Invest in a good domain

Buying a domain name is an investment that will rarely lose you money. Of course there are exceptions to this, but in general a good domain name will hold its value quite well and sometimes even grow in value, particularly if you have built a site which has attracted a reasonable amount of traffic.

There are a number of factors that will determine whether a domain name is of any value or whether it will work well for you. So, it is important to determine which of these factors are of importance to you and your site project.

You may decide that a good keyword domain will limit your marketing spend as it will attract organic traffic. This approach doesn’t suit everyone.

How many people would use google if it was called mostrelevantsearchengine.com? OK, so maybe not such a good example. But you get the idea. Sometimes building a brand is your goal and so a memorable brand name will carry much more value. Sites such as Facebook.com, Bebo.com, Twitter.com are all good examples of branded sites whose names do not necessarily describe their purpose, but who have attracted such high volumes of traffic that the domains themselves probably hold a very high price tag.

By building volume of traffic to your domain you also increase the value of similar domains, misspellings and country specific domains. This is mostly because they will pick up some traffic from users seeking out your service. So, it is worthwhile buying up all possible variations to avoid paying a premium further down the line. This is particularly relevant if you are building up a brand.

A dating site can run pretty well on a keyword domain if you can manage to get a reasonable organic search placement. This is particularly relevant to niche dating sites. But, really, there is no replacement for a good memorable brand.

Check out the domain auctions at http://www.buydomains.com and www.sedo.com.

Your Branding.... Really!!

If building a dating site brand is your long term goal then you need to get it right from the beginning. This is about thinking ahead and making sure that you don't come across problems years down the line when you have grown your dating site and maybe want to consider an exit strategy.

Planning is crucial and that involves making sure you are with the correct white label provider. Clearly my opinion will be biased, so I'll just lay out some facts and you will agree or disagree with them. But either way, they are based on experience and knowledge in this industry.

By building a branded site you will expect it to be part of your business and you will want ownership of the customers that have been attracted to your brand in the first place. After all, their loyalty is to you, because they followed the promises you made in your marketing message. So, ownership of your customers is something you will want to ensure.

Your site itself will need real customisation options so that you can truly give it the look and feel of your existing brand identity or match the brand identity you envisaged from the outset. You'll want the level of customisation that can change the overall colour palette as well as the header and footer of the site.

When you launch your branded dating site you will most definitely want to feel that the company hosting and managing your site is one that is here to stay and that they themselves have solid financial grounding and that their business is successful in its own right and not dependent upon maybe a few white label partners for a large percentage of their revenues. What if these larger partners decided to use another provider? What strain would be place on the company’s resources. And how would that affect you?

This is the level of diligence you should put into finding a white label partner to work with you in building your dating brand.

 Until the next time… good luck.