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Of course the work doesn’t stop after deciding on a niche. Having the perfect product to promote is just one piece of the puzzle of building a successful niche site.
The next part is working out your domain name.
This may sound simple and in some ways it is. However, there is a bigger question you need to answer before purchasing this domain name. What size website do you want? How much time do you have? How much money? How much money do you want to make? Before deciding on your domain name, you will want to answer these questions.
Step 2: Buy a domain name
If you haven’t read step 1: choose a niche, read this first.
The first thing we did after choosing our niches was buy the domain names.
A good domain name for a niche will be brandable and include your buying keywords. Of course, if you plan to add multiple products to your niche site at some point, you need to take this into account.
It can be a tough decision to decide how big your niche site should be. Should you build a micro niche site that’s just based on one product? Should you go after a much bigger niche and write about many products?
Micro niche site versus a bigger niche site
A lot of this depends on how much time and money you want to devote. A micro niche site is quicker and easier. Obviously, there will be less content to write but it’s also far easier to rank a micro niche site especially if you have your product in the domain name of the micro niche site. Both of my existing Amazon niche sites are only about one type of product each and you can see that they still make great money.
I have read other SEO bloggers saying that the keywords being in the domain name doesn’t matter anymore. I say bullshit. Do a google for any of the product buying keywords that you would have considered in the previous step and I bet there are niche sites ranking with the product name in the domain. I have definitely found it easier to rank my niche sites for the product that is in the URL name versus other products.
However, a bigger niche site is going to have far more potential over the long run. It is hard for me to increase my earnings on my existing niche sites. I have tried adding other products but those articles have never done as well in search rankings. A bigger niche site is going to take far more time and money and need more links to rank. I would see this as more of a long term project, like a blog.
If you are sticking with a micro niche (and I do think this is a great place to start), I would definitely try to put your product in the domain name, if not your main buying keywords if that is possible (it’s usually taken). If you were going after juicers, for example, some ideas could be bestjuicer, juicerreviews, ourbestjuicers, juicerexpert, thatjuicerguy, mrjuicer, juicersite, etc etc. I recommend sticking with a .com.
If you are planning to build a bigger site, I’d be looking at a brandable domain name. So if you were looking at juicers but wanting to add other kitchen gear, maybe something like mykitchen, kitchenexperts, ourlovelyhome, etc etc.
I am sure you can come up with something better. Creativity is definitely not my strong point!
Once we had the domains sorted, it was time to register them. I stuck with my favourite register, NameSilo. I love them because they are cheap and simple. It only takes minutes to buy and they don’t rip you off at renewal – They are one of the few (only?) registers I have come across that charge the same on renewal as when you sign up the first time and they don’t charge extra for privacy.
If you need to register a domain, use this link and the coupon code:DNWSAVE1 for $1 off. This makes a .com domain, including privacy, only $8! I do recommend that you have privacy set to yes for your domains.
You can watch this video about exactly how to register your domain at NameSilo step by step
Our niche sites
I decided for our new niche sites that they would be mainly focused on one product but we would build them with the scope to add a few related products. I took this into account with the domain names.
Site 1: The domain name includes the product name but has a brandable name which will help it cover other, closely related products which we have found good buying keywords for.
Site 2: We have the main buying keyword in the domain name and added “andthings” in the hope that it will look better when we cover other products too!
Time and money spent on buying a domain name
Time spent: 1 hour
Money: $18 for 2 domains on NameSilo
We would have spent less than an hour on this step and $9 per domain.
You can now read set 3: setting up a niche site.
Find all niche site case study 2 updates here.
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I would love to hear your thoughts below about micro versus large niche sites and picking a domain name!Find more posts on my case studies and niche sites here.
Disclaimer: This article contains affiliate links to NameSilo. I love this domain registrar! If you puchase a domain with my link, I will receive a small credit towards my own domain renewals. Thank you for supporting this site and ensuring I continue to add valuable content about how to build a niche site.
