Choice of Domain name extensions

The Domain name extension is the part of a domain name after the dot eg. www.your-domain-name.extension

Your choice of domain name extension can affect how your website and business is perceived. Domain name extensions are divided into three main groups

Global Top Level Domains
Country-specific domain names
The "new" Generic Top Level Domains

Global Top Level Domains

.com (commercial) - "dot com" This is most suited for a business that trades internationally although it can be used by non-commercial organisations and individuals
.org (organisation) - "dot org" This is most suited for an international non-profit organisation although it can be used by non-profit organisations limited to one country or by individuals. It is not recommended for use with commercial companies
.net (network) - "dot net" Originally intended for networks of computers this is often used when the desired domain name is not available with a .com extension

There are other top level global domain extensions .int (international organisations) eg un.int, .edu (education organisations) .gov (us government), .mil (us military) but their use is severely restricted. Note use of .com, .org or .net does not signify the country you are based or wish to indicate you are based.

Country specific Top Level Domains

Each country is allocated a two letter domain name extension and allowed to allocate domain names either directly with that domain name extension or at the "second level" to a sub-division of that domain name extension

Three examples of country specific domain name extensions are:

.uk "dot uk" for UK registered domains
.fr "dot fr" for French registered domains
.de "dot de" for German registered domains

A full list of country specific domain names is detailed in the wikipedia article at the foot of this page whilst further information concerning each country's domain name extension is also available on wikipedia

We will look more closely at the UK domain name extension. Only recently have people been able to register directly under the top level country extension thus www.your-domain-name.uk. Registrations have been done at the second level under a number of sub-divisions (sub-domains)

.co.uk (company) "dot co dot uk" - Ideal for a UK based business especially one that does not do any overseas business. Still many uk businesses use the .com domain name extension.
.org.uk (organisation) "dot org dot uk" - Ideal for a UK based non-profit organisation or charity though many UK charities do use the .org domain name extension.
.me.uk (me = personal) "dot me dot uk" - Used as an alternative sometimes for personal use or general us if the desired .co.uk or.org.uk domain names are not available. This is not as popular as the first two extensions.

There are a number of restriced use domain names which include .ac.uk (education), .gov.uk (uk government), .mod.uk, .mil.uk (uk military), .net.uk (network companies), .nhs.uk (the National Health Service), .police.uk (police), .sch.uk (schools)

There are two restricted domain name extensions that may be of interest... .ltd.uk and .plc.uk for limited and public limited companies. The domain names are further restricted to the actual registered legal company names.

The "new" Generic Top Level Domains

I have used the term "new" to describe the remaining non-country specific domain name extensions that have been added over a period of time since the original domain names

These are a couple of the more popular extensions:

.info "dot info" - Intended for information sites, most suitable for a website that does not sell anything.
.biz "dot biz" - Intended for business websites, possible as an alternative when the .com or .co.uk domain names are not available

A full list of the available domain name extensions is on wikipedia. Some of these extensions have negative associations and have been used extensively for spam and scam websites. It is advisable to fully research these extensions before registering a domain name with one.

Another domain name extension that is sometimes registered is .uk.com "dot uk dot com". This is essentially a subdomain of the domain name extension .com for the UK zone.

When should you consider registering more than one Domain name extension

If you are a British company who does business internationally... use a .com domain name for your website address, also register .co.uk and have the domain redirect to your website, that way you will not lose any potential visitors unsure whether you have a .com or .co.uk website.

If you are a British based charity/not-for-profit who operates internationally... use a .org domain name for your website address, also register .org.uk and have the domain redirect to your website, that way you will not lose any potential visitors unsure whether you have a .org or .org.uk website.

In both the examples above you will also protect your company/organisation name from anyone registering the international (global) extension when you have only registered the national extension or vice-versa.

If you have a business/organisation that operates in other countries then you might find a national domain name extension such as .fr (France), .de (Germany), .it (Italy) etc might be useful if you have specific country information where it is worth having a separate website BUT and a big BUT don't have a national domain name extension website unless you are prepared to create a website in the language of that country. There would be an expectation that a .fr website would be in French, a .de website in German and a .ch website in one of the national languages of Switzerland.

Sometimes for historical reasons a charity/not-for-profit has established a website using a .co.uk or a .com domain name extension where it would be more usual to have a .org.uk or .org domain name extension. It is worth considering whether to transfer all the webpages to a new .org.uk or .org domain name extension website and use 301 redirects from the respective .co.uk or .com domain name extension urls (the pages do not need to be online once the new site is set up). This would meet people's expectations and not lose visitors from search engine results pages using the commerial domain name extensions. Over a period of time Google would replace the .co.uk or .com entries with .org.uk or .org entries.