Should I register or buy a domain name

So you have decided to get a domain name for your blog but discovered that the domain you wanted is already registered and you are now thorn between registering another available name or buying the domain you really want. There is no right answer to this question. There is no question that the right domain will give you a lot of benefits but using another domain will not put forward any obstacles that you cant overcome and you can reach the same goal with any domain even if it might take some more work. Whether you should buy the domain or register another depends in no small part on the answer to a couple of questions:

• Do you have a budget for the blog that allow for the purchase of the domain. If you have the budget to buy it than it might be worth getting it if you still have enough left in your budget to promote your site. If you by buying the domain will use such a large part of your budget that there are no or little money left for advertising it might be better to refrain from buying it. The benefit you get from the perfect domain will to a large part be lost anyway if you can not promote the domain. If the budget has room for both the domain and promotions than I recommend going for it and buying the domain.
• Is the domain worth the price asked. It is not worth buying a domain if the price asked is higher than what can be justified based on the value of the keywords that can be targeted and the amount of traffic that can be received. Do not overpay for domains.
• Are you an experienced web marketeer or is this your first venture. If you have little and no experience you might not be able to take full advantage of the benefit of a perfect domain and the domain will therefore have less value. If this is your first experience it is likely better for you to register another still available domain unless you are able to get the domain at a good price.

If you decide that you want to buy the domain i recommend conducting the transaction through a well respected escrow provider such as moniker.com that specialize in domain transactions. If the price is low it might be cheaper and better to just take the risk and trust the seller.

If you decided that you do not want to buy the domain you will need to choose another domain name. First thing you should do is to think if you can think of any related but slightly more narrow domain. As an example if you wanted fishing.com you might check if fishinglure.com, flyfishing.com or sportfishing.com is available (all these examples are registered). If you can not find a suitable domain like this you might want to consider adding a prefix or suffix to the domain. A short suffix is usually the best option but a prefix might also make for a good domain. An example of a domain like this could be fishingcenter.com or fishingtoday.com. .com is usually the best option but you can check and see if the name you want is available in another TLD. If it is not available in net, com or org it is better to choose another name. Any other domain type will reduce the second hand value of the blog and domain a lot. You will get the best value from .com domains.