How to choose a good domain name

A domain name is your address on the internet.

Pick the wrong one, and it’s like opening a shop in an alley no one walks through.

Pick the right one, and people remember you after seeing it once.

Why have your own domain?

Four reasons.

1. Own your address

Write on Medium, your URL is medium.com/@alexhsu. Send newsletters on Substack, your URL is alexhsu.substack.com.

These are all castles built in someone else’s kingdom. When the platform changes its rules, you have to follow. When the platform dies, your castle dies with it.

alexhsu.com is your own address. Just like you can port your phone number to a different carrier, you can move your website from WordPress to somewhere else tomorrow. The URL stays the same, so your readers don’t have to find you again.

2. It looks more professional

alexhsu.com vs alexhsu.blogspot.com

Which one looks like someone who’s serious about what they do?

3. Own your email address

hi@alexhsu.com vs alexhsu1990@gmail.com

The first one is a brand. The second one is a random person.

Plus, if you ever want to switch email providers, your address stays the same.

4. Build your brand

A domain name is your name on the internet.

Every article you write, every newsletter you send, adds value to that name.

Ten years from now, that domain becomes your portfolio, your resume, your brand.

Understanding domain structure

google.com can be split into two parts:

• google is the first name
• .com is the last name

The last name defines your identity. .com is commercial, .org is organization, .edu is education.

Now there are tons of new last names: .dev, .app, .blog, .io, .xyz…

But .com is still the safest bet.

Why? Because every major brand uses .com. Your mom won’t remember what .io means, but she definitely knows plenty of .com websites.

There’s another reason. Email services like Gmail automatically filter some emails as spam. Compared to newer domain extensions, .com has been around forever, so email deliverability is higher. .xyz is often used for crypto or scam sites, so its deliverability is reportedly terrible.

Meta originally used thefacebook.com. Later they paid $200,000 for facebook.com. Then they paid $8.5 million for fb.com.

When I worked at Meta, my internal email was alexhsu@fb.com.

$8.5 million. That’s the value of a short, powerful domain name.

Why are some domain names so expensive?

Scarcity.

Just like a license plate GOD-8888 is worth a fortune, domain value comes down to scarcity.

• One-letter .com: Only 26 exist in the world. x.com was acquired by Elon Musk years ago and now replaces Twitter. Priceless.
• Two-letter .com: Only 676 exist. Easily worth millions. fb.com is one of them.
• Three-letter .com: Only 17,576 exist. Worth tens of thousands to millions.
• Four-letter .com: 450,000 exist. Random ones go for around $200. But if it’s a CVCV (consonant-vowel-consonant-vowel) combination like nike.com, hulu.com, or fomo.com, it’s easy to pronounce and remember, so it can reach tens of thousands.
• Single-word .com: Like speak.com or book.com. The more common the word, the higher the price.
• Two-word .com: Like facebook.com or porkbun.com. If it hasn’t been turned into a brand yet, you might get it at a reasonable price.

These domains are expensive not because the letters have some magic power.

What’s expensive is the possibility.

Buyers aren’t paying for the string of characters. They’re paying for what that string could become as a brand.

Five principles for choosing a domain

You probably can’t spend $8.5 million on a domain like Meta did. But you can learn five principles from their approach:

1. Short. The shorter, the easier to remember.
2. Pronounceable. You can say it out loud without spelling it letter by letter.
3. Speakable. Imagine introducing your website on a podcast or telling someone over the phone. x7k9m.com is easy to copy-paste, but no one will remember it.
4. No hyphens or numbers. alex-hsu-123.com is uncommon, which makes it hard to remember.
5. Brandable. Someone hears it once and can still recall it when they get home.

If possible, buy your own name first. I even bought domain names for my kids.

Can’t find a short .com? You can settle for alternatives. Just be careful: some extensions affect email deliverability, which matters if you send newsletters.

My name is Alex Hsu, so my options were:

• alexhsu.com ✓ (I paid good money for this one)
• ahsu.com (seller wanted $100,000, I passed)
• alex.blog (taken)
• alexhsu.dev (not as good as .com)

If nothing works, come up with a two-word brand name:

• alexcreates.com
• alexwrites.com

As long as it’s memorable, pronounceable, and brandable, you’re good.

Where to buy?

Don’t use GoDaddy or Namecheap. Too expensive. Their money goes to ads.

I recommend two affordable options:

• Porkbun: Simple interface, transparent pricing
• Cloudflare Domains: At-cost pricing, zero markup

One thing to note: you can’t buy a domain permanently. You rent it. A .com costs about $14 per year if no one else owns it. As long as you keep paying, it’s yours.

If the domain you want is already taken, sellers often list it on these sites or provide contact info. If not, you’ll have to pick something else.

I also like browsing GoDaddy Auctions, the world’s largest domain auction site. You can see what people are willing to pay for different domains. It’s fascinating.

Buying secondhand domains has its own nuances. You need to check what the domain was used for before. In extreme cases, if it was previously an adult site, you probably don’t want to inherit it along with its previous visitors.

Two final things

A domain is just an address. What matters is the content.

Domains can be migrated anytime. Content takes years to build. Don’t put the cart before the horse.

And one more thing.

If you buy a domain, use it.

Many people buy domains and let them sit there as collectibles, or hope to flip them for a profit.

That’s like buying a house and never living in it. Buying a car and never driving it.

The value of a domain isn’t in owning it. It’s not in investing in it. It’s in using it.

Don’t be a domain hoarder.

Buy it. Build on it. Write on it. Ship it.

That’s what domain names are for.