How to Choose a Domain Name for Your Vacation Rentals Website for Maximum Exposure
Are you a proud owner of vacation rentals and want to advertise them online? Then build a website! Why? Here are a couple of reasons:
1. A personal rental website is the simplest and cheapest way to advertise your website. That is, if you’re internet-savvy. All that a website requires is a cheap hosting and a domain for starters.
2. It gives you a better chance to be viewed by your target audience instead of competing against dozens of vacation rental owners on the more popular vacation rental listing websites.
3. You can put any number of photos, videos and you can also post lengthy property descriptions.
If you’re convinced on putting up a website for your vacation rentals advertisement, then the first take that you should take is to choose your domain name.
Your primary goal, of course, is to position your website to a nice spot in Google’s search results. And with this in mind, we have to choose the right domain name. Why?
Because a domain name is an important factor that affects a website’s position in the search engines. If you want proof, go ahead and key in the search term “vacation rentals” and you’ll see that vacationrentals[dot]com is way up on there. If your domain name gives you a slight advantage over your competitors, then take advantage of it.
To optimize a domain name, it should be keyword-rich; meaning that the domain name should include a phrase that people search for. To look for keyword phrases that you can use for your domain name, use the Google Keyword Tool. This easy to use tool will give you an insight on what keywords holidaymakers use to find vacation rentals online.
The Google Keyword Tool
To find your keyword using this tool, set the language and country to match your target market and set the “Match Type” to “Exact”. Now enter the key phrase ”(your property’s location) + vacation rental” and hit the “Get keyword ideas” button. Once the list populates, you’ll see the phrases that people search for. Pick the ones that are searched for most often and also relates to your property.
After you’ve collected enough keyword phrases, go to Google and see how many search results come up for that keyword. If there are a hundred million or more pages competing for that keyword, then you have that many pages to beat. Try looking for a keyword phrase that have lower than a hundred million search results. Compile a list of your best keyword phrases, then go to GoDaddy, ‘coz it’s time to go shopping.
Checking for Availability
It’s more likely that you’re chosen keyword has already been taken by someone else. But don’t worry. All you have to do is to add a little variation to it. It’s also good to include a word that best describes your vacation rental to the keyword phrase.
Extensions
There are lots of extensions available, but the most popular one is the .com. If you live in another country, you may also want to consider getting an extension that is commonly used locally. These are the country-level extensions like .co.uk (UK) .au (Australia) .eu (Europe) etc. Why? Because Google gives a slight prevalence to local websites where the search query originated from.
Now, all that’s left is to register your vacation rentals’ domain name and find a webhost for it! Happy tweaking!
Jules is your online guide to amazing destinations in the US, giving advice on where to go and what to see. Visit http://thinkrentals.com to add or view properties on offer.
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