There are millions of websites on the Net, 56 million. Every website has a name and it is unique. No two websites are allowed to have the same name.

There are several companies that keep records of the names of websites or domain names so that you can check that your great idea for a website name is unique.
About the best one is www.BetterWhois.com. Any name you think up needs to checked there before you go ahead and try to buy it.

In fact you cannot really buy a domain name-when you try and do so you will be asked to choose how many years you want it for! In other words all we can really do is rent the right to call our website by a particular unique name. After that period anybody else can jump in and use that name.

The first time you do this you probably want to just register your domain name for a year because it costs less.

However...There is reason to believe that search engines look at how long a domain name has been bought for 1 year, 2, years, 5 years etc. as part of the way they estimate the importance of a website.
It is only natural for a search engine to reckon that a domain name booked for 5 or 10 years is much more serious and possibly worthwhile than a domain booked for 1 year. So do not over estimate this but book your domain for more than a year if you can. Most companies will automatically renew your domain name for you at the end of the booking period. so that you do not lose it. This is something you MUST check!

If you want a little help choosing a good domain name try www.enom.com and www.nameboy.com. These sites have useful suggestions tools in choosing and inventing domain names. You may find most of the names you think of are taken. This is what everybody finds and you just have to plug away until you get a good one.

So should you book or buy your domain name now? Probably not unless you have done your keyword research
Tips on Choosing A Domain Name

1. Only book a dot com. Absolutely avoid .net, .info .org etc
2. Make the name obvious to your niche. For example golfing-girls.com, or home-decor-for-men.com, Confederate-Coins.com is the kind of thing you can do.
The hyphens are just there to make it easier for people to read, your domain name may not need them. It is best to book both versions of your domain name-with and without hyphens. For Example www.Online-Income.com and www.OnlineIncome.com
3 Book you domain for more than a year
4. One of the easiest places to buy and one of the cheapest is godaddy.com. Follow the suggestion on the godaddy website to register your domain
5. Check from time to time that the credit card number you use to allow automatic renew to function is OK as regards expiration date!

A website that is founded on sound market research is going to be making you money for years. A decent domain name can help. But it is your whole marketing and sales process which produces results.

A good domain name is worth a few hours or even a few days thought but after that just make a decision to go for a less than perfect domain name. A rose by any other name DOES smell as sweet.