So - you have this great internet business concept to market swimming pools. You will have a hum-dinger of a website. On it you will inform the viewers about everything there is to know about swimming pools. When they send in an information request or call, you will get all of the required additional information and tell them you will have a consultant call them shortly.  Then you will put the lead out to bid among the top 10 pool builders in your city. I hope you live in a very large southern city.  

Great idea! From an SEO standpoint you want a domain that is searched frequently. So you do some keyword research and decide you want “pool builders” and the geographic modifier “Atlanta” – your home town.  You go to GoDaddy and “poolbuidersatlanta.com” has already been registered. So has the .net.  You can get poolbuildersatlanta.org, but you don’t feel comfortable with the .org because people will think you’re a nonprofit organization. You opt for AndersonSwimmingPools.com which is unregistered and available so off you go.

First of all, if the purpose of your site is purely for branding, when someone comes looking for Anderson Pools and you want a website that looks great etc. you probably made an OK decision, or at least not a terrible one. You have to understand what your website is supposed to do for you. If you are trying to get leads to sell to other contractors then this is not a branding site. It is a lead site, and as such the assumption is no one knows you, and your sole focus in life is to capture people searching the internet for pool builders in Atlanta. Your research told you that “pool builders Atlanta” is the most searched broad term and exact term. That is the domain you want – poolbuildersatlanta.something.

Now when it comes to SEO - .com, .net, and .org are all the same. And again, you’re just trying to come up high in a search result. It doesn’t matter what it looks like. If you can get poolbuildersatlanta.org it’s a good domain for your SEO plan. However, those who looked once and then tried to find you later will probably very often type the .com address in error. I think that's a minor problem though.

What about the .com that was already registered – gone off the market? Not so fast. Type in the URL and see that it comes up with a list of links. It is parked. Someone registered it, but isn’t using it. In fact they bought it as an investment and will be happy to sell it. Your thinking, “I’m not paying more than $50.” After all, they registered it for $12.  You contact them and they want $1200. SO- you immediately think “decision made” you’re going to go with the .org. Hold on junior! You’re not through evaluating the .com domain.  You think you’re done because of the price, but maybe it’s worth that and much more.  Suppose you look up the registration to find out that this was registered 13 years ago.  It's a used domain and an old one at that. The company went belly up three years ago. Guess what else - they have nearly 400 back-links still intact. Not spammy link-farm type links, but high quality pool industry links.

A residential swimming pool costs from $30k to $80k plus.  A lead can be worth from $400 to $1200 each. Will the .com domain that matches the most searched keyword, is 13 years old and has 400 back-links justify the $1200 domain?  Obviously, the domain is under priced if anything you would be crazy not to snatch it up as quickly as possible. Some of the best domains are those that are being resold, because they may have age and established links.

One last “hold everything!”  Snatch it up after you dicker a bit.  I have always been successful buy domains offering much less that the asking price, and playing the “will you take”and “I can’t go any higher” game, back and forth to a money saving conclusion. I have rarely paid more than 75% of the asking price and occasionally paid less than half the asking price.

The point is, that just because a domain has been registered doesn’t mean it isn’t available. If it is for sale it may have tremendous equity and half the time the seller isn’t aware of the real value.  Remember, most of the domains that are registered are for sale.  Their all the same accept some are different.

KJD