?

What domain name should you use for your author website? As you approach this question keep these things in mind.

• Make it memorable
• Make it simple
• Make it unique
• Make it fit your brand
• Make sure it's not trademarked

Your domain name should be easy to remember. You want readers to find you quickly. If they can't remember it, they'll have a hard time getting to your site.

Make it simple. Don't over complicate this. A simple domain name goes hand in hand with making it memorable. Sure, sometimes finding an available domain is tricky since all domains must be different, but if your name gets too long or complicated, then you'll probably lose website traffic.

Make it fit your brand. For example, if you publish in romance, then don't choose a domain name that goes against that vibe. If you publish in multiple genre's then choose a name that can be used for all of them.

The trick here is to determine how you want to brand yourself and your work, then stick with it. Often, authors brand themselves with their pen name or their actual name. That's fine. If you want to be more creative, that's fine too. Just make sure your readers will make the connection between your domain name and your brand. That makes it easier to remember.

Action Items

Get out an Excel spreadsheet or a notepad. Brainstorm as many domain names as you can think of in five or ten minutes. Write down everything. This gets the juices flowing. When your done, take a break for a while and come back to your list later.

Now that you're back, read through the names and cross out any that you don't like, that would be hard to remember, or that don't fit your brand.

Great Job. Now, go to a website host that offers domain name lookup. Most do. Here's a link to namecheap.com where you can search to your heart's content. Just type in a domain name and see if it's available.

Once you've found a domain name that you like, you'll want to make sure you don't infringe on any trademarks. Every country will have their own way of doing this, but if you're a US author, go to the United States Patent and Trademark Office's website and search their trademark database.

Why? Because you don't want to be forced to change your website domain name due to trademark infringement. Changing your domain will confuse your followers.

P.S. I'm not a lawyer. If you want official advice on laws, please go see a lawyer.

Finally, consider waiting a couple of days before purchasing the domain. Make sure you're really happy with the decision because like I said before, changing your domain is confusing to readers.

You can purchase your domain from any host. If this is your first website, many will offer a free domain name for one year with the purchase of a website hosting package.

If you have any questions, comments, or you found this information helpful, then please let me know below.