Your web site is located by an IP (Internet
Protocol) address such as 67.15.4.94 and is accessible on the Internet
by typing http://67.15.4.94. Instead of typing a series of numbers
which are difficult to remember, you can register an easier to remember
domain name which becomes associated with your IP address. Visitors
typing an easy to remember domain name will be pointed to your IP
address. Similar to a 1-800 vanity phone number, some domain names
pertain to the subject of the web site, while others may simply be the
name or an abbreviation of your firm.
Lawyer-Advertising-Blog.com is the primary domain name for my blog,
which is instantly obvious that it is a blog concerning lawyer
advertising. When you type that domain name into the address bar of
your browser, the domain name servers on the Internet know that you're
looking for http://67.15.4.94 and take you there. You can have multiple
domain names pointing to the same web site. For instance, I also
registered LawyerAdvertisingBlog.com (without hyphens) which is used
for branding because people never type hyphens. Because some people may
remember the name incorrectly, I also registered many other domain
names such as AttorneyAdvertisingBlog.com, LawFirmAdvertisingBlog.com
and others, all of which will bring the visitor to
Lawyer-Advertising-Blog.com.
Tips to help you pick a domain name:
1) Choosing: Choosing a domain name is a lot like choosing a name for
your company or law firm. Ideally the name should be consistent with
your branding. Determine whether you are branding the name of your
company, product or service. Your domain name should be good for
branding - short, easy to remember, and has a “ring” to it or creates
an image in the mind of the consumer.
2) Trademark: Before registering your domain name, be sure to check the
U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to make sure that the name has not
been trademarked. You can check at www.uspto.gov, click on Search under
Trademarks. Assuming that your choice has not been trademarked and you
have now registered a non-generic domain name, you may want to protect
your name by filing a Trademark or Service mark application.
3) Ownership: When you register a domain name, make sure that you are
the registrant of your domain name. Some web site design firms will
register your domain name with their name as the registrant. This will
give them ownership of your name keeping you hostage. You can easily
register your domain name yourself for $8.95 per year at
8.95Domains.com or GoDaddy.com.
4) Hyphens: There have been misunderstandings about whether to use
hyphens in a domain name. First of all, the domain name you give out to
the public must not have hyphens. The domain name without hyphens is
the domain name that everyone will type in the address bar of their
Internet browser.
The reason that some people say that you should have a domain name with
hyphens is to force the search engines to see keywords in your domain
name so that your web site does better in search engine results. The
bigger search engines can now see individual words without hyphens,
however, smaller search engines may not and even the bigger ones may
see a word differently than you want.
Thus, the importance of using a hyphenated domain name has diminished.
If you wish to use a hyphenated domain name as I did with
Lawyer-Advertising-Blog.com, you should also register the unhyphenated
domain name which you will forward to the hyphenated domain name. Use
the unhyphenated domain name in print and advertising.
5) Extensions: Domain names are available with various extensions, such
as .com, .net, .org and many other extensions. If it's really important
to you, you can register domain names in several extensions, however,
for most firms only the .com extension is important. If you feel that
you need to use .org, you should also register your name in the .com
extension.
The .com extension is similar to 1-800 for telephone numbers. Most
people automatically dial 1-800 even when they see 1-888. Likewise,
most people will type
.com even when they see .net or .org. Additionally, many people
including myself simply type in the domain name without http://www. or
.com and press "Control, Enter". Pressing "Control, Enter" will type
http://www. and .com for you, automatically taking you to a web site
with .com.
6) Top Level Domain vs. Sub-Level Domains: A sub level domain is a
second level domain under a first level domain name and can look like
yourfirm.freehosting.com. You must have your own domain name. Do not
under any circumstances use a free hosting service, since free hosting
services will only give you a sub level domain. No one will ever
remember it and it's sort of like handwriting your own letterhead.
7) Ethics for Law Firm Domain Names: A website name should be used as
an address, not a trade name which is prohibited. Advertise your web
site name as an address, a means for people to find your web site, not
a trade name. Like a vanity telephone number, some web site domain
names can violate legal ethics. Make sure that your web site name
avoids use of certain words which could create a potentially incorrect
expectation in the mind of the consumer or violate one of the other
ethics rules.
Your domain name should not imply that you are better than another
lawyer or that you can accomplish something that may not actually
occur. Use of words such as "BEST", "TOP", "FOREMOST, "LEADING", "WIN"
and similar words in a web site domain name could create a misleading
expectation in the mind of the consumer and will violate ethics rules
in most states.
For instance, LeadingLawyer.com or BestLawyer.com will likely violate
lawyer ethics rules by implying that you are a leading lawyer or the
best lawyer. The question is by what standards are you leading or the
best and in what? WinningLawyer.com or WinningCase.com may be better
for a casino, because it will imply that the person who becomes a
client of the firm will win money when, that may not happen and even if
it does, it's an award for just compensation, not gambling.
Laura Hodes in her article for the ABA Journal entitled Vanity Phone
Numbers Make Your Firm Less Forgettable, at
http://www.hurt911.org/hurt-911-articles/ABAJournal.htm, quoted Will
Hornsby, an expert on lawyer advertising and staff counsel in the ABA
Division for Legal Services, who said that while there is nothing
unethical about vanity numbers, "1-800-I-WIN-CASES would be unethical
because it is making an unsubstantiated claim, creating unjustified
expectations that can be true but still be misleading." The same can be
said about domain names.
8) Advertising Your Domain Name: Be sure to include your domain name on
your business cards, letterhead, and all advertising. When advertising
in off-line media, always advertise your domain name with www. and
without http://, such as www.LawyerAdvertisingBlog.com. Note that when
publishing your domain name on the Internet, you may sometimes want to
use http:// to ensure that you create a link back to your web site.
When advertising in off-line media, always advertise a domain name
without hyphens.
About the author:
Philip L. Franckel, Esq., publishes articles on Lawyer Advertising at
http://www.Lawyer-Advertising-Blog.com
and created
http://www.HURT911.org
an accident and injury research web site for people hurt in an accident
and personal injury lawyers.
©2005 - All Rights Reserved