Step One: Choose The Domain Name (Web Address)

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Choosing a domain is a very important decision.  The name you choose will be your identity on the internet.  It should reflect something about theme of your website such as WonderWidgets.com or JaneDoesDiary.net.

Domain names can be up to 67 characters in length.  There is some debate on whether to use a long name or short name.  Whether to hyphenate, to abbreviate, or to use "text type" (4U2C.org).

One solution is to see if people can remember the name.  If you can tell someone the name and they can write it down, then you have a good name that will cause less confusion and more visits to the site.

It can be difficult to get a domain name using .com.  You may have to be creative or use one of the other domains (.net,.org,.info etc.).

Domains are registered through a registrar approved by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN).  There is a complete list of registrars on their website.  GoDaddy.com and Register.com are two popular registrars.

You can can go to a registrar site and try differnet names for free to see what is available.

Once you have decided on a domain name, the next step will be Hosting.